Daily Archives: June 11, 2024

In a welcome development for people who care about liberty, Australia's government suspended its efforts to censor the planet. The country's officials suffered pushback from X (formerly Twitter) and condemnation by free speech advocates after attempting to block anybody, anywhere from seeing video of an attack at a Sydney church. At least for the moment, they've conceded defeat based, in part, on recognition that X is protected by American law, making censorship efforts unenforceable.

The Rattler is a weekly newsletter from J.D. Tuccille. If you care about government overreach and tangible threats to everyday liberty, this is for you.

"I have decided to discontinue the proceedings in the Federal Court against X Corp in relation to the matter of extreme violent material depicting the real-life graphic stabbing of a religious leader at Wakeley in Sydney on 15 April 2024," the office of Australia's eSafety Commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, announced last week. "We now welcome the opportunity for a thorough and independent merits review of my decision to issue a removal notice to X Corp by the Administrative Appeals Tribunal."

The free speech battle stems from the stabbing in April of Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel and Father Isaac Royel at an Orthodox Christian Church by a 16-year-old in what is being treated as an Islamist terrorist incident. Both victims recovered, but Australian officials quickly sought to scrub graphic video footage of the incident from the internet. Most social media platforms complied, including X, which geoblocked access to video of the attack from Australia pending an appeal of the order.

But Australian officials fretted that their countrymen might use virtual private networks (VPNs) to evade the blocks. The only solution, they insisted, was to suppress access to the video for the whole world. X understandably pushed back out of fear of the precedent that would set for the globe's control freaks.

"Our concern is that if ANY country is allowed to censor content for ALL countries, which is what the Australian 'eSafety Commissar' is demanding, then what is to stop any country from controlling the entire Internet?" responded X owner Elon Musk.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) also argued that "no single country should be able to restrict speech across the entire internet" as did the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE). The organizations jointly sought, and received, intervener status in the case based on "the capacity for many global internet users to be substantially affected."

In short, officials lost control over a tussle they tried to portray as a righteous battle by servants of the people against, in the words of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, "arrogant billionaire" Elon Musk. Instead, civil libertarians correctly saw it as a battle for free speech against grasping politicians who aren't content to misgovern their own country but reach for control over people outside their borders.

Worse for them, one of their own judges agreed.

"The removal notice would govern (and subject to punitive consequences under Australian law) the activities of a foreign corporation in the United States (where X Corp's corporate decision-making occurs) and every country where its servers are located; and it would likewise govern the relationships between that corporation and its users everywhere in the world," noted Justice Geoffrey Kennett in May as he considered the eSafety commissioner's application to extend an injunction against access to the stabbing video. "The Commissioner, exercising her power under s 109, would be deciding what users of social media services throughout the world were allowed to see on those services."

He added, "most likely, the notice would be ignored or disparaged in other countries."

This is where the U.S. First Amendment and America's strong protections for free speech come into play to thwart Australian officials' efforts to censor the world.

"There is uncontroversial expert evidence that a court in the US (where X Corp is based) would be highly unlikely to enforce a final injunction of the kind sought by the Commissioner," added Kennett. "Courts rightly hesitate to make orders that cannot be enforced, as it has the potential to bring the administration of justice into disrepute."

Rather than have his government exposed as impotently overreaching to impose its will beyond its borders, Kennett refused to extend the injunction.

Three weeks later, with free speech groups joining the case to argue against eSafety's censorious ambitions, the agency dropped its legal case pending review by the Administrative Appeals Tribunal.

"We are pleased that the Commissioner saw the error in her efforts and dropped the action," responded David Greene and Hudson Hongo for EFF. "Global takedown orders threaten freedom of expression around the world, create conflicting legal obligations, and lead to the lowest common denominator of internet content being available around the world, allowing the least tolerant legal system to determine what we all are able to read and distribute online."

But if the world escaped the grasp of Australia's censors, the country's residents may not be so lucky.

The fight between eSafety and X "isn't actually about the Wakeley church stabbing attacks in April it's about how much power the government ultimately hands the commissioner once it's finished reviewing the Online Safety Act in October," Ange Lavoipierre wrote for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

"The video in dispute in the case against X has been used, in my opinion, as a vehicle for the federal government to push for powers to compel social media companies to enforce rules of misinformation and disinformation on their platforms," agrees Morgan Begg of the free-market Institute of Public Affairs, which opposes intrusive government efforts to regulate online content. "The Federal Court's decision highlights the government's fixation with censorship."

That is, the campaign to force X to suppress video of one crime is largely about domestic political maneuvering for power. But it comes as governments around the worldespecially that of the European Unionbecome increasingly aggressive with their plans to control online speech.

If the battle between Australia's eSafety commissioner and X is any indication, the strongest barrier to international censorship lies in countriesthe U.S. in particularthat vigorously protect free speech. From such safe havens, authoritarian officials and their grasping content controls can properly be "ignored or disparaged."

Read more:
Australian Censors Back Down, Highlighting the U.S. as a Free Speech Haven - Reason

Ask just about any American college administrator and they'll tell you: This past semester was one of the most chaotic on record.

College leadership can enjoy a momentary sigh of relief for surviving the semester marked by post-October 7protests,encampments,congressional inquiries andfreespeechcontroversies. But without real reform, the same problems will be waiting for them in the fall: demands to censor protected speech, questions about what is and isnt protected expression on campus, and increased concerns about student safety amid campus protests.

When facing protest-related challenges, some administrators might be inclined to create policies that further restrict expression. This must be resisted at all costs. The solution must never be censorship but a recommitment to the principles of free expression that have long been the lifeblood of academia.

It is the duty of college leaders to ensure students and faculty understand and respect First Amendment rights and responsibilities. In doing so, they establish a baseline from which they can turn controversy into teachable moments rather than turning to censorship.

The path forward is simple: Craft policies that protect free speech, do not overburden campus expression with oppressive regulations, teach free expression from day one, and commit to making free speech an institutional value before controversy ever arises.

First things first: Colleges and universities must ensure their policies safeguard expression rather than stifle it. While this sounds simple,85% of Americas four-year institutions either clearly and substantially restrict free speech or impose vague regulations on expression. Worse yet, more than1 in 5 students reported that their college administrations stance on free speech on campus is not clear.

As university leadership reviews and solidifies existing policies, it must make those policies as clear and concise as possible. Too often schools attempt to regulate events based on content or viewpoint or place other unreasonable burdens on public expression.

Yes, universities may enforcereasonable time, place, and manner restrictions to ensure expressive activity does not infringe on teaching and learning on campus, but any such restriction must be content- and viewpoint-neutral. In other words, it must be carefully crafted to guarantee faculty and students are able to teach and learn free from substantial interruption while providing alternative options for individuals to express themselves on campus.

We cannot allow illiberal activity to be an excuse to ignore basic First Amendment principles. Now is the time to correct course and ensure these institutions continue to grow as beacons of intellectual exploration and human progress.

Weve already seen calls fromlegislators demanding viewpoint-based restrictions on campus speech. For example, the federalAntisemitism Awareness Act would require the U.S. Department of Education to use a definition of anti-Semitism that is vague, overbroad, and includes criticism of the Israeli government.

Mandating a definition of this nature would not help schools address discrimination, but it would pressure institutions to investigate and censor speech that falls under such a definition even when those statements are protected by the First Amendment. Similar overbroad policies have recently been used to suppress free speech in places like theUniversity of Texas at San Antonio, where an administrator allegedly told protesters that they cannot say Zionism because it qualifies as antisemitic hate speech.

As confidence in higher education reaches historic lows, now is the time for campus leaders to return to first principles and re-establish their institutions as communities devoted to the discovery, preservation, and dissemination of knowledge.

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Second, universities must not strangle free speech with red tape. Institutions likeKean University mandate that students reserve an area multiple days before protesting or passing out pamphlets and brochures. These unnecessary hurdles chill speech by limiting students ability to express themselves in the moment or overburdening students to the point they may choose not to express themselves at all.

Third, we must educate incoming students on the principles of free speech from day one. Unfortunately, colleges today cannot expect students to arrive on campus with knowledge about the boundaries of free speech and academic freedom. For instance,more than a quarter of students said that using violence to stop a campus speech is acceptable to some degree, according to FIREs College Free Speech Rankings. Another 45% said that students blocking other students from attending a speech is at least rarely acceptable. These illiberal forms of mob censorship create environments in which students become afraid to speak up.

Orientation is the perfect time to educate students on the role of free speech on campus, the limits of First Amendment protections, and how students can legally exercise their freedom. From this foundation, students can begin their educational journey without censoring themselves for fear of overstepping the boundaries of protected expression.

Finally, colleges must cultivate an environment where students and faculty are free to push the boundaries of human understanding and challenge themselves and established orthodoxies.

The policy change could spark similar reforms throughout higher education. Where Harvard leads, others follow.

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Some of the countrys premier institutions are already rising to that challenge. Within the past two weeks,Harvard University,Syracuse University, andStanford University have taken proactive steps by committing toinstitutional neutrality, promising to refrain from issuing statements on political or social issues that do not impact core operations of the school. These declarations affirm the schools dedication to providing a platform where students and faculty can engage in debates on contemporary issues, free from institutional bias or commentary.

During the spring semester, we witnessed peaceful protests, civil disobedience, violence, and arrests on our nations campuses. This is not the first time weve seen such turmoil on campus, and it probably wont be the last time. We cannot allow illiberal activity to be an excuse to ignore basic First Amendment principles. Now is the time to correct course and ensure these institutions continue to grow as beacons of intellectual exploration and human progress.

FIRE is happy to work one-on-one with university administrators to reform the speech climate on your campus free of charge. Just email us at speechcodes@thefire.org.

Go here to see the original:
How college leaders can overcome the current campus crisis - Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression

Harvard evolutionary biology lecturer Carole Hooven didnt set out to cause controversy, but her research on hormones and behavior led her to conclusions on a third-rail topic that drove a wedge between her and her peers.

After defending the use of the terms male and female in a public interview, Carole endured a media firestorm and backlash from students, professors, and administrators, some of whom publicly disparaged her for simply sharing her views. The professor defended herself, but the environment became so hostile, she ultimately resigned.

Fortunately, her story doesnt end there. In the wake of the controversy, faculty formed the Council on Academic Freedom at Harvard to further free inquiry and intellectual diversity on campus. As an active member of the now-more-than-170-member group, Carole is working toward a Harvard where faculty can fearlessly pursueVeritas.

If there is any silver lining to losing the career that I found so fulfilling, she wrote in The Free Press, perhaps its that my story will help explain the fear that stalks campuses, a fear that spreads every time someone is punished for their speech.

Read the original:
FIRE's 25 Faces of Free Speech - Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression

The article is here; the Abstract:

Speech damages someone's reputation when it leads others to believe that that person has done something that reflects poorly on their character. When that belief is also false the reputational damage is undeserved, and it is the point of American defamation law to protect individuals from suffering such undeserved reputational damage.

It is easy to understand why individuals would need protection from false and derogatory claims made about them in works of nonfiction, such as journalism, documentaries, and biographies. But it is not immediately clear why individuals would also need protection from fiction. Although authors of fiction often base their fictional characters on real people, they do not typically make real people characters in their stories. Even when they do put real people in their stories and depict them as doing bad things, the audience is still usually meant only to imagine the real people doing those bad things.

Nevertheless, some works of fiction are not only about real people but also do real and undeserved damage to their reputations. It may not be true, as has often been alleged, that Aristophanes's comedy The Clouds gave Socrates the reputation for rejecting the gods and corrupting the young that later led to his execution. But readers of parodies of news articles published on sites like The Onion and The Babylon Bee are sometimes duped, especially when they are already inclined to think poorly of the public figure that is being ridiculed.

Of course parodies are believed only when they are not recognized as parodies. But there are other genres of fiction that mix facts into the story, such as biofiction, biopics, and docudramas, and it is not always easy for audiences to distinguish what the author is making up from what the author is, or ought to be, trying to get right.

The biographical drama Amadeus suggested that Salieri poisoned Mozart, re-popularizing an old rumor about Salieri that the filmmakers must have at least strongly suspected was false. Salieri, being dead, is in no position to bring a lawsuit. But the villain of the docudrama When They See Us, Linda Fairstein, is alive and is suing Netflix and Ava DuVernay, the director, for defamation.

Fairstein was chief of Sex Crimes Prosecution during the investigation and prosecution of the "Central Park Five," five Black and Latino teenagers who were convicted of the beating and rape of a jogger in Central Park but who were exonerated years later after a serial rapist whose DNA was found at the scene confessed to the crime and said that he had acted alone. Fairstein alleges that she was defamed in several scenes in the docudrama, including in a scene where she is depicted as concealing potentially exculpatory evidence from the defense and a scene where she is depicted as instructing officers to use harsh interrogation techniques. As a result of her depiction in When They See Us, Fairstein's publishing contract was canceled (she had become a best-selling mystery writer since leaving the DA's office), her literary agents dropped her, #cancellindafairstein trended on Twitter, and Glamour magazine expressed regret they had named her Woman of the Year in 1993.

As the docudrama When They See Us makes clear, fiction about real people can do serious damage to their reputations. It is another question whether it is ever appropriate to hold an author of fiction legally liable for that damage. One aim of defamation law may be to reflect our pre-legal moral duties of care to avoid damaging others' reputations. If so, one important consideration for determining how defamation law should handle fiction is whether and when an author of fiction would count, morally speaking, as having wrongfully damaged someone's reputation.

But defamation law is also answerable to another moral value, namely, freedom of speech, that may be in tension with these pre-legal duties of care. Even when it is plausible that an author of fiction has wrongfully damaged someone's reputation, there might still be a reason of freedom of speech, even an overriding reason, to shield such an author from liability.

This Article will address the question of what limits, if any, freedom of speech would place on holding authors liable for the reputational damage they cause with fiction. By "freedom of speech" I will not be referring to the First Amendment but rather to one conception of the moral idea underlying it. According to this conception, the limits that freedom of speech places on the scope of authors' liability for causing false and defamatory beliefs are whatever limits are necessary to adequately protect our interests as potential authors and audiences, and whose costs are acceptable in terms of other interests. To apply this conception, it will be necessary to identify our interests as potential authors of and audiences for fiction about real people, and to assess how these interests would be affected by different limits.

Ultimately, I will argue that freedom of speech is consistent with holding authors liable for reputational damage caused by their violations of fiction's "veracity rules" and for reputational damage caused by mistakes that their target audience would be expected to make. But liability for beliefs that are traceable to mistakes that only an author's incidental audience would be expected to make is, I will argue, prohibited by freedom of speech, so long as the costs of that protection remain acceptable.

Read more here:
Journal of Free Speech Law: "Fiction, Defamation, and Freedom of Speech," by Prof. Collin O'Neil - Reason

George Kimball was ready for war as soon as the first brick hit his head.

The 20-year-old printer was listening to an abolitionist lecture in Bostons Bowdoin Square during the 1860 presidential campaign, when a pro-slavery throng tried to shut it down. Kimball was prepared, present as part of a torch-bearing, black-clad bodyguard called the Wide Awakes, who beat the brick-throwers back using their torches as clubs.

As Kimball walked home, blood in his eyes, he wanted war declared at once. Years later, having fought his way through from Bull Run to Gettysburg to Petersburg, he still considered that Boston brickbat, as much a casus belli as was the firing upon Fort Sumter. For him, it was the embattled right to publicly protest slavery that sparked the conflict a fight over free speech brought on the war.

Today, our starkest political debates often turn on similar questions of public speech and public violence. Across diverse conflicts, from college campuses to the Capitols steps, we keep asking where the line is between heated words and aggressive deeds. Though framed as a legal question concerning the First Amendment, more often its a conundrum for our political culture.

In a democracy, how far is too far?

Its a question that fueled Americas bloodiest war. The Civil War was fought over slavery (anyone who says it wasnt is just wrong). But how did American slavery, which began in 1619, spark a conflict in 1861? How did a long-running debate turn into a shooting war? Where, exactly, was that dynamic moment when an argument became a fight?

George Kimballs Wide Awakes help make sense of it all. That half-forgotten movement provides a missing link between the election and the war. In the presidential campaign of 1860, hundreds of thousands of diverse young Americans joined companies of Wide Awakes, marching in militaristic uniforms, escorting Republican speakers, fighting in defense of antislavery speech. Their grass-roots rising helped elect Abraham Lincoln as president but also began the spiral into war.

Originally posted here:
Opinion | Long Before the Woke, There Were the Wide Awake - The New York Times

Yulia Navalnaya and the Russian Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK), established by her late husband Alexei Navalny, receivedDW's 2024 Freedom of Speech Award at a ceremony in Berlin on Wednesday.

Navalnaya told the audience that free speech had been her husband and his organization's "most important weapon" during the last 13 years while trying to oppose Russian President Vladimir Putin.

"During these years, Putin has destroyed elections. During these years, Putin has prohibited protests. During these years, Putin has suppressed independent media. And he has tried to silence anyone who said what he didn't like.But he failed. Yes, he killed my husband, Alexei Navalny. But he didn't silence him and his ideas," she said.

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The decision to give the prize to Navalnaya and the FBK was originally announced last month.

Navalnayahailed her husband for "risking everything" to show Putin and Russian society more generally that freedom of speech "is not a weakness," as she said dictators like Putin perceived it, but rather a strength.

"Alexei proved this with his entire life and work, when he wasn't afraid to speak in court, in prison, risking everything. Believing that sincere words will defeat any lie. Showing how honest speech brings hundreds of thousands of people to the streets in a country where it seemed like there was no space left for public politics. Showing how the truth makes even an all-powerful dictator tremble with fear," she said.

DW's Director General Peter Limbourg and German Finance Minister Christian Lindner paid tribute to Navalnaya and her late husband, and the FBK's Ivan Zhdanov, a lawyer and longstandingfriend and ally of Navalny's.

"The Anti-Corruption Foundation and Yulia Navalnaya are dedicated to bringing light into the darkness of the corrupt and murderous system that is the Russian government," Limbourg said.

Both Lindner and Zhdanov spoke at length about Navalny's letters from prison during his incarceration prior to his death, including one in which he had noted how the "virus" of free thought appeared to be spreading in Russia's prison system, voicing hope that the secret services would struggle to suppress it.

Lindner described Navlany as a "super-spreader" of this virus in Russia.

"His aim was to, in a way, infect society in order to democratize and permanently immunize it against every form of oppression and autocracy," Lindner said."Like a virus, he was first isolated, and then repressed in the most brutal way. In the end, the regime I have no doubt even murdered him."

Lindner said the DW award served asa reminder of the meaning of democracy and the rule of law.

"Wecannot take for granted any of the core values on which our society is built, even if in Germany we sometimes think that we can, with a certain arrogance. In Russia, you risk your life if you fight for them," he said.

But Lindner also said it was crucial to remember the words of Navalnaya, namely that "Putin is not Russia, and Russia is not Putin."

Navalny had written in one of his letters from prison, when he was saying how he was reading Soviet-era dissident literature and despairing at how familiar the story felt, that he hoped that by 2055nobody could have the same experience in Russia. Lindner voiced hope that not only would this day come, but in much less than another 30 years.

"We must not lose sight of the fact that time is on our side. It is a fact that Putin's time in office will come to an end one day. Which makes it all the more important that Russia is prepared for democracy when the time comes. Ladies and gentlemen, in the long term, the will to be free will always prevail over oppression," said the leader of the neoliberal Free Democrats.

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Alexei Navalny founded the Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK) in Russia in 2011. Its original primary aim was to combat corruption by uncovering and publicizing cases of bribery and abuse of power among the Russian elite.

But he became one of the most prominent and outspoken opponents of PresidentPutin.

Navalny decided to return to Russia, despite having barely survived what German doctors designated as an attempt to poison him with a Soviet-era nerve agentin January 2021.

He was immediately detained on his return, accused of violating the terms of his bail for prior convictions,and was later sentenced to a series of other charges he dismissed as politically motivated.

In December 2023, he went missing from his prison cell near Moscow for around three weeks. It later transpired he had been transferred to a remote maximum security penal colony in the Arctic Circle.

On February 16, the Russian prison service reported that he had died at the age of 47.

That was just a matter of weeks before Putin's reelection as president.

Navalny's death came on the same day as the opening of the Munich Security Conference in Germany, as DW's chief political correspondent Michaela Kfner noted during the ceremony on Wednesday. Until the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, thesecuritygathering had always made a point of ensuring Russian participation.

Navalnaya still spoke at that event as scheduled, saying she intended to continue her husband's work.

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"Like you, Yulia, I was at the Munich Security Conference when the news broke. It was no coincidence, I'm sure," Lindner said of the timing of Navalny'sdeath. "Putin wanted to send a message to the world. But he was wrong. If he achieved anything, it was to strengthen our resolve. It was you, Yulia, of all people, who gave us back our courage that day. For you to find the strength and determination in Munich to address the worldwas impressive, moving and most inspiring."

The FBK is now designated as a terrorist organization in Russia and is operating effectively from exile. "Deutsche Welle knows the feeling," Kfner said when mentioning this at the event, in reference to the closure of DW's offices in Moscow shortly before the invasion of Ukraine.

DW's Russian language service continues to operate and try to reach users in Russia, Director General Limbourg stressed at the event, despite Moscow's efforts, not unlike China, to restrict ordinary people's access online or by other means of reception.

DW launched the annual Freedom of Speech Award in 2015.

It "honors people who passionately stand up for freedom of opinion and of the press," as Limbourg put it during Wednesday's ceremony in Berlin.

Past winners include investigative journalists Oscar Martinez from El Salvador, Tobore Ovuorie of Nigeria, Anabel Hernandez from Mexico, the White House Correspondents' Association, Saudi Arabian dissident and humanist Raif Badawi, andMstyslav Chernov and Evgeniy Maloletka from eastern Ukraine, for their work soon after Russia's 2022 full-scale invasion.

Edited by: Natalie Muller

Read more:
Yulia Navalnaya: Free speech is our 'most important weapon' DW 06/05/2024 - DW (English)