Daily Archives: February 16, 2024

Many legal protections are grouped under two related but distinct categories: civil liberties and civil rights. The former, which includes the right to freedom of speech, protects individuals from oppression. The latter prevents wrongful discrimination against groups based on race, religion, national origin, or other attributes.

On many issues, devotees of civil rights and civil liberties coalesce. Sometimes, however, they diverge.

Consider hate speech. Civil rights activists tend to argue (and have argued since at least the 1980s) that certain types of speech are so hurtful and offensive to racial minorities that they should be prohibited. In contrast, civil libertarians tend to maintain that virtually all speech, even the most deplorable, ought to be protected.

The result? Bitter disputes over speech codes on college campuses and beyond.

As an African American with strong, decades-long commitments to civil rights and civil liberties, I have been concerned to see racial justice activists in the African American community distance themselves from the most ardent champions of freedom of speech in recent years.

I have been concerned to see a notable paucity of African American students attending campus events focused on threats to civil liberties. And, in the broader world of civil liberties advocacy, I have watched with dismay as leading civil liberties organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, and the National Coalition Against Censorship have struggled to attract the support of young African Americans, at least in part because those organizations are seen as defending the rights of racists.

This alienation between supporters of civil rights and civil liberties is harmful and avoidable. Reconciliation is essential and urgently needed.

Racial justice activists must realize that a speech-protective culture a culture that defends even ugly expression benefits minority communities that depend upon protest to make their presence and preferences seen and heard.

Especially at this moment, as state governments threaten to remove Black thinkers and artists from school curricula, the sentinels of racial justice must defend artistic, academic, and political liberties for all.

Many of the most important judicial rulings that extended civil liberties in the post-World War II era arose directly from protests seeking racial justice.

In the 1950s, when the state of Alabama sought to obtain the membership lists of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, lawyers persuaded the Supreme Court to protect NAACP members right to free association without fear of exposure and retaliation.

In the 1960s, when white supremacists arbitrarily denied Black civil rights activists the permission to hold rallies, lawyers persuaded the Supreme Court to protect the right to protest, requiring officials to issue clear, objective, uniform regulations, applicable to all on an equal basis.

Student-led activism also contributed to much of this liberty-protective jurisprudence.

In 1960, when Alabama State College expelled Black students participating in a sit-in at a racially segregated lunch room, a federal court of appeals determined that the punishment, administered without benefit of notice or a hearing, violated the students right to due process.

Later, in 1967, a federal district court ruled in favor of Black students at South Carolina State College, protecting their right to protest without prior approval from the college administration.

Indeed, there is a long history of the intrepid champions of racial justice being among the fiercest defenders of freedom of expression.

In 1952, for example, the Baltimore Afro-American newspaper criticized the prosecution of a white supremacist who had been convicted under a state law that criminalized racist group vilification. In an editorial, the newspaper wrote that the battle against bigotry can be fought most effectively in an atmosphere in which freedom of speech is not restricted or confined.

We seek for those with whom we disagree, the editorial continues, the same rights and privileges we demand for ourselves.

Thurgood Marshall, Pauli Murray, and Eleanor Holmes Norton all stalwart fighters for racial justice echoed that same sentiment, defending the rights of racists to speak freely because they could see the bigger picture.

The most aggressive censorship efforts in American history have attended the imposition and maintenance of racial hierarchy. In the 19th century, many states enacted laws that criminalized teaching literacy to Blacks an egregious effort to erase the African American mind.

As new attempts at suppression rear their head today, we must remember that tragic experience and subsequent iterations of ideological and intellectual tyranny. Racial justice activists ought to use those acts of censorship as rallying points to resist all undue encroachments upon freedom of speech, listening, teaching, and learning because free expression helps, rather than hurts, the fight for racial justice.

Randall L. Kennedy is the Michael R. Klein Professor at Harvard Law School. His column runs bi-weekly on Thursdays.

See the original post:
Free Speech Aids Racial Justice. Activists Must Defend It. | Opinion - Harvard Crimson

In my columnlast week, I detailed how GOP lawmakers in several Western states have jettisoned their usual concerns about free speech and have passed laws that require cellphone users to disable government-mandated filters before having open access to apps. It's a foolhardy endeavor done in the name of protecting The Children from obscenity, but at least these measures are narrow in scope (and mostly about posturing).

Meanwhile, progressives are hatching attacks on "disinformation" that threaten the foundations of the Constitution. Republicans share some responsibility, as they've backed variousproposals targeting Big Tech out of pique about the censorship of conservative views. These ideas included limits on liability protections for posted content and plans to treat social media sites as public utilities.

Conservatives have already shown a willingness to insert government into speech considerations, so they are left flat-footed asleftistshatch plots to rejigger open debate. Whenever the Right plays footsie with big government, the Left then ups the anteand conservatives end up wondering what happened. What is happening now is an effort to use legitimate concerns about internet distortions to squelch what we read and say.

Traditionally, Americans of all political stripes have accepted thatexcept for a few strictly limited circumstancespeople can say whatever they choose. The nation's libel laws impose civil penalties on those who have engaged in defamatory speech, but those laws are narrowly tailored so the threat of lawsuits doesn't halt legitimate speech. This emanates from the First Amendment, which said Congress shall make "no lawabridging the freedom of speech, or of the press."

Such protections were applied to all governments, of course. Thecourtswrestle with gray areas (commercial and corporate speech, pornography, political advertising), but our nation thankfully has tilted heavily in the direction of upholding the broadest speech rights. This legal framework has been bolstered by a broad consensus among the citizenry that speech rights are sacrosanct. There always have been those people who want to police speech, but they have largely been outliers.

The internet and the information free for all that's followed have challenged that consensus. When I first got into the journalism business, Americans had limited access to information. We could read the daily newspaper, which didn't cover many issues and where editors served as gatekeepers. We could watch the network news at 6 p. or subscribe to magazines. There was no internet or cable news. Talk radio was in its infancy. Now anyone can post anything online and traditional news sources are struggling.

In the old days, I was routinely frustrated by the strict gatekeeping, as it was hard to find viewpoints that diverged from the accepted mainstream point of view. Now, we all have information overload, and it's hard to know what to believe. These days, Americans can't even agree on a basic set of facts before developing an opinion. Russian and Chinese bot farms churn out obviousdisinformation. Outright falsehoods spread like wildfire and become accepted truths among large groups of Americans.

Concerns about internetconspiraciesare not unwarranted, but efforts to address those problemsespecially ones that rely on governmentpose dangers to our rights as Americans. It's one thing to target a concerted online disinformation campaign from the Chinese Communist Party, but quite another to clamp down on "misinformation"ideas and facts that one might find to be inaccurate or based on shoddy and biased reasoning.

In a 2021 Harvard Gazette article, Harvard Law School professor Martha Minowarguedthat the Federal Communications Commission should "withhold licenses, remove them, terminate them, for companies that are misleading people." In other words, federal bureaucrats would be tasked with determining what amounts to "misleading people" and then yank the licenses of broadcast news outlets that failed to conform to that standard.

Think about how that would play out. Many public health officials have railed against COVID-19 misinformation, and yet we later learned that the officials' solutions turned out to be wrong and that critics raised important points. That's how life works in a free society. Different people make different claims and then evidence unfolds, albeit in a messy and imprecise manner. How often have we found that official sources get things terribly wrong?

After detailing an example of spreading online misinformation, a New York Timesarticle from 2020 argued that "increasingly, scholars of constitutional law, as well as social scientists, are beginning to question the way we have come to think about the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech. They think our formulations are simplisticand especially inadequate for our era."

It's unclear how this new regimen will play out, but it's a good guess it will mean creepy government control over our discourse. Be prepared, as such "questioning" will onlyincreaseas a political movement at home with canceling verboten speech offers specific solutions. Conservatives may rue the day they ever toyed with speech limitations.

This column was first published in The Orange County Register.

View post:
Progressives Are Ditching Free Speech To Fight 'Disinformation' - Reason

When I was starting my academic career at the UKs Open University (OU), feminism was against the determinism of biological sex as the defining force in identity. The malleable influences of gender and culture were emphasised instead.

So it seems odd that gender-critical feminists such as Jo Phoenix now insist on its primacy. But there are reasons for this apparent reversal. And even if colleagues dont agree with them, harassment, victimisation and discrimination ought not to be their reaction.

As transgender activism has gained momentum, cisgender women have become increasingly concerned about womens and girls safety in spaces such as toilets and workplaces. Over decades, women have fought against toxic masculinity and sexual harassment. They have united around the common experiences of biological women: menstruation, pregnancy, childbirth and menopause. And they fear that highly publicised incidents, such as the male rapist placed in a Scottish womens prison after self-identifying as female, are just the tip of the iceberg.

But people who identify as transgender have compelling human rights too. A 2022 Canadian study found that transgender adolescents were 7.6 times more likely to attempt suicide than their cisgender peers. Transgender youth disproportionately suffer from bullying, loneliness and mental health problems, including self-harming, anxiety and rejection. People with transgender identities arent taking a cheap ticket away from normal life.

Adopting only that second human rights position, numerous OU faculty made Phoenixs life so difficult that she felt compelled to resign a hostile environment from which the university was criticised for failing to protect her in an employment tribunal ruling last month.

Womens and transgender rights are just one spiky cultural controversy in our educational institutions. Whether its islamophobia v antisemitism, immigration v national identity, or religious freedom v homophobia and patriarchal oppression, we are being drawn into conflicts that seem almost irreconcilable. And it isnt just the OU that is finding it hard to navigate such terrain. In my opinion, most universities are responding in utterly dysfunctional ways.

Two-thirds of US higher education institutions, for example, now offer anti-bias training. Yet an extensive reviewhas concluded that such training doesnt reduce bias, alter behaviour or change the workplace. Indeed, it often increases bias by dividing people into binaries of those who are unarguably privileged and those who are unambiguously oppressed.

For example, all those with white privilege even those who grew up in poverty are set against all BIPOC (Black, Indigenous and people of colour), including wealthy political leaders or royalty. This is despite the fact that, in the UK alone, 3 million people are mixed raceand self-reported rates of discriminationare also high among people who are Irish, Jewish and Roma/Travellers.

Heterosexual identities are also contrasted with LGBTQ+ identities, yet UK youngsters who are bisexual feel marginalised by both gay and heterosexual communities.Setting people against each other in these mutually exclusive ways is a zero-sum game.

In response, some academics oppose cancel culture with freedom of speech. The problem, though, is not just that free speech can permit hateful views to be aired. The libertarian stance simply allows clashing positions to coexist. It doesnt offer ways to bring peoples perspectives and rights closer together in a democratic intellectual community.

There is a better way than condoning a cacophony of views. That is to replace a framework of individual human rights, pursued at the expense of anyone elses rights, with what is known as competing human rights.

A place to start is the Canadian province of Ontarios Human Rights Code. This aims to encourage people to show dignity and respect for one another and to share responsibility for finding agreeable solutions. It also rejects power imbalances and hierarchies of human rights, advocating mutual and maximal recognition of interests, rights and obligations.

How would this help Phoenix and her critics? It would bring them together in facilitated dialogue, guided by protocols that ensure active listening. Rights and risks would be addressed on both sides. Clear ground rules would be set, such as civility, empathy, humility, forgiveness, rationality and practicality. It might even encourage transgender students and scholars to work together withgender-critical peers on common projects that create mutual understanding.

Practical solutions could be sought, such as better all-gender toilets. All students and faculty would exercise their rights to choose and display their own pronouns without pressuring everyone else into posting theirs. Misplaced pronouns and misjudged attributions of identity would lead to sincere apologies and swift corrections rather than protracted and punitive inquisitions. Course materials would include readings on competing perspectives.

Cancel culture must stop. But nor can we have a free-for-all, where the loudest voice or most powerful lobby prevails. Instead of demeaning and destroying each others human rights, a competing human rights framework will allow us to expand our humanity together.

Andy Hargreaves is honorary professor at Swansea University, research professor at Boston College and visiting professor at the University of Ottawa. His co-authored book with Dennis Shirley is The Age of Identity: who do our kids think they are and how do we help them belong?

Read more:
There is a way out of cancel culture but it's not free speech - Times Higher Education

The Watsonville City Council made the right choice Tuesday when it voted to endat least for nowpublic participation by Zoom.

In October, both that body of elected leaders and the Capitola City Council were subjected to a series of hateful, expletive-filled racist comments from people who hid behind the anonymity of the teleconferencing platform during their public meetings.

While freedom of speech is one of the most sacred rights we as Americans possess, it is common sense that this right must be weighed against our right to not be victimized by bullies. As the old adage goes, your right to swing your fist ends at my nose.

Watsonville City Attorney Samantha Zutler told the council that public comment can be stopped under two circumstances: when it is so disruptive that it hinders their ability to conduct business, and when it falls outside the citys subject matter jurisdiction.

The so-called Zoom bomb comments fell under both those categories, and I appreciated the citys decision to shut down its Zoom option until Tuesdays meeting.

It was also pointed out by Councilman Casey Clark that the council has the right to enforce its rules of decorum for in-person participants, an option I have seen employed at a handful of public meetings.

This typically happens when a crowd gets so disruptive that the council or board cannot hear, or when they refuse to obey a fire marshals order to leave.

Watsonville Mayor Vanessa Quiroz-Carter said during Tuesdays meeting that hate speech is protected, and as a journalist with a passion for the First Amendment and a vested interest in the idea of Freedom of Speech, I agree wholeheartedly.

But that is separate from whether such speech should be allowed wherever one might wish to utter it.

If in the future the city finds a platform with a kill switch to stop hate speech in its tracks, then by all means they should bring it back.

Yes, we as adults, and elected leaders in particular should have thick skin and be able to weather slings and arrows from those who would speak against us.

Still, giving elected leaders the tools to shut down hate speechto be used sparingly and in extreme situations to be sureis essential to making sure that they can do the work we need them to do.

More here:
Editor's take: Limiting hate speech not a First Amendment violation - The Pajaronian

A proposal that allocates $150,000 to the Colorado Attorney General's Office to study the spread of "misinformation" or "disinformation" online sparked a spirited debate about the parameters of free speech, what role the government should play in counteracting it, and questions about the legislation's price tag, given the state's tight budget.

UnderSenate Bill 084, which the Senate Judiciary Committee advanced on Thursday by a vote of 3-2, the state's attorney general would be responsible for establishing initiatives promoting "respectful engagement and discourse" and developing ways to facilitate "productive and honest conversations regarding state and nationwide issues to help people find common ground."

The attorney general would also be tasked with conducting a study on how the internet and other media channels are used to share and spread "misinformation." The office would be required to present the study's findings to the legislative body by March 1, 2025, and lawmakers would decide whether to pursue legislation based on those findings.

During discussions, Colorado Springs Republican Bob Gardner and Committee Chair Sen. Julie Gonzales, D- Denver, both expressed worries about the bill's price tag $150,000.

"I think in the context of some of the fiscal challenges that our state is navigating, in terms of the appropriation to this bill, I may have concerns," Gonzales said.

Ultimately, Gonzales said she agrees with the policy and voted with her two fellow Democrats to move the bill to the appropriations panel. The judiciary committee's two Republicans voted against the bill.

In outlining the need for the study, bill sponsor Sen. Lisa Cutter, a Democrat from Evergreen, said that "foreign entities have come into the U.S. and worked really hard to divide us through perpetuating deliberate disinformation."

"I believe deeply in the First Amendment and its protections for individuals to be able to speak their minds and I've run several bills along those lines, so it's something I value greatly," she said. "But what we're concerned with in this bill is studying what effects this widely perpetuated misinformation and effects they're having on our social media and our discourse."

Cutter defined"misinformation" as unintentionally false or inaccurate information, while "disinformation" is deliberately intended to mislead.

While Cutter maintained that the bill's intent is not to infringe on anyone's First Amendment rights, several witnesses speaking in opposition said that it would.

"This bill is in direct conflict with the U.S. Constitution and the right to free speech," said Amanda Monk of Yuma County. "Freedom of speech is a foundation of a self-governing nation. Ideas that go unopposed by differing opinions become weak and ineffective instead of being strengthened by competing ideas. If speech is stifled and muted, a society quickly loses its ability to resolve its problems."

Marla Fernandez, a paralegal who specializes Constitutional law, echoed Monk's apprehensions, calling the bill "an assault on our freedom of speech and expression."

"While the intentions behind the bill may seem noble, the implications are far-reaching and dangerous," she said. "It seeks to dictate what information is permissible, what opinions are acceptable, and what conversations are appropriate. Such heavy-handed government intervention has no place in a society governed by the rule of law."

Erin Meschke, a Boulder resident, added that the bill is redundant.

"I think it is imperative that we not fund more studies on things we kind of already know the answers to," she said.

Gardner also suggested the study is unnecessary.

"I pick up the Wall Street Journal every day and I'd be hard-pressed to not find something in there every day about (efforts to combat misinformation)," he said."Don't we already have a good deal of information and aren't there numerous organizations out there studying everything in this bill such that our efforts might be redundant?"

Jeffrey Riester, a representative of the Department of Law, which supports the bill, acknowledged Gardner's worriesbut said that, unlike the research already being conducted at a national level, this study would specifically focus on Colorado. He also said the bill gives no additional authority to the attorney general, nor does it grant the office the right to determine what constitutes "misinformation" and "disinformation."

"This is meant to protect the very rights that people are concerned will be infringed upon," he said. "The study may come back and say Colorado has no authority to do anything."

"The hope is that this will give us resources to take this review of a very serious and complicated subject, come back and present a framework of what that all means, and potentially show you all a pathway to how to address this issue that is affecting everyone on all sides of the aisle," he said.

Andrew Barton of Colorado Common Cause, who supports the measure,said his organization has conducted an independent analysis of social media posts and that the study revealed an increasing prevalence of "misinformation" about candidates for office, election processes, and the validity of the country's voting system.

"Our democratic institutions only work when we can all engage with them accurately and honestly," Barton said. "Because of the threat of misinformation and disinformation, it's imperative that data around how such information is spread through online media sources can be gathered and examined so the legislature can develop data-driven solutions that help build understanding and trust within our political systems."

The panel amended the bill to remove the word "curriculum" to clarify that the legislation does not affect the education system. Cutter said that rather than a "curriculum," the attorney general would put together more of a "resource bank" with helpful tools.

See original here:
Colorado bill tasking attorney general to study online 'misinformation' sparks First Amendment debate - coloradopolitics.com

Its that time of year again time for the first spring showers, a forecasting groundhog, flowers and chocolates, king cake, and an annual skewering of Americas worst censors. Each year, FIRE names and shames the worst-of-the-worst silencers, bowdlerizers, and steamrollers of free speech.

This year, weve included five free speech villains whose chilling misdeeds happened off of college campuses. Thelist belowincludes people guilty of many forms of censorshipincluding raiding a small-town newspaper, punishing a middle schooler for wearing eye black at a football game, canceling students and professors for their views on the Israel-Hamas war, and retroactively censoring famous authors without their consent. The 13th annual Lifetime Censorship Award went to Harvard University, a university as censorial as it is famous.

Read on for full descriptions, in no particular order, of these censors attempts to turn America into the land of the silenced and home of the afraid.

San Diego middle school gives itself a black eye by punishing a student for wearing eye black.

Any sports fan knows its common for athletes to wear eye black black paint or grease applied under the eyes. For some players, its functional, reducing glare from the sun or stadium lights. For others, like superstarsBryce Harper andJalen Hurts who liberally smear it on like warpaint its about the look.

Last October, a Muirlands Middle School student, whose initials are J.A., adopted that look to show school spirit at a football game. He wore eye black throughout the game without incident. But a week later, J.A.s principalsuspended him for two days and banned him from future athletic events for wearing blackface.

Wait, what?

There was noblackface. J.A.s eye black had no racial connotations he was just emulating the way many athletes generously apply it under their eyes.

Whats next? The school suspending a student for wearing a charcoal face mask in an Instagram selfie?

J.A. appealed his suspension, and FIRE sent aletter in support. The bottom line is that J.A.s face paint is constitutionally protected expression. There is no evidence it substantially disrupted school activities.

But after reviewing the play, the school district let the ruling on the field stand.

Now, with the help ofDhillon Law Group, J.A.s family issuing. But there was a simple way for the school to avoid this challenge flag in the first place: Dont violate the First Amendment by misrepresenting students expression and then punishing them for it.

Feeling threatened by a small-town newspaper and its 98-year-old co-owner, police raid the papers headquarters, attacking the First Amendment in the process.

Apolice raid against a local newspaper sounds like a story out of Putins Russia but it happened in theheart of Kansas.

The Marion, Kansas police, with the help of a magistrate judge (andmaybe even state-level officials), cobbled together a search warrant to invade the offices of the family-owned Marion County Record. Why? They didnt like that the newspaper had dirt on a political ally not to mention the papers investigations into allegations of misconduct bythe police chief himself.

They seized computers. They ripped a reporters cell phone out of her hand. They even rummaged around the home of the 98-year-old co-owner of the paper, ignoring her protests. The next day, following the shock of the raid, shepassed away.

Thats a tragedy. The raid was an assault on press freedom that would make our Founders blood boil. And it should make your blood boil too. No matter your views on the state of todays press, when public officials attack just one newspapers freedom, they show their contempt for everyones freedom.

Rightly, the Marion Countypolice chief resigned after leading this shameful attack on the First Amendment. FIRE will continue to stand up to government bullies who try to turn journalism into a crime.

Mayo Clinic College of Medical Science tells doctor to shut up or toe the party line.

Can doctors offer a second opinion? Not according to Mayo Clinic College of Medical Science, which punished medical professor Michael Joyner for sharing his expertise and research.

Joyner is arenowned academic whose commentary on COVID-19, public health, and sex differences in sports performance you can read inCNN,The New York Times, and numerous other media outlets over his 36 years at the Mayo Clinic. For speaking in his personal capacity about these issues, Mayo Clinicsuspendedhim for failing to communicate in accordance with prescribed messaging and reflecting poorly on Mayo Clinics brand and reputation.

The college alsodemanded he discuss approved topics only and stick to prescribed messaging and vet each individual media request through Public Affairs. In other words, Joyner can speak the words administrators put into his mouth or not speak at all.

Yet the collegepromises its faculty robust academic freedom and freedom of expression rights essential to medical professionals expected to share their expertise even when it is difficult or unpopular. Despite this commitment, Mayo Clinic leadership put its business interests above the freedom necessary for scientific innovation and sound medical advice, to the detriment of doctors and patients alike.

For sacrificing scientific integrity in a vain attempt to maintain its brand, Mayo Clinic rightfullyearned condemnation from the medical community. For gagging a prominent academic merely because administrators didnt like what he had to say, the collegeearned alawsuit by Joyner and a spot on this list.

Legislators and publishers bravely protect American people from dangerous childrens authors Mark Twain, Roald Dahl, and R.L. Stine.

If theres one thing the left and right can agree on, its that some books are beyond the pale.

Legislators across the country drafted a number of vague, overbroad policies to remove or limit access to books they believe are inappropriate. And whilethere are important considerations regarding what constitutes a book ban and how curation works in public versus private libraries, many of the legislative actions crossed the line into First Amendment violations.

TexasREADER Act, for example, required book vendors to rate books they sell to school libraries based on vague criteria surrounding what constitutes sexually explicit material, effectively turning booksellers into censors. Thankfully, the U.S. Court of Appealsblocked enforcement of the legislation, noting that the law was an example of unconstitutional compelled speech.

Meanwhile, other would-be censors took a different approach. In addition to the usual protests over books like To Kill a Mockingbird and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, we also saw a number of publishers memory-hole so-called problematic content from the works of authors likeRoald Dahl andR.L. Stinein new editions throughsensitivity reading. FIRE spoke out in these incidents and in the case of Roald Dahl, contributed to public pressure that made some publishersreconsider completely phasing out the authors original language.

Whatever the censors methods, the motives behind these actions are the same: to remove, revise, or restrict booksthey deem inappropriate for others to read. Both from a constitutional and a cultural standpoint, FIRE stands against such censorial behavior and when it violates the First Amendment, we respond.

While San Francisco State investigates history professor for teaching history, its students make speaker flee for her safety for talking about womanhood.

San Francisco State University administrators were busy investigating ahistory professor for displaying ahistorical image in ahistory lesson when all hell broke loose during a speaking event on campus, ending in protesters shouting, chasing down, and cornering an Olympic athlete.

Last spring, SFSUs censors dove headfirst into a months-long investigation of professor Mazair Behrooz after he displayed an image of the Prophet Muhammad in a class lesson about the history of the Islamic worldbetween 500 and 1700. FIREwrote to SFSU warning that its chilling investigationran afoul of the schools constitutional obligations.

While administrators were tied up violating Behroozs academic freedom rights, students took censorship into their own hands when former Olympic swimmer Riley Gaines came to campus to share her opinions about womens sports and gender identities. Students and protesters screamed, chanted, stomped, and interrupted her speech, then accosted her as police officers attempted to escort her out. The officers were unable to do so safely until hours later.

FIREwrote to SFSUurging it to investigate the response of the administration and police, and SFSU responded by confirming it was investigating the disruption and claiming it was committed to free speech.

The school was not so quick to backtrack with Behrooz, and it continued its investigation through the end of the summer.

For dragging out its chilling investigation and censorship of a history professor forteaching historyand allowing its students to run roughshod over each others free speech rights, SFSU handily won a place on this list.

In the wake of the Israel-Hamas conflict, hypocritical college admins enjoy a censorship frenzy.

Universities across the country havealmost as many administrators on staff as there are students on campus. What do they all do? Well, they definitely dont protect free speech.

In the wake of Hamas Oct. 7 attack on Israel, as campuses roiled with protests, demonstrations, and controversies over speech, administrators enthusiastically engaged in censorship.

The University of Southern California prohibited professorJohn Strauss from teaching on campus after he called pro-Palestinian protestors ignorant and Hamas murderers.FIRE wrote to USC calling for the university to rescind its punishment of Strauss for his speech which is protected underUSCs policies.

Brandeis University unrecognized its chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine due topro-Hamas comments made by the national SJP organization.FIRE sent a letter reminding Brandeis that denying student group recognition based on viewpoint, speech, or fear of disruption violates free speech principles. FIRE sentanother letter on November 17 escalating our concerns and calling on Brandeis to restore SJPs recognition.

This turmoil was exacerbated by thehypocritical testimony of Liz Magill, Claudine Gay, and Sally Kornbluth presidents of the University of Pennsylvania, Harvard University, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, respectively before Congress. Magill and Gay in particular made remarks that were correct but deeply unsatisfying given their respective universities terrible track records on campus speech which put them in the bottom two spots inFIREs 2024 College Free Speech Rankings.

As FIREsNico Perrinowrote in response to the controversy, administrators should defend free speech in all cases. No hypocrisy. No double standards.

California Community Colleges stamp out racism by labeling everyone racist.

No one can rightly force another person to pledge allegiance to the flag, but in California, community college professors are required to profess allegiance to state-mandated views on diversity, equity, and inclusion.

In April, California Community Colleges imposeddraconian regulations forcing more than 54,000 professors to teach and promote politicized conceptions of DEI. The mandated viewincludes the anti-racist opinion that persons that say they are not a racist are in denial or that color-blindness that is, treating individuals as equally as possible, without regard to race, culture, or ethnicity only perpetuates existing racial inequities and denies systematic racism.

Professors, who once assigned readings presenting different perspectives on racial issues to invite classroom discussion and debate are now altering their curriculum to avoid perspectives contrary to the state-mandated viewpoint. Other professors are left wondering how to incorporate DEI concepts into their chemistry curriculum to comply with the new rules.

Whether professors satisfy the states ideological requirements has real career consequences. Faculty performance and tenure are now evaluated based on professors demonstrated commitment to and promotion of the state of Californias official views.

FIREwarned California that the regulations are unconstitutional, but the state chancellor dismissed our concerns, asserting that professors lack any individual right to academic freedom to express views contrary to those mandated by the community college system.

In August, FIRE filed alawsuit on behalf of six California community college professors to halt the new regulations. That lawsuit is pending in federal district court.

TAMU admins endorse censorship by text message and ban drag.

The Texas A&M System had a chilly 2023.

When board members found out that the university was hiring Kathleen McElroy a former New York Times editor to lead its journalism program, thetext messages started flying. One board member complained that the Times was biased and progressive leaning, another said the purpose of us starting a journalism program is to get journalists with conservative values into the market. That goal bled over into a broader plan to control the liberal nature of faculty in the arts and sciences. The brouhaha ultimately saw the universitys president resign and cost the university a cool million to settle the dispute.

A similar situation emerged when professor Joy Alonzo, an expert on the opioid crisis, criticized Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick during a lecture. An offended student in the class was the daughter of a state official. Within two hours, Chancellor John Sharp wastexting with Patrick and his chief of staff, assuring them that Alonzo was placed on administrative leave pending investigation re firing her. shud [sic] be finished by end of week. That promise didnt ultimately pan out, but Alonzo was suspended for two weeks.

While Sharps fingerprints were all over the Alonzo affair, he wouldnt lift a finger tostop censorship. After an LGBTQ+ student organization planned an on-campus charity drag show, West Texas A&M University President Walter Wendler banned drag shows. Wendlerargued that drag performances are sexist, and said he would not permit them even when the law of the land appears to require it. After the studentssued, Wendler changed his tune, claiming that drag shows arent performances at all, so they arent protected by the First Amendment. Still, he stood by the ban, and FIRE will keep fighting against it.

Taylor Swift wouldnt change anything, anything, anything about New York. We disagree.

New York has a problematic pattern of censorship.

After a school shooting in 2018, the Empire State launched a crusade against the National Rifle Association by threatening companies that did business with the NRA. FIREurged the Supreme Court to hold New York accountable for its unconstitutional pressure campaign.

Shortly after another shooting in Buffalo in 2022, the state enacted a law requiringsocial media networks to address hateful speech i.e. fully protected speech that the state doesnt like. FIREsued, and the lawsuit persuaded a federal judge to prohibit the state from enforcing its law because it could have a profound chilling effect.

But in the face of yet another tragedy the recent attacks in Israel New York ignored the courts order,sending investigation letters to FIREs client Rumble and other social media networks demanding that they disclose their policies for removing speech related to the conflict. FIREfiled a motion urging the judge to enforce his preliminary injunction order.

Making matters worse, New York Gov. Katy Hochul got in on the action. She sent an ill-advisedletter to thepresidents of all colleges and universities in New York, both public and private, demanding that they discipline students for calling for the genocide of any group of people and promised aggressive enforcement action against any institution failing to do so. This would stifle political debate and blatantly violate the First Amendment.

New York must stop using tragedies as opportunities for censorship.

Florida isnt where woke goes to die its where the First Amendment goes to retire.

In Florida, officials have performative censorship down to an art whether on campus or on stage.

Take drag. As anti-drag bills became this years legislative fad, Florida joined the ranks of governments cracking down on drag performances. State officials dispatched undercover officers to monitor performances of A Drag Queen Christmas. Those undercover agentsreported in records obtained by FIRE that there were provocative outfits, but no lewd acts. That didnt stop Floridas officials from going after the theaters liquor license anyway. Not content to be left out, Floridas legislature then passed a law of its own targeting drag performances a law soonput on ice by a federal court.

The same chilling charade plays out on campus. In the wake of the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks in Israel, the chancellor of Floridas universitiesdemanded university officials ban Students for Justice in Palestine chapters, threatening adverse employment actions and suspensions for school officials. But when the university leaders, citing the possibility of personal liability for violating students First Amendment rights, balked and the student groups sued, that will to censor evaporated. Soon, Florida meeklytold a federal judge that the formal memo was little more than a suggestion an open letter and it had no real plans to follow through.

Not only did Floridas university presidents have issues with censorship in 2023, but Floridas 28 college presidents started the year by unanimouslypledging to enforce Floridas Stop WOKE Act evenafter a federal court said the positively dystopian law violated the First Amendment in higher education. FIRE ischallenging the Stop WOKE Act in court.

Harvard is Americas worst college for free speech. Its recent attempt to silence The New York Post shows why.

Harvard University came indead last on this yearsCollege Free Speech Rankings achieving a worst-ever score. When asked about Harvards abysmal ranking during her congressional testimony in December, then-Harvard President Claudine Gaysaid she didnt think the ranking was an accurate representation of Harvards respect for free speech. But all one needs to do to understand Harvardsdisrespect for free speech is look at its record of censorship.

Only a few weeks before Gays testimony, Harvard hiredself-advertised media assassins tothreaten the New York Post with a defamation lawsuit and immense damages if the paper published a story alleging Gay plagiarized some of her scholarship. So much for placing a high priority on freedom of speech or freedom of the press for that matter. Gay resigned on Jan. 2, after more than 40 allegations of plagiarism came to light.

Long before Harvard threatened news outlets with litigation for their reporting, it punished faculty and students for their speech. School administratorsdrove out lecturer Carole Hooven for arguing that biological sex is real. Itrescinded a fellowship for former Human Rights Watch Executive Director Kenneth Roth over his purported anti-Israel bias. It effectivelyfired an economics professor for an op-ed he published in India. Itcanceleda professors course on policing following student uproar. Itfired professor Ronald Sullivan from his deanship after students protested his role on Harvey Weinsteins criminal defense team. It bizarrelydemanded students take down a Nicki Minaj flag because the community could find it offensive. And the listgoes on.

Even outside speakers invited to campus arent safe from Harvards censorial glare. In 2022, feminist philosopher Devin Buckley wasdisinvited from an English department colloquium because of her views on sex and gender. Her talk was supposed to be on the separate topic of British romanticism.

Harvard students clearly feel the chill. Students report low administrative support for free speech and low comfort expressing ideas, placing the school near the bottom of FIREsCollege Free Speech Rankings in both individual categories. Unfortunately, Harvard students themselves may also contribute to the problem. If the efforts to oust Sullivan and cancel the policing class arent evidence enough, an alarming 30% of Harvard students think using violence to stop a campus speech isacceptable in at least some circumstances.

For its long track record of censorship, Harvard is receiving FIREsLifetime Censorship Award. It joins Georgetown University, Yale University, Syracuse University, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and DePaul University in receiving this honor. Its past time Harvard truly commits to its ostensible truth-seeking mission and the principles of free speech and academic freedom that make it possible. But that may be wishful thinking, the triumph of hope over experience.

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10 Worst Censors: 2024 | The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression - Foundation for Individual Rights in Education

Universities have long been esteemed as bastions of free speech, where ideas and debates are encouraged and fostered. However, recent events point to a growing trend of censorship within these institutions. Harvard University, one of the most prestigious universities globally, has been listed as one of the 10 worst censors of 2024. The university has been accused of threatening the New York Post with a defamation lawsuit over accurate stories about its leadership. This action has earned Harvard a Lifetime Censorship Award from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE).

The Lifetime Censorship Award is given to institutions or individuals demonstrating a consistent disregard for free speech and expression. Harvard University has been awarded the sixth Lifetime Censorship Award by FIRE for their record of censorship. This includes threatening defamation lawsuits, driving out faculty, rescinding fellowships, and canceling courses. The university received the lowest ranking in the College Free Speech Rankings for disrespecting free speech.

Multiple incidents of censorship at Harvard University have come to light. The university has been accused of punishing faculty and students for their speech. Notably, lecturer Carole Hooven was driven out for arguing that biological sex is real. A fellowship for former Human Rights Watch Executive Director Kenneth Roth was rescinded. An economics professor was effectively fired for an op-ed, and a professors course on policing was canceled following student uproar. Additionally, professor Ronald Sullivan was fired from his deanship, students were demanded to take down a Nicki Minaj flag, and a feminist philosopher was disinvited from an English department colloquium because of her views on sex and gender.

Harvards actions have far-reaching impacts on freedom of speech and journalism. By threatening the New York Post with a defamation lawsuit, the university has not only censored the newspaper but also set a dangerous precedent for other institutions. This could potentially stifle investigative journalism and discourage journalists from reporting on controversial topics. The universitys actions also send a chilling message to its students and faculty that dissenting views will not be tolerated.

Harvards Lifetime Censorship Award is not an isolated incident. FIRE has released its annual list of Americas 10 Worst Censors, including college presidents testifying about antisemitism on campus, Brandeis University unrecognizing its chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, and off-campus offenders. The list also includes people and institutions guilty of many forms of censorship, including raiding a small-town newspaper, punishing a middle schooler for wearing eye black at a football game, and canceling students and professors for their views on the Israel-Hamas war.

Freedom of speech is a fundamental right that fosters creativity, innovation, and social progress. Universities, in particular, should be safe havens for free and open discussions. The recent trend of censorship at Harvard University and other institutions is concerning. It not only infringes on individual rights but also poses a threat to journalism and the free flow of ideas. It is incumbent upon all stakeholders institutions, faculty, students, and the public to challenge and resist such trends that threaten the very essence of academia and a democratic society.

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Harvard University's Lifetime Censorship Award: Impact on Freedom of Speech and Journalism - Medriva