Category Archives: Free Speech

Faculty and staff saw significantly higher participation in the survey across the institutions than students. Some conservatives report a better learning environment in recent months.

More than a third of students enrolled at state Board of Regents institutions completed first amendment training in the spring 2022 semester.

On the University of Iowa campus, 35 percent of students and 57 percent of faculty and staff completed the training.

Across all colleges, faculty and staff had a higher completion rate, and the UI had the lowest participation rate of the three schools.

The University of Northern Iowa had participation from 39 percent of students and 76 percent of staff, while Iowa State had participation from 37 percent of students and 81 percent of staff.

Iowa law required Board of Regents institutions to implement the training. Instruction from UI President Barbara Wilson and Board of Regents President Mike Richards said students, faculty, and staff were expected to complete the training by the end of the spring 2022 semester.

This requirement came about in reaction to some instances on campus where conservative students reported not feeling able to express themselves. This included when College Republicans chalked messages in support of the police, former President Donald Trump, and anti-abortion sentiments. Other students then washed away the messages with water, prompting the UI to issue a statement on their chalking policy.

RELATED: University clarifies campus chalk policy after College Republicans chalk Pentacrest

Rep. Bobby Kaufmann, R-Wilton, said he was receiving a significant among of complaints from conservative on Iowa campuses about the environment a year and a half ago, but that the atmosphere seems to have improved significantly on campus in the last six to eight months, he estimated.

According to the University of Iowa Campus Climate Survey conducted in 2021, 44 percent of undergraduate students at the UI reported feeling less likely to be respected.

Ive actually had some people reach out and say, hey, whatever you guys did, whatever the university or whoever did, its sure working because we feel a lot more fairly represented and a lot more fairly treated, he said.

RELATED: University of Iowa College of Dentistry to alter approach to student speech

Rep. Mary Mascher, D-Iowa City, who has worked as an educator and is a member of the Iowa House education committee, said she supports the intent behind the training

I dont have a problem with teaching what is and isnt ok and making sure that everybody is on the same page in terms of freedom of speech and making sure that everybody is on the same page in terms of what that entails,Mascher said.

In the same vein, Mascher added she also doesnt want to see censorship of books including topics some legislators find controversial. Republicans, such as Sen. Jake Chapman, R-Des Moines, proposed punishing K-12 educators for offering books including topics of racial injustice and queer characters, claiming in the opening on of the 2022 legislative session that some educators had a sinister agenda.

I just think it sends a chill into the hearts of educators who are there to provide a good learning environment for students, Mascher said.

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More than a third of students participated in free speech training - UI The Daily Iowan

Category: Cases, Free Speech, Litigation

Can a powerful organization bully a critic into silence for condemning the use of electric-shock devices on residents? Not on FIREs watch.

NeuroClastic, Inc. is a small, autistic-led, nonprofit organization that criticized the Judge Rotenberg Educational Centers use of electric shocks on autistic people to suppress their behaviors. Based outside of Boston, the Rotenberg Center is the only facility in the United States using such electric-shock devices a practice so notorious that it was condemned by the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture.

In August 2021, NeuroClastic surveyed professionals in the field of applied behavior analysis regarding the Rotenberg Centers use of the device. The findings, which were published on NeuroClastics website, note that 89% of survey respondents were strongly opposed to the electric-shock device.

On April 27, 2022, the Rotenberg Center sent NeuroClastic a cease-and-desist letter arguing that seven statements in the article were defamatory. It threatened to sue NeuroClastic for damages if it did not permanently and immediately delete the objectionable statements.

On August 30, 2022, FIRE demanded that the Rotenberg Center drop its baseless threat of litigation. As explained in the response to the cease-and-desist letter, the Rotenberg Center cannot clear the high bar imposed by the constitutional malice test for defamation. Because the Rotenberg Center is a public figure, the First Amendment requires that it prove by clear and convincing evidence that NeuroClastic knew its statements were false or acted with reckless disregard for the truth. Additionally, defamation only applies to statements of fact. Opinions, including opinions on electric-shock therapy, are not actionable in a defamation suit. NeuroClastics statements are true or protected opinions. FIREs letter explains that the threatened defamation claims are meritless and puts the Rotenberg Center on notice to preserve all records of the electric-shock usage going forward given its threat of further legal action. Additionally, FIRE notes that an apology from the Rotenberg Center and retraction of its litigation threat is warranted.

The letter marks one of FIREs efforts as counsel defending the expressive rights of off-campus speakers following its June expansion beyond higher education.

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NeuroClastic: Autistic-Led Nonprofit Organization Stands Up for Free Speech Against Bully's Threat of Defamation Suit - Foundation for Individual...

Public Artwork Will Be Shown Every Evening Wed.-Sun., Sept. 1418

(NEW YORK)On five nights in September, the renowned artist Jenny Holzer will celebrate PEN Americas century-long defense of the written word and the fundamental rights that make free expression possible with a powerful new series of light projections that will illuminate three buildings in Manhattans iconic Rockefeller Center.

Starting after sunset at 8 pm on Wednesday, Sept. 14, and continuing until 10 pm each evening through Sunday, Sept. 18, the facades of 30 Rockefeller Plaza and 610 and 620 Fifth Avenue will be lit with selected passages from gifted writers and artists who have supported PEN Americas vital work to protect free expression.

The outdoor installation, titled SPEECH ITSELF, will include quotes from more than 60 authors in a visual tribute to the cherished freedoms to write, read, and speak. Among those whose words will be projected are Ayad Akhtar, Salman Rushdie, Kwame Anthony Appiah, Margaret Atwood, Ron Chernow, Henry Louis Gates Jr., Joy Harjo, Jhumpa Lahiri, Yoon Ha Lee, Toni Morrison, Alejandro Zambra, and Nadya Tolokonnikova of the performance art group Pussy Riot.

The collaboration between the 100-year-old organization of writers defending free expression for all and the impresario of language who makes words into visual spectaculars, as the New York Times called Holzer, comes amid rising threats worldwide to the rights of writers, journalists, scholars, artists and people from all walks of life to read, speak, teach, and learn freely.

For a century, PEN America has defended imperiled writers such as Salman Rushdie, a former PEN America president, who was savagely attacked in August after living for more than three decades under a fatwa issued by theocrats in Iran calling for his murder.

According to PEN Americas annual Freedom to Write Index, rising authoritarianism worldwide is targeting a growing number of writers and intellectuals for persecution and imprisonment (277 imprisoned in 2021 according to the 2021 PEN America Freedom to Write Index). At home, PEN America is tracking proliferating threats including book bans, educational gag orders, disinformation, and self-censorship. The litany of attacks is chilling: more than 1,500 book titles banned in U.S. schools; educational gag orders censoring topics from race to LGBTQ issues in classrooms; the undermining of protest rights; online harassment of journalists to silence them; the stifling of out-of-step voices on campuses, and the disappearance of local news outlets. All of this makes PEN Americas mission of the last 100 years to defend and celebrate free expression more urgent than ever.

Suzanne Nossel, CEO of PEN America, said: Because her work reifies and celebrates words, there could not be an artist more fitting to celebrate PEN Americas centenary than the legendary Jenny Holzer. Her vision of elevating the ideas and stories unique to PEN America and making them accessible to a wider public has been transformational for our organization. To watch her keen eye pore through the annals of free speech and our history as an organization to choose messages, statements and questions that demand attention has been riveting. We are thrilled that the people of New York City will be able to join in this visually arresting, intellectually challenging homage to words, ideas, writers and voices that embody the ongoing, urgent battle in defense of free speech.

Holzer stated: PEN Americas extraordinary commitment to the written and spoken word, and to standing for open expression worldwide, inspires. PENs work to protect some rawness to borrow from Colm Tibn supports the purpose of language in public spaces. I am delighted and honored to collaborate with PEN on an installation that lights its significant century-long dedication to the freedoms to think, to write, and to speak.

Holzer has presented her astringent ideas, arguments, and sorrows in public places and international exhibitions, including the Venice Biennale, the Guggenheim Museums in New York and Bilbao, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the Louvre Abu Dhabi. Her medium, whether a T-shirt, plaque, or LED sign, is writing, and the public dimension is integral to the work. Starting in the 1970s with her New York City street posters and continuing through light projections on landscape and architecture, her practice has rivaled ignorance and violence with humor and kindness.

Jenny Holzers monumental tribute to freedom of expression demonstrates the immense power of public art and is a poignant reminder of PEN Americas vital impact over the past century, said EB Kelly, Head of Rockefeller Center and Managing Director at Tishman Speyer. The stirring messages that will be illuminated across Rockefeller Centers historic buildings each evening will invite visitors to pause and reflect on the urgent need to protect free expression.

PEN Americas yearlong centenary celebration includes PEN America at 100, an exhibit at the New-York Historical Society through Oct. 9, highlighting the concerns that have engaged PEN Americas writers in activism and community through the decades. PEN America at 100 traces the organizations evolution from a dining club formed by well-known New York writers in 1922 into a force for literary and human rights that unites writers and readers across the U.S. and world in defense of the fundamental freedoms to write, read, and speak. Spotlighting consequential debates and dramatic moments in history that continue to reverberate today, PEN America at 100 shines a light on free speech, inclusion and diversity, censorship, government intrusions in the free flow of information, digital and press freedom, and the exclusion, silencing, and persecution of writers and journalists.

The centenary began with the 2022 PEN America Literary Gala last May 23 in New York, which was highlighted by the unveiling of a fireproof edition of Margaret Atwoods best seller The Handmaids Tale (sold by Sothebys for $130,000 to benefit PENs work) and continues through the 2023 gala next May. Also included in the commemoration is a daylong public symposium called Words on Fire in New York City, with a scheduled lineup of literary stars including Atwood, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, and Dave Eggers, among others; as well as Flashpoints, a series of talks on free speech and civil rights in cities nationwide that continues through 2023.

Quotes to be displayed on the facades of Rockefeller Center buildings as part of SPEECH ITSELF include:

We have no richer capacity than the ability to formulate and express ideas.

Andrew Solomon

Life in which you are denied expression is a life in which you cant be fully who you are.

Kwame Anthony Appiah

In a world where independent voices are increasingly stifled, PEN is not a luxury, its a necessity.

Margaret Atwood

Free speech has long been a potent weapon for disenfranchised groups, used to expose repression and prevent the powerful from silencing dissent.

Suzanne Nossel

The biggest threat is apathy. Without the will to do something, however small, the tyrants win.

Yoon Ha Lee

About PEN America

PEN America stands at the intersection of literature and human rights to protect open expression in the United States and worldwide. We champion the freedom to write, recognizing the power of the word to transform the world. Our mission is to unite writers and their allies to celebrate creative expression and defend the liberties that make it possible. Learn more atpen.org.

Contact: Suzanne Trimel, STrimel@PEN.org, 201-247-5057

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Artist Jenny Holzer to Light Up Rockefeller Center in Tribute to PEN America's 100 Years of Defending Free Expression - PEN America

Back in early July, after the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade, Governor JB Pritzker and the two Democratic legislative leaders, House Speaker Chris Welch and Senate President Don Harmon, issued a joint statement, which in part said: We plan to work closely together for the remainder of the summer to assess every possibility of what we can do and convene a special session in the coming months.

But the fine print of the rest of that statement has slowed things down: As we build on Illinois' nation-leading abortion protections and access, it is essential to bring lawmakers and advocates into the room to continue to work together. In the coming weeks, as the ripples of the decision to overturn Roe are felt throughout the nation, we expect to get an acute sense of our needs and how Illinois can play an even more vital role in standing up for reproductive freedom.

Lawmakers and advocates have been brought together for talks ever since that special session statement was issued, but, as always, the devil is in the details.

Advocates and several legislators appear to only want to pass bills with immediate effective-dates. And that means each chamber would have to come up with three-fifths super-majorities if anything is passed before the end of this calendar year. The voting threshold for immediate effective-dates drops to simple majorities starting January 1. Until then, per the state constitution, the earliest a bill passed with a simple majority can become law is next June 1.

And it almost seems like every few days brings a new legal twist from another anti-abortion state legislature. Just the other day, for instance, a federal judge temporarily blocked part of Idahos near-total abortion ban because it appears to violate a federal law mandating the provision of emergency health-care. The suit was brought by the U.S. Attorney General. Indianas sweeping new anti-abortion law takes effect in September. Iowas Supreme Court flip-flopped in June and ruled that the states constitution does not protect abortion rights after all. And new bans took effect last week in Tennessee, Texas, and North Dakota, according to NPR.

Also, new ideas are popping up with frequency as laws from other states are being analyzed. An idea from Democratic Secretary of State candidate Alexi Giannoulias campaign to block anti-abortion states from using Illinois traffic-camera images to track their residents who travel here for abortions is just one of them.

Giannouliasproposal would prohibit data gathered by automatic license-plate readers from being used to assist other states track their residents while theyre in Illinois for possible violations of abortion laws in their home states. Illinois must enact protections to ensure that data is not used to target women seeking access to abortion services, or employing it as any type of surveillance system to track them, Giannoulias told WBBM Radio.

His Republican opponent, Representative Dan Brady, has responded by saying hell stick to improving services and cutting wait-times and not involve himself in policy. Giannoulias replied that he could walk and chew gum at the same time.

It was a clever move to tie the mostly-ministerial Secretary of State office to actual public policy thats in the headlines every day and driving the nations political dialogue. And thats clearly a sign of a strong campaign.

Along those lines, one of the measures that the legislative leaders and the governor hoped to pass in a special session was an advisory referendum on this Novembers ballot asking if voters wanted a constitutional amendment protecting abortion rights.

These sorts of referenda were a favored tool of former House Speaker Michael Madigan, who would use issues like a tax surcharge on millionaires to drive up Democratic election-day turn-out and, to a lesser extent, provide a boost to future legislative initiatives on the topic, or provide an excuse for not doing anything further.

A referendum has been rejected by many advocates and pro-choice legislators alike, who want to see actual results, not symbolism for obvious political gain.

The bottom line here is that a special session on abortion rights is not looking all that likely any longer.

And the same thing goes for gun-law reforms. There are a lot of moving parts to this issue, and some legislators, particularly Downstaters, would rather not poke the gun lobby before election day.

Rich Miller also publishes Capitol Fax, a daily political newsletter, and CapitolFax.com.

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Will Giannoulias Inherit White's Seat by Tying Abortion Rights to Free Speech? - River Cities Reader

Donald Trumps legal team is struggling to come up with an adequate legal argument for why the ex-president brought government secrets down to Mar-a-Lago with him when he left office. The strategy so far has been to throw everything at the wall and see what sticks, but nothing is sticking. At first, Trumps team argued that he had every right to declassify sensitive information, but then it became obvious that the crimes hes being investigated for dont depend on the material being classified. Another argument they shifted to was that Trump liked to bring his work home with him, which also fell flat because he cant take work home from a job he no longer has. Next, some moved to saying he wanted the documents to help him write his memoirs which is a total joke since Trump doesnt read or write. Its no wonder the former president was having trouble finding a talented legal team to help him because he doesnt appear to have any valid argument that will get him out of this mess.

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Trump's Legal Team SCRAMBLING to Find an Argument - Free Speech TV

LOS ANGELES Citing First Amendment grounds, a judge has dismissed a lawsuit filed by a Colorado teen who alleged she was sexually assaulted at Turn-About Ranch after Dr. Phil McGraw and his staff recommended and arranged for her treatment at the facility for troubled youth.

Plaintiff Hannah Archuleta, who was 19 years old when she filed suit last Oct. 19 in Los Angeles County Superior Court, said she was taken to the ranch in Escalante, Utah, when she was 17 after appearing on an episode of Dr. Phil with her parents in October 2019.

On June 28, Judge Stephanie Bowick heard defense arguments urging dismissal of Archuletas case based on the states anti-SLAPP (Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation) law, which is a legal bar to preventing people from using courts, and potential threats of a lawsuit, to intimidate those who are exercising their free-speech rights.

The judge did not immediately rule, saying she wanted to ponder the issues further. She issued a final decision on Aug. 19.

Defendants carried their initial burden of that this action is barred because the causes of action arise from the content and pre-production activities of a television show broadcast which were acts in furtherance of the exercise of free speech on matters of public interest: television and mental health, the judges order stated.

The complaint alleged McGraw, now 71, and his show staff made glowing statements about the ranch and pressured Archuletas father to send her there immediately while negligently failing to mention the various complaints and charges of physical and emotional harm that befell minors sent to the facility.

Dr. Phil and the show staff members did not tell me anything about any risk that Turn-About staff would physically harm me there, Archuleta said in a sworn statement filed in opposition to the dismissal motion. I was not aware of any facts or allegations of such risks or misconduct before I was sent to Turn-About.

Archuleta further said she was taken directly to Turn-About from the Dr. Phil show by a male and a female escort who said they had to wake up at 5 a.m. that day to come and get her.

But according to the defense attorneys court papers, all the alleged representations by the defendants took place in the context of creating and broadcasting the widely viewed Dr. Phil television show and involved issues of mental health, a matter of public interest.

Archuletas parents contacted the show because of their teenage daughters out-of-control behavior, which included stealing, smoking marijuana, not going to school and terrorizing her father and mother, according to the defense lawyers court papers.

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McGraw, CBS win dismissal of woman's lawsuit on grounds of freedom of speech - 2UrbanGirls

Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones has agreed to allow the company behind his far-right Infowars website to participate in his Connecticut defamation case, meaning both will be on trial in Waterbury in September to decide what they should pay in damages for their false claims that the Sandy Hook school shootings were a hoax.

Jones wholly owned Free Speech Systems told a Texas bankruptcy court Monday that it no longer opposes the Connecticut trial, effectively removing itself from bankruptcy court protection. The company, with Jones, will be exposed millions of dollars in damages to relatives of Sandy Hook victims at the trial, tentatively scheduled for Sept. 13.

Jones threw the Connecticut trial schedule into turmoil when he put Free Speech Systems into federal bankruptcy on July 29, a filing that indefinitely stopped all related litigation in state courts.

Jones allowed a Texas defamation suit to proceed and earlier this month the jury awarded about $49 million to a Sandy Hook family who sued there.

In Connecticut, where the bankruptcy filing came as jury selection was to begin, Judge Barbara Bellis ordered the damages trial to proceed against Jones alone, who did not file for bankruptcy. Some legal analysts suspect Jones decision to allow Free Speech Systems to participate in the Connecticut case is strategic, in that it will permit him to make a stronger defense.

As of Monday night, six jurors and one alternate had been selected for the Waterbury trial. Bellis has instructed the lawyers to agree on three more alternate jurors. Free Speech Systems, in the agreement reached in Texas bankruptcy court, accepted the jurors so far chosen.

Twenty-six first graders and educators were shot to death at the Sandy Hook elementary school in Newtown on Dec. 14, 2012 when 20 year old Adam Lanza blasted his way into the locked school with a semi-automatic rifle and began executing people. He killed himself as police approached.

Family members of murdered children and educators, as well as an FBI agent who was among the first responders, sued Jones for defamation and emotional distress after he asserted repeatedly on his influential radio broadcasts and Internet sites that the massacre was a hoax created to increase support for gun control.

Jones has since acknowledged that the shootings occurred.

The September 13 damages trial in Waterbury involves the consolidation of three suits filed in Connecticut state court against Jones and various of his companies. The suits have been bitterly litigated for four years.

Late last year Bellis took the extraordinary step of issuing a default order against Jones in the Connecticut cases for failing to comply with her orders to disclose information to the victim families effectively settling the suit in favor of the families and leaving only the question of damages against him unresolved. A judge in Texas issued the same ruling in response to Jones apparent efforts to stall the case in that state.

Under the agreement reached in Texas bankruptcy court, Connecticut lawyer Norm Pattis will continue to defend Jones and Free Speech Systems, with assistance as a non-appearing counsel from one of Jones Texas lawyers, F. Andino Reynal.

Both Pattis and Reynal are the subjects of a disciplinary inquiry begun early this month by Bellis after it was learned that highly confidential medical and psychiatric records of the family members suing in Connecticut were improperly disclosed to the legal team representing parents who sued in Texas. The records were protected by state and federal privacy laws, as well as a detailed order by Bellis.

The inquiry has revealed so far that Pattis provided a digital version of the material to one of Jones Texas bankruptcy lawyers, who then handed the material to Reynal. Reynal testified that his secretary gave the material to lawyers for the family suing in Texas, mistaking it for a collection of text messages extracted from Jones telephone.

Lawyers following the case have said the disciplinary inquiry could provide Jones with another opportunity to delay the Connecticut proceedings if he suspects Pattis defense may be affected by the presiding judges investigation.

The bankruptcy court ordered Free Speech Systems to pay Pattis $100,000 a month for September and October, and possibly more if the defense stretches into November or beyond. The Connecticut victims agreed to the fee schedule.

The agreement in Texas bankruptcy court also requires Free Speech Systems to make its representatives available as witness for both Jones and the families suing him.

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Alex Jones to allow company behind Infowars to be part of Connecticut defamation trial in September - theday.com

This show originally aired August 9, 2021

In her new book, Suzanne Nossel delves into the nation's culture wars over the right to free speech and argues that the way forward as a society is to ensure an open market of ideas and protect all speech even that which we disagree with.

Does free speech play an essential role in promoting democracy and human rights? If speech isn't free, who controls it? What are the potential implications of reining in free speech and expression?

What can be done to secure freedom of expression in a "diverse, digitalized, and divided culture"? How can we combat the propagation of disinformation "without running roughshod over values of equality"?

Is it possible to protect free speech and mitigate the harmful impacts of hate speech in the real world and online? Is it possible to support free speech and also battle bigotry? Where should we draw the line?

Guest:Suzanne Nossel, CEO of PEN America and author of "Dare to Speak: Defending Free Speech for All"

"The Source" is a live call-in program airing Mondays through Thursdays from 12-1 p.m. Leave a message before the program at(210) 615-8982. During the live show, call833-877-8255, emailthesource@tpr.orgor tweet@TPRSource.

*This interview was recorded on Monday, August 9.

Originally posted here:
Nossel: To Safeguard Free Speech, We Must Protect Everyone's Right To Be Heard Even Those With Views Offensive To Others - Texas Public Radio

In the middle of July, three big blue billboards went up in and around Jackson, Mississippi. Pregnant? You still have a choice, they informed passing motorists, inviting them to visit Mayday.Health to learn more. Anybody who did landed on a website that provides information about at-home abortion pills and ways to get them delivered anywhere in the United Statesincluding parts of the country, such as Mississippi, where abortions are now illegal under most circumstances.

A few days ago, the founders of the nonprofit that paid for the billboard ads, Mayday Health, received a subpoena from the office of the attorney general of Mississippi. (The state has already been at the center of recent debates about abortion: Dobbs v. Jackson Womens Health Organization, the ruling that overturned Roe v. Wade, upheld a Mississippi statute by allowing states to put strict limits on abortion.) The subpoena, which I have seen, demands a trove of documents about Mayday Health and its activities. It may be the first step in an effort to force Mayday Health to take down the billboards, or even to prosecute the organizations leaders for aiding and abetting criminal conduct.

Mayday Health is not backing down. This week, it is taking out a television ad on Mississippi channels and putting up 20 additional billboards. This makes the legal fight over the Jackson billboards a crucial test in two interrelated conflicts about abortion that are still coming into public view.

Read: The abortion-rights message that some activists hate

The first is that the availability of abortion pills, which are very safe and effective during the first three months of pregnancy, has transformed the stakes of the abortion fight. The pro-life movement has hoped that states new powers to shut down abortion providers will radically reduce the number of abortions around the country. The pro-choice movement has feared that the end of Roe will lead to a resurgence of back-alley abortions that seriously threaten womens health.

Yet the changes wrought by the recent Supreme Court ruling may turn out to be more contained than meets the eye: Legal restrictions on first-trimester abortions have become much harder to enforce because a simple pill can now be used to induce a miscarriage. Abortion by medication is widely available in large parts of the country; as Mayday Health points out on its website, even women who are residents in states where doctors cannot prescribe such pills can set up a temporary forwarding address and obtain them by mail.

The second brewing conflict is about limits on free speech. So long as abortions required an in-person medical procedure, the pro-life movement could hope to reduce them by shutting down local clinics offering the service. Now that comparatively cheap and convenient workarounds exist for most cases, effective curbs on abortion require the extra step of preventing people from finding out about these alternatives. That is putting many members of the pro-life movement, be they Mississippis attorney general or Republican legislators in several states who are trying to pass draconian restrictions on information and advice about abortions, on a collision course with the First Amendment.

Some limits on speech are reasonable. States do, for example, have a legitimate interest in banning advertisements for illegal drugs. If a cocaine dealer took out a billboard advertising his wares, the government should obviously be able to take it down. Especially when it comes to commercial speech, some common-sense restrictions on what people can say or claim have always existed and are well-justified.

But the laws that Republicans are now introducing in state legislatures around the country go far beyond such narrow limits on objectionable commercial speech. In South Carolina, for example, Republican legislators have recently sponsored a bill that would criminalize providing information to a pregnant woman, or someone seeking information on behalf of a pregnant woman, by telephone, internet, or any other mode of communication regarding self-administered abortions or the means to obtain an abortion, knowing that the information will be used, or is reasonably likely to be used, for an abortion.

Read: The coming rise of abortion as a crime

This lawwhich is modeled on draft legislation that the National Right to Life Committee is trying to get passed in many states around the countrywould seriously undermine the right to free speech. It could potentially make doctors in states where abortion is actually legal liable to prosecution for discussing their services with someone who calls them from a state where abortion is illegal. It could even outlaw basic forms of speech such as news stories containing information that might be used by someone seeking an abortion. Theoretically, even this article could fall under that proscription.

The subpoena issued by the office of Mississippis attorney general is objectionable for similar reasons. Mayday Health is not advertising a commercial product or service. The organization does not handle or distribute abortion pills. All it does is provide information. Although one could reasonably believe that the information Mayday Health is providing may be used to commit acts that are now illegal in some parts of the United States, a ban on informational speech that can be used for the purposes of lawbreaking would be unacceptably broad and vague. After all, would-be lawbreakers might also consult the blog posts of lawyers who explain how to object to an improper search of a vehicle or study the pages of a novel to figure out how to make a Molotov cocktail. Should the attorney or the novelist also be considered to have aided or abetted a crime?

Recent efforts to suppress speech about abortion would seriously undermine the nations ability to debate the topic openly and honestly. Anybody who believes in the importance of the First Amendment should oppose them. As Will Creeley, the legal director of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, has pointed out, These proposals are a chilling attempt to stifle free speech Whether you agree with abortion or not is irrelevant. You have the right to talk about it.

In recent years, the wider debate about free speech has undergone a strange transformation. Historically, the American left staunchly defended the First Amendment because it recognized the central part that free speech played in the struggles against slavery and segregation, and in the fight for the rights of women and sexual minorities. But as establishment institutions, including universities and corporations, became more progressive, and parts of the left came to feel that they had a significant share in institutional power, the absolute commitment to free speech waned.

Progressives started to find the idea of restrictions on free speech appealing because they assumed that those making decisions about what to allow and what to ban would share their views and values. Today, some on the extremist left endorse restrictions on free speech, demanding campus speech codes and measures to force social-media sites to deplatform controversial commentators and censor what they claim is misinformation.

Mary Ziegler: Why exceptions for the life of the mother have disappeared

The transformation of the lefts position on freedom of speech has allowed both principled conservatives and the less-than-principled protagonists of the MAGA movement to cast themselves as defenders of the First Amendment. In the mind of many people, the cause of free speech has astoundingly quickly shifted from being associated with left-wing organizations such as the ACLU to becoming the property of right-leaning pundits and politicians.

This makes the new front in the fight over abortion rights an important reminder of why the left should never abandon the cause of free speech. If the left gives up on the core commitment to free speech, what people can say is as likely to be determined by the attorney general of Mississippi as it is by college deans or tech workers. Curbs on free expression have always been a tool of governments that seek to control the lives of their citizens and punish those who defy them. The same remains true today.

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Why Freedom of Speech Is the Next Abortion Fight - The Atlantic

Internet blackouts. Strategic lawsuits against journalists. Regulations restricting the activities of NGOs. The weaponisation of health and security policies. These are all strategies that governments around the world are increasingly using to curtail the right to dissent, protest, and even just access information.

The data is clear: 80 percent of the worlds population lives with less freedom of expression than they had a decade ago, according to this years The Global Expression Report, which I authored, working with statistician Nicole Steward-Streng. The report is published annually by Article 19, a NGO that promotes freedom of expression around the world.

Our research this year shows that only seven percent of people live in a country where freedom of expression has improved over the last decade, and more than one third or 2.6 billion people live in countries where it is in crisis.

Myanmar and Afghanistan saw the largest ever declines in freedom of expression scores last year. This followed amilitary coupin the former, and thereturn of the Talibanto power after two decades of insurgency in the latter. In both cases, the new regimes severely limited freedom of the press, social space for activism, and access to information.

While the scores have not been tabulated since Russia invaded Ukraine at the end of February, both countries are expected to suffer similar plunges this year: Armed conflict is a catastrophe for freedom of expression without exception.

While these dramatic events naturally make headlines, less attention is paid to the slow-marching decline of freedom of expression over time.

Armed conflict is a catastrophe for freedom of expression without exception.

Freedom of expression and democracy are intimately linked, and both are deteriorating on a global scale. State restrictions on free speech are a clear sign that a government is turning away from its people. And once voices are silenced, autocracy is easy work.

The slow reduction of freedom of expression is most marked in the Americas, where countries like Colombia, El Salvador, and Brazil, have seen sustained declines over time as institutions have been eroded and the environment for organisation, civic action, and dissent has been constricted. Hungary and Poland have also seen a steady deterioration of their scores.

These types of declines might happen more slowly, and without violence and upheaval, but they can be just as severe for the people living through them.

Varieties of Democracy, or VDem, is a research initiative that uses hundreds of indicators to measure how robust a given democracy is. Their data shows us that attacks on free expression are often the first step in a democratic backslide, and are frequently followed by the erosion of democratic institutions and then the undermining of elections.

The downward trajectory often starts with restrictions on the press, internet censorship, suppression of protests, or the murder of activists with no accountability. Once on this path, the destination is clear: democratic decline.

The career of Russian President Vladimir Putin provides a clear example of how the decline progresses. Since he took office in 2000, Putin has been eroding the space for public debate in Russia. He moved from dismantling independent media and establishing discursive control to eroding governing institutions, centralising power, and ensuring his permanence in leadership via a referendum and elections where the outcomes were largely predetermined.

Putins efforts have been repeated on a smaller scale across the globe: The level of democracy enjoyed by the average citizen around the world in 2021 has regressed to 1989 levels: 70 percent of the global population lives under dictatorships, according to VDems data. Thats a rise of 20 percent over the past decade.

If this trend continues, we risk reaching a tipping point where enough countries are governed by autocrats and dictators, who support and bolster one another economically and in the international arena, that sanctions will become ineffective and that international governance and human rights bodies will be undermined and diluted to the point of futility.

The level of democracy enjoyed by the average citizen around the world in 2021 has regressed to 1989 levels.

The effort to suppress free expression by anti-democratic regimes is also not limited to within their borders. We have seen abductions and the kidnapping of journalists and dissidents across borders and the abuse of Interpol notices. Cases like that of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was murdered in 2018, have shown us that authoritarian states feel increasingly confident in their ability to commit crimes and to attempt to silence freedom of expression beyond their borders, without facing consequences.

Russia, for example, has long targeted dissidents outside its borders. But only in the wake of the Ukraine invasion has the international community taken strong measures to hold Putins government to account. Meanwhile, the wider lesson seems to have escaped the international community: Even as Western countries slap sanctions on Russia, they have slowly allowed Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman back into the fold, despite his appalling record of suppressing freedom of expression online and evidence that he played a role in the murder of Khashoggi.

The international response to attacks on freedom of expression has been, at best, uneven, consisting of empty words or slaps on the wrist that do little to deter countries from attacking protesters, journalists, and netizens.

We can no longer allow this impunity to reign. As an urgent first step, we must reframe the conversation. There is a growing tendency towards sensationalist and myopic discussions of free speech focusing on hot-button political issues that miss the bigger picture: Freedom of expression means freedom of all expression in the press, through protest, and online. It also encompasses our right to access the information we need about government decisions.

The very real attacks on those rights have many faces, which we must continue to identify and begin to push back against by demanding better of our leaders and representatives, as well as the companies who inform and mediate our means of expression and the information we consume.

The right to freedom of expression defines how we interact, what we know, and how we partake in the way our societies are run and therefore, how we live as individuals and collectively. We must start to defend it by demanding consistent, meaningful action from leaders to protect and ensure that freedom, both for ourselves, and for others within our societies and beyond.

Edited by Abby Seiff.

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Why the backsliding on free expression around the world needs to end - The New Humanitarian