Monthly Archives: February 2022

OPINION:

Led by Americas example, Western countries have shined as a global refuge for free expression and religious liberty, standing in contrast to the many authoritarian governments that act as paternalistic gatekeepers of their citizens speech.

Sadly, religious liberty is under siege in the West. State-imposed, social media endorsed, tyrannical censorship continues to seep into nations such as Finland and Canada as they attempt to purge dissident thought through prison sentences. If we are not careful, this contagion could soon affect American citizens First Amendment rights, including religious freedom.

Pivi Rsnen, a 62-year-old grandmother and former minister of Finlands Parliament for 26 years, was recently labeled a threat to society before being charged by Finlands Prosecutor General with three counts of ethnic agitation, a hate speech offense found in Finlands criminal code.

Why? Rsnen publicly professed her views on marriage and sexuality in a tweet quoting biblical scripture. Authorities interrogated Rsnen regarding her Christian beliefs and the tweets meaning before expanding the investigation into an unwarranted evidence-collecting mission to further uncover her beliefs on marriage and sexuality. She posted the tweet in 2019, but authorities dug back decades into her personal beliefs to build their case.

As a result, this 62-year-old grandmother is now facing jail time for a tweet.

Rsnen has not been the only Finnish citizen swept up in the countrys persecution of religious beliefs. Juhana Pohjola, Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Mission Diocese of Finland, was also indicted alongside Rsnen for a pamphlet he published in 2004. This pamphlet expressed his religious convictions and personal views on marriage and was published 4 years before the hate speech laws enactment.

Rsnen and Pohjola are each facing two years in jail and appeared in court for another hearing on February 14.

In both cases, the laws allegedly violated did not even exist when some of the evidence was created. Finland legalized same-sex marriage in 2017, just 5 years ago, and the hate speech laws were not enacted until 2008. If the charges are upheld, they will represent a remarkable escalation and a dangerous precedent. Ex post facto law is a hallmark of tyranny, as people may be punished at the whim of those in power.

The weaponization of the courts against faith leaders and public servants alike is rapidly dismantling and eroding Western values, including freedom of speech and religious liberty. At the same time, it is chipping away at the cultural, historical, and faith-based traditions of Finland and other nations. Perhaps the Finnish government should look at its own flag, which features the blue Nordic cross, to see a reminder of the countrys faith-based heritage.

As egregious as Finlands culture of censorship may be, it is not the only Western nation to inflict dictatorial speech restrictions onto its citizens. Canadas recently unanimously passed law, C-4, prevents its citizens from spreading Biblical views on marriage and sexuality. Canadian parents, faith leaders, and citizens who hold traditional views of marriage and sexuality will now face up to 5 years of jail time for providing spiritual guidance to those seeking counseling.

As a horrific assault on civil rights, Canadas egregious policy directly targets faith and has effectively placed targets on the backs of many of its own citizens. Should practitioners trying to assist those calling for help be thrown into jail for their compassion?

Our own country now faces similar concerns, as an American high school football coach lost his job for praying post-game on the field.Americas bedrock founding of religious freedom, enumerated in the First Amendment, has set a longstanding example for the world. By enabling and allowing Big-Tech oligarchs and bureaucrats to undermine the public by canceling and even criminalizing religious speech and expression, we too will be oppressed. While Canadian and European citizens have long accepted the erosion of their religious values, religion, and culture through tyrannical speech codes, Americans cannot follow suit.

Thankfully, several United States Senators have boldly spoken out to condemn Finlands unmerited, totalitarian government interference. Five Senators are urging the newly confirmed U.S. Ambassador-at-Large to monitor the landmark case closely.

The government cannot and should not have the authority to censor scripture, criminalize deeply held convictions, or nefariously target religious beliefs. Our government leaders were never envisioned to engineer society or adversely constrain American citizens socially. Instead, they were intended to serve in a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. How can government be for the people when it actively targets, silences, and criminalizes its own citizens for their religious beliefs?

Americans, will you fight back to protect your voice, faith, and country? The trends across Western democracies are telling, and it may be too late if action is not taken soon.

Originally posted here:
Free Speech and the Bible on global trial - Washington Times

It all seems very reasonable how Polly Hopkins (Parenting should always trump politics, Feb. 24) describes being a mother, standing at a podium asking questions of a publicly elected body in the name of my childs well-being and education . But, how reasonable or smart is it to use the term domestic terrorist as a title in your Twitter name? Mostly, I would ask toward what end?

She reminds the Town Council that domestic terrorist is protected speech, and shes right. She can call herself anything she wants! Unfortunately, some individuals claiming their free-speech rights set aside the responsibility that comes with those rights. Not being appointed to a board is not an infringement on her rights. She made her decision and the council made theirs. They fulfilled their elected responsibility.

I confess to not knowing much about Twitter handles, but I do know that we are suffering in this country from terminal uniqueness being played out under the mantra of parental rights and protected speech. In my opinion, the council was right to not appoint someone to a position who takes pride in self-describing on this Twitter handle, temporary or otherwise, as a domestic terrorist. We are living in a time when elected officials, school board members and teachers are at the mercy, at best, of abusive rhetoric, and, at worst, being threatened with harm. I often wonder if parents claiming their free speech and parental rights consider that their children are listening and watching those who are supposed to be the adults in the room their parents?

So, Polly Hopkins claims that her denial of a seat on a commission is politics, pure and simple, but I would suggest thats exactly where she wanted this to go. We have to buy that her decision to use the term domestic terrorist as a title in her Twitter name is mere happenstance, thoughtless naivete on her part, or her doing exactly what she accuses Mr. Moffitt and Mr. Robbins of, that is, playing at divisive politics. It all seems so reasonable parents using a platform for free speech and standing together on social topics....

Beverly Conti

Westerly

Original post:
Letter: Free speech is a choice that has consequences - The Westerly Sun

DENVER In politics, language matters. It can be inspiring, moving entire crowds to vote or support a position. It can also be ugly or downright demeaning, with mudslinging and name-calling.

In more recent years, some of that language has included calls to silence or even imprison political opponents.

During a recent FEC United meeting in Castle Rock, some called for the imprisonment of Secretary of State Jenna Griswold. Members of the audience chanted, Lock her up, as one speaker questioned the results of the 2020 presidential election.

Give her due process and justice and I think if you are involved in election fraud, you deserve to hang, said Shawn Smith. Sometimes the old ways are the best ways. Some people say Im endorsing violence. Im not endorsing violence. Im saying once you put your hand on a hot stove, you get burned and you ought to see it coming and thats what happens to tyrants.

This is not the first time Griswold has heard language like this before. In December, she asked state lawmakers for $200,000 annually for guards and other security-related measures after receiving escalating threats over her advocacy of elections security.

Nearly two weeks later at a Colorado Conservative Patriot Alliance conference, a gubernatorial candidate used similar language to call for the imprisonment of Governor Jared Polis.

I believe if elected officials break the law, theres one place for them," said Danielle Neuschwanger. "Let me remind them what a jail cell looks like. When Governor Polis is ruining our economy and taking money out of your pockets and lining marijuana companies' pockets, I believe he belongs in a jail cell."

When does free speech go too far?

Despite the harsh language and calls for the imprisonment of political foes, speech like this isnt actually illegal, according to Alan Chen, a law professor at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law.

As extreme as those forms of expression are, they don't actually meet the requirements of showing a true intent to commit an unlawful act of violence, Chen said.

The First Amendment offers vast amounts of protection for free speech, but it does have some limitation. Speech is not considered to be protected when it is considered a "true threat." The U.S. Supreme Court has defined true threats as a serious expression of an intent to commit an unlawful act of violence against a particular individual or a group of individuals.

Obviously, many of these people aren't really in a position to imprison or arrest public officials, so that makes the threat less realistic and therefore less of a concern, Chen said.

Something else that is not considered protected speech is incitement, when someone uses language to encourage or incite another person to commit an unlawful act. It can be difficult to prove intent versus political hyperbole, though.

However, political rhetoric like this is not necessarily new in the context of the countrys political history.

We forget that heated political rhetoric has been going on since at least the late 1700s in the United States, Chen said. Throughout history, politicians have used hyperbole, exaggeration, and even something that sounds dangerous to sort of make their views known.

Just because its legal, is it right?

While the language may be legal, both Democratic and Republican state parties have come out against threatening rhetoric.

As chairman of the Colorado Republican Party, I have condemned any violence or threats of violence for the purpose of political means, said Kristi Burton Brown, chairwoman of the Colorado Republican Party.

Burton Brown says the voters she has spoken with want less rhetoric from both sides of the aisle and more focus on the issues. She also says she doesnt believe threatening language is an effective political tool to get elected, but says people from both sides have participated in the harsh language in the past.

Our stance is violence should never be a part of political discourse, said Howard Chou, vice chair of the Colorado Democratic Party. Coming out with a violent type of attack or calling other people to be hanged, we're going down a slippery slope that's really going to incite a kind of discourse ... that's very un-American. It's very disturbing, and it's going to lead to a trend of more violent action.

However, political science professors say they have seen this type of vitriol ramp up in recent months and years, not only with threatening language, but also with attempts to delegitimize other candidates.

You don't just run against someone, you lock them up. You try and essentially just take people out of society, and that's a dangerous area, said Seth Masket, a professor of political science and director of the Center on American Politics at the University of Denver. All those are things that are just sort of warning signs that lead to democratic decline. They lead to elections being increasingly contested.

Masket says sometimes political figures will use this language strategically just to rally their base. However, that rhetoric from politicians can sometimes inspire some of their supporters to try to take matters into their own hands. In 2017, a left-leaning activist shot U.S. Congressman Steve Scalise and several others during a Republican baseball team practice. In 2020, a group of far-right men plotted to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer but were caught.

Whether it's treason and hanging or violence aimed at particular public officials, it does have the potential to become reality, said Robert Preuhs, chair of the political science department at Metropolitan State University of Denver.

There is a balance between free speech and threats. Preuhs believes protected speech is an important piece of any democracy, but it comes with downsides.

It's fundamental part of what establishes a democracy, but at the same time there's always that risk, he said.

With the 2022 midterm elections getting closer, the political partisanship and harsh language is likely to increase as both sides vie to get their candidates elected.

Read the original:
As some call for political foes to be locked up, where's the line between free speech and threats? - The Denver Channel

For the past year, history professor Michael Phillips has been warning about a right-wing purge taking place at Collin College, led by administrators angling to remove progressive voices from the Texas school. Then he himself was purged.

Last month, Phillips, an award-winning professor of history, was called to a meeting about his impending removal from the institution hed taught at for the past fourteen years. As he recalls, he was offered a deal: he and college leadership would craft a narrative that he had left voluntarily, and theyd help him find a job to move on to, giving him a graceful exit. He refused. Not long after, he was told he would not be employed come May 15. Hes now the fourth professor to be fired from the public community college in Texas over free speech issues.

The firing of Phillips and his colleagues is first and foremost a story about administrative abuse at Collin College, where administrators have used the deliberate lack of tenure to single out and punish faculty who are too outspoken. But its also part of a larger story were seeing unfold across the country, of the Right working with increasing ferocity to stamp out what they see as progressivism in education, trampling over free speech rights in the process.

Phillips had been clashing with administrators for some time before he was fired. Phillips immediately butted heads with now president H. Neil Matkin when he was a finalist for the position in 2015. Concerned that Matkin had received degrees from an unaccredited college run by the Worldwide Church of God (now known as Grace Communion International) described by one former adherent as a white supremacist doomsday cult that taught that God approved of slavery and wanted white people to rule the world he recalls confronting Matkin privately, asking him about his attitudes to matters like interracial dating and evolution.

According to Phillips, Matkin got upset. For Matkins part, hed later complain that Phillips had come to the conclusion the church was racist and that therefore I was racist.

Two years later, Phillips authored several op-eds for the Dallas News calling for the removal of Confederate statues in the city, the second one getting the signature of one hundred religious leaders, activists, and scholars, including nine Collin College faculty.

They faced immediate pushback. Suzanne Jones, a professor of education at Collin, was asked by administrators to remove Collins name from her signature on the op-ed, according to a lawsuit she later filed. Phillips says he, too, was asked by his campus provost not to use the colleges name, fearing it would hurt the colleges image and make locals feel bad, since their ancestors were Confederates.

To her, the default face of a Collin College student and a resident of the county was a white face, he says now. It didnt occur to her that black people mattered, and maybe black people wouldnt think it was a bad thing.

The next clash came after the 2019 El Paso shooting, whose perpetrator had attended Collin College. Matkin instructed faculty not to talk about the incident, and both Phillips and another faculty member independently recalled Matkin then announcing to those assembled the shooters grade point average (a violation of federal law).

Soon after, Phillips was quoted in the Washington Post report on the shooter, mentioning the presence of racist fliers on the Collin campus and the DallasFort Worth region in recent years, fliers whose existence was a matter of public record. Despite viewing the gag order on the subject as unconstitutional Professors have a right to talk about matters of public concern, he says Phillips had thought he had stayed within its bounds, having refused to discuss the shooter and offering only to talk about the historical context, about which he had written a prominent book. Nevertheless, he recalls being called in by unhappy administrators as a result.

But it was the arrival of the pandemic that sent events hurtling toward their endgame. We had very cordial correspondence about one issue or another over the years, former history professor Lora Burnett recalls about her relationship with Matkin. He never had a cross word for me, and I not to him, until COVID.

Matkin had taken a distinctly blas approach to COVID-19, to the point that even hes since admitted there were things that I did say early on that werent terribly helpful. He claimed the pandemic had been blown utterly out of proportion, that reports about it were too sensational, that deaths had been clearly inflated, and that Texans were one hundred times more likely to die in car crashes, which he later acknowledged was not true.

He resisted faculty requests to do remote learning, in line with neighboring institutions, and kept in-person classes going through the 2020 fall semester. A seventy-year-old nursing professor died of the virus a few months after that, not long after one of her students had tested positive. Her family is convinced she caught it while teaching.

According to Phillips, he was admonished for several tweets obliquely critical of the colleges pandemic policy on his personal Twitter account, one suggesting the college didnt care about its staffs health and safety, which he was asked to delete. The other described a dream he had of people seated together without masks at a college, wondering if that was the scenario coming in the fall.

The final straw came a year later, when faculty were told by administrators that staff and faculty were forbidden from even recommending to students that they wear masks voluntarily. The reasoning given was Texas governor Greg Abbotts ban on mask mandates even though Abbotts later order banning vaccine mandates strongly encouraged as a matter of personal responsibility that Texans abide by various pandemic mitigation practices.

Phillips took a photo of the PowerPoint slide outlining the policy and posted it on social media, before objecting to the board of trustees that faculty shouldnt be withholding critical information from students. Days later, he was given a discipline warning, then told his contract would not be renewed.

Theyre now retaliating against the most vocal, most principled faculty member, and the most vocal supporter of the rest of us who were disciplined, says Burnett.

As Burnetts words suggests, Collins clampdown on speech goes well beyond Phillips. Four faculty have lost their jobs now for exercising their First Amendment rights, a gross breach of the principle of academic freedom.

Burnett first entered the crosshairs when a post on her personal social media page became the subject of a right-wing cancel culture campaign. Her tweet calling for the moderator of the 2020 vice presidential debate to talk over Mike Pence until he shuts his little demon mouth up was seized on by right-wing media and organizations, leading Republican state representative Jeff Leach to text Matkin, asking if Burnett was paid with taxpayer dollars. Im aware of the situation Jeff and will deal with it, Matkin replied, adding, Appreciate you. Good luck in November friend.

Burnett further drew Matkins ire by tweeting criticisms of the colleges pandemic policies. In February of last year, Leach tweeted out that her firing was BIG WIN, unwittingly revealing both Collin leaderships plans to fire her and that he was apparently privy to them. Later that month, she was informed the college would not be renewing her contract. Shes since won a $70,000 settlement from the college plus payment of her legal fees.

Audra Heaslip was a humanities professor who had worked at the college for fifteen years, nearly ten of them as full-time faculty. She says she felt morally compelled to bring up staff concerns about COVID policy in 2020, when people started texting her, asking her to speak up.

There was already an environment of fear where you dont ever ask questions or speak up against anything, she says.

Heaslip recalls putting together a document of peer-reviewed research on the virus in summer 2020 and asking people to add their comments to it. She hoped it would start a conversation instead, she says, Matkin took it as a hostile move, referring to the document as a set of demands. In January 2021, she was told the president had declined to renew her contract.

Suzanne Jones, who had earlier run afoul of administrators for signing her name to Phillipss op-ed against Confederate monuments, also sparked anger by pushing back against the schools lax COVID policy in a Facebook post. But Jones says she suspects it was being on the faculty council when it wrote a resolution asking for safety precautions at the start of the pandemic that really drew administrators ire. She was accused by administrators of going outside normal channels of communication and learned the same month she, too, would not have her contract renewed, ending a twenty-year career at the college.

It wasnt always constitutionally protected speech that was the issue. Photography professor Byrd Williams had been at Collin for nearly thirty years when he says leadership moved to push him out. They started getting rid of all the people who had an opinion, plus the people in the highest pay rate, he says. They told me we can hire two people for what we pay you. Meanwhile, English professor Barbara Hanson was denied a multiyear contract for mysterious reasons, with school officials citing her application for two administrative positions at the college and cherry-picked student evaluations.

Then there was the Texas Faculty Association (TFA), the closest thing to a higher education union in the right-to-work state an advocacy group, rather than a labor organization with the right to strike. The ousted faculty note that Jones and Heaslip were both local officers of the Collin chapter of TFA, as was Phillips, who stepped in when the latter was removed. Joness misuse of the colleges name on a website associated with the TFA was specifically mentioned by Matkin as one of the reasons she was pushed out.

He certainly didnt choose us out of faculty council, because there were a lot of people on there who were a lot more vocal, says Jones. To me, it looks like they dont want this advocacy group or union existing.

Matkin is an obvious lightning rod for outrage over this spate of firings. Besides his conservative connections and the leading role he played in ousting the various professors, Matkin had stirred up accusations of unprofessionalism through incidents like revealing the El Paso shooters GPA, and his tendency to make offensive anatomical jokes about African Americans. But thats not the whole story.

It seems like the root of the problem is in the board of trustees, says Heaslip.

The leadership has a very pronounced conservative Republican slant, says Burnett.

Trustees include executives from health insurance company Cigna, corporate consulting firms, and a medical technology firm. But ousted faculty typically point to Bob Collins, whose reelection endorsement page as trustee lists the Collin County GOP, Collin County Conservative Republicans, and the conservative organizations of We the People Allen and McKinney First PAC, which says its membership dues go toward fund[ing] the conservative movement locally. It also lists a collection of Republican state legislators, including Jeff Leach, the lawmaker who had pushed Matkin to act against Burnett for her tweet criticizing Pence.

Collins, a founding trustee of the college, made clear in a 2015 speech why it uses the system of rolling contracts for its faculty, which have made it so easy for administrators to push those like Phillips out.

Collin College does not have tenure. Thats by design, he said:

Where you have tenure is where you tend to have a self-promoting faculty. So, with the tenure system, you tend to have the ultraliberal, anti-capitalism socialistic professors want to hire more just like them. So, we dont have that here. We have a contract system.

Collins would later defend Matkin when he placed a bowl on his head to mimic a yarmulke and called himself Cary Israel, the previous, Jewish president of Collin College. Its a shame we cant do things like that and not have people get offended, Collins said at the time. Yet it appears both Collins and Matkins defense of free speech only goes so far: while racist jokes may not cross the line for them, progressive politics, pandemic mitigation, and workplace organizing do.

The Collin College saga is a free speech and First Amendment scandal. Its a violation of academic freedom. Its an incident of union busting. And its just one case of many of these basic rights being trampled at educational institutions across the country, even as right-wing media and organizations point to campus protests as an authoritarian threat while ignoring or even cheering on flagrant abuses by college administrators.

The biggest loser is the college itself, which has not only seen tens of thousands of dollars wasted on settlements with fired staff but has lost faculty who were recognized both within and outside the college for their quality of teaching.

Were really concerned about the students at the college, because most of the people that they let go are the longtime professors, says Heaslip.

And now at the center of it is Michael Phillips, who Lora Burnett calls the William Lloyd Garrison of Collin College and who is joining his ousted colleagues in filing a lawsuit against the college. Yet even if he wins, as Burnett points out, the threatening cloud the colleges leadership has conjured above the facultys head will remain.

If they can get rid of Michael Phillips, who else is going to dare raise their voice?

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At a Texas Community College, the Attack on Free Speech Is Coming From the Right - Jacobin magazine

And they have found allies in Congress. Two House members, Raul Grijalva (D-AZ) and Katie Porter (D-CA) of the House Committee on Natural Resources, have given a deadline to a number of media companies and sponsors of PR awards program to hand over materials related to oil company PR campaigns. There is also talk of compelling heads of PR firms to testify on their work for oil companies.

Right now this campaign is targeting oil and gas companies and the PR firms that work for them.

But if this campaign is permitted to succeed it will have profound implications for all firms that provide PR, advertising, marketing and political consulting to any industry sector that may find itself addressing controversial issues. Indeed, it is nothing short of an attempt to deny companies their right to speak their mind on issues affecting their customers, employees and shareholders. It also sets a dangerous precedent.

How else can this be interpreted but as an attempt to deny citizens their First Amendment rights?

This campaign is also, to a large degree, based on a lie.

The campaigners and their supporters claim the communications sector is involved in campaigns of misinformation, climate denial and attempts to stop any policy initiatives to address climate change. One widely promoted study, The role of public relations firms in climate change politics, is frequently cited as proof that the PR industry is blocking smart climate policy.

However, if media and the public were to read this study, they would see that no such finding can be supported:

The impact of these campaigns is hard to ascertain it is unclear how much effect it has had on policy making Yet despite extensive research into public opinion on climate change per se, we have identified no studies that measure the impact of such campaigns on public opinion. (Page 19)

Ive spent more than three decades managing communications at the highest levels of the energy sectorboth in-house and as a consultant. Over this time, I have never used the term existential threat in regard to my profession. But in this instance, I think this is what we are facing unless the sector itself steps up and says stop the madness.

To call this a threat to our right to operate and to the private sectors freedom of speech is not an overstatement.

These activists are attempting to play judge and jury to decide what companies can and cannot say about matters of controversy, and who they can work with. Today it is climate change. But whats next? Claims of vaccine safety and efficacy? The relative merits of fast food? Products imported from China? The use of smart phones and social media by teens and adolescents? Anything would be fair game.

Lets face it: We live in a complex world. There is not a single matter or topic in our society that is without disagreement. Everything we do carries both benefit and risk. Companies produce and sell products and services that consumers need or desire. All of it done legally. Yet there are some who feel empowered to dictate who has a right to speak and who does not.

Were not talking here about continuing climate denial, deception or fraud. Today virtually every international oil and gas company accepts the climate science and the role of hydrocarbons in contributing to climate change, and they are also making considerable investments in decarbonization and energy transition strategies. And communications advisors are working with them on this journey.

Were talking about an important conversation about the right paths to confront climate change, and whether the communications consulting sector has a right to contribute to this conversation.

As well-intentioned these activists may be, they seem blind to the implications of what they seek. We have a right to do what we do, and so long as there is a market need for it, and so long as we do our work with integrity, with honesty, transparency and relying on a strong values set, we can make a vital contribution to the climate challenge.

One final thought:

What is also troubling is the relative silence coming from the communications sector about this threat. Duck and cover seems to be the order of the day. We communicate for a living, but nobody seems to want to talk about this threat, much less confront it. It seems as if the PR powers-that-be hope it will all go away if we keep our heads low. It wont.

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Why the attack on oil and gas PR is a threat to free speech - AdAge.com