Category Archives: Free Speech

In February, the Modi governments notification of Information Technology Rules was met with concern and criticism. There were demands for the withdrawal of the rules, primarily because of their negative impact on the right to privacy and freedom of expression and their overbroad scope. Several challenges against these rules are pending in various High Courts, and some of the interim orders issued indicate that these courts share concerns about the rules unconstitutionality.

There has also been a lack of clarity on how key aspects of the rules are to be complied with, including, for example, which platforms need to comply with the requirement to trace the first originator of content.

In early November, the government released Frequently Asked Questions on Part-II of the IT Rules, in an attempt to provide clarity and allay concerns. (Part II of the rules set out due diligence requirements, including traceability and establishes a grievance redressal mechanism. This part applies to intermediaries, and significant social media intermediaries, which are those with more than 50 lakh users).

However, it arguably fails to allay concerns, and the limited clarity they offer is on certain procedural aspects relating to the appointment of compliance officers. The questions otherwise rehash old defences, for instance with respect to traceability, that does not substantively address concerns raised by civil society, tech companies and internet users.

This article provides rebuttals to the governments justifications for the IT rules with respect to both Part II and Part III on the code of ethics for digital media which have come up time and again, most recently through the frequently asked questions, to demonstrate how they jeopardise the right to privacy and freedom of expression.

According to the central government, Principles of reasonableness and proportionality have been taken into account while framing the rules, and they create a harmonious, soft-touch oversight mechanism.

However, with respect to all online content including news and current affairs, the rules create a three-tier structure for grievance redressal with the central government at the top of the pyramid. The government also exerts a degree of control over the second-tier involving self-regulatory bodies of publishers, as they need to be registered with the Union Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.

Effectively, the government has the ultimate authority to determine what stays online with the power to direct modification or deletion of content. This will have a chilling effect on free speech. Far from a soft-touch mechanism, this framework tightens the governments grip over free expression online. Reasonableness and proportionality would require meaningful checks and balances limiting arbitrariness and including independent, judicial oversight.

The Centre also claims that the rules were finalised only after elaborate consultations with the public and stakeholders.

While the previous draft of the intermediary guidelines released in 2018 went through public consultation, the current version was not placed in the public domain prior to being enforced. The 2021 rules contain provisions that are either dramatically different from the ones in the previous draft, such as the one on traceability or did not feature in the previous draft at all, such as the code of ethics for online news, OTT platforms and digital media.

Given that these rules have the potential to completely change the internet landscape in India, and their impact on fundamental rights and freedoms, they should be withdrawn and put through an open and inclusive public consultation.

The government claims that the rules do not affect the normal functioning of WhatsApp and there will be no impact on the common user. It also claimed that sufficient legal safeguards have been incorporated while framing the order to trace first originators of information, and would only be adopted as a final measure after other options have been exhausted.

The traceability mandate will require end-to-end encrypted platforms like WhatsApp and Signal to fundamentally alter their architecture to the detriment of users. A defining feature of WhatsApp, Signal and other end-to-end encrypted communication platforms, is that no third party, including the service provider itself, can access the information shared between the sender and the intended recipients. Even in the best-case scenario, the traceability mandate would undermine or weaken encryption by requiring that the originators information, or a kind of identifier, be tagged with a message, thereby creating additional data collection and retention obligations and compromising users privacy and anonymity.

And in the worst-case scenario, the alterations to the platform to make more information of users available would result in a vulnerability that compromises or breaks encryption, resulting in the possibility of unauthorised access to communications and exploitation by malicious actors.

The traceability provision has a direct bearing on the right to privacy and freedom of expression and should have meaningful limitations on the governments discretionary powers which it currently lacks. The government can issue a traceability order on overbroad grounds, the provision does not adhere to the principles of necessity and proportionality recognised by the Supreme Court and there is an absence of independent judicial oversight, all of which point to the lack of sufficient legal safeguards.

The governments response in the frequently asked questions does not address the argument made by civil society, security experts, tech companies and others several times over regarding the technical infeasibility of implementing traceability without undermining the privacy and security promise of end-to-end encryption. It continues to be premised on the false belief that traceability and end-to-end encryption can coexist seamlessly. Separately, the larger issue is that even if implementing traceability may be technically possible, the fact remains that it will jeopardise the privacy and free expression in an unnecessary and disproportionate manner.

The rules aim to place online news platforms on a level playing field with print and broadcast media, according to the government. The decision to govern OTT platforms under the new IT rules was taken in light of complaints raised by civil society and parents requesting interventions. According to the government, A robust grievance redressal mechanism has been provided while upholding journalistic and creative freedom. The measures do not restrict freedom of speech in any manner, the government claimed.

Part III of of the rules create a structure that poses a serious threat to the independence of online news.

In India (as in many other countries) news media is regulated by a peer-based oversight mechanism. News media must adhere to the Norms of Journalistic Conduct, issued by the Press Council of India, an autonomous body under the Press Council Act, 1978. However, these are moral objectives and do not give a state body the power to remove content an essential safeguard for the independence of the media.

All news media is subject to the existing regime of civil and criminal law, including the laws on defamation. Television news must adhere to a Programme Code, created under the Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act, 1995.

In contrast, IT Rules create a three-tier grievance redress mechanism in which the third tier, the inter-ministerial body, has the final say over decisions relating to news content. This tier hears appeals from readers grievances, and the ministry can also directly approach it with complaints relating to the content. This effectively gives the government control over news content.

The grievance redress mechanism makes the publisher responsible for reporting on every complaint filed with the grievance redress officer. This removes the checks inherent in the judicial process in effect granting a trolls veto.

The code also requires publishers to ensure content is in good taste and decency. These are vague and subjective terms and could open publishers up to a wide range of complaints about the news they have reported. The Bombay High Court referred to the Code of Ethics as an impermissible Sword of Damocles hanging over people.

Similarly, the Code of Ethics for OTT platforms imposes constraints on the freedom of expression. The interdepartmental committee is comprised of bureaucrats, which in effect, grants the government the powers to act as a super censor of content. While the government says this brings OTT platforms at par with TV and cinema. It overlooks a fundamental difference between the two mediums.

While TV and the cinema are like push media (ie the material is broadcasted to the public at large), the latter is an instance of pull media, more similar to a video-rental store, available on demand. As consumers have more control and choice in the latter instance, the two types of platforms should not be censored in the same way. In any case, imposing more regulation on content is a retrogressive step, which takes us back to an era of greater regulation of expression.

In any case, regulating OTT platforms and digital news media is beyond scope of the Information Technology Act. Rules, which are issued by the executive branch of government, have to be confined to the subject matter of the parent Act that they are issued under.

The government claimed, The rules aim at controlling the spread of fake news, the misuse of social media by criminals and anti-national elements, and ensuring online safety, particularly for women users, by restricting the circulation of pornography and morphed images. The government aims to tackle this by enabling identification of the first originator of such contents.

These are all serious issues that need to be addressed. However, well-intentioned measures are not necessarily, as in this case, lawful or effective. Traceability undermines end-to-end encryption and its privacy and security guarantees.

Once traceability is implemented on end-to-end encrypted platforms, malicious actors will merely shift to other encrypted channels. The problem of illegal content online will not be resolved, and the public at large will be deprived of secure channels for communication.

Further, as experts have explained, traceability will be practically ineffective because the originators information, such as the mobile number, can be easily manipulated. Commercial services for untraceable messaging will burgeon and traceability is not an effective deterrent as is evident from the prevalence of disinformation on social media platforms on which users can be identified.

Any benefits of implementing traceability are hypothetical and would come at too steep a cost in terms of violation of the fundamental rights to privacy and freedom of expression.

Namrata Maheshwari is a policy counsel and Akhil Thomas is a policy fellow at Access Now, an international digital rights organisation.

Ria Singh Sawhney is a lawyer and researcher who works on digital rights.

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How the Modi governments new IT rules jeopardise the right to privacy and free speech - Scroll.in

The moon landing is fake shouts a man presenting his ideas on campus.

Peter Jarvio has been on campus sharing his theory about the moon landing being a cover up for the flat Earth. Jarvio first presented his ideas Nov. 8 in the University Breezeway and was asked to leave by Public Safety. He came back to the university Monday, but he moved his presentation to a free speech zone.

He stood on the grassy corner next to the Art Center all day Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday sharing his truth to all who will listen.

They faked the moon landing to give us propaganda, Jarvio said. Personally, I think they did a pathetic job of faking it, but people are so gullible.

Jarvio said the 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing was a cover up because, according to him, NASA discovered the Earth was flat. He backed this up by saying the Deep State and Illuminati control NASA, and NASA covered it up.

He claims the Earth is flat because water is able to fit perfectly on his 2D printed models of the Earth. Whereas, he said his spherical model cant possibly hold water at all. Jarvio said he learned this information from binge-watching YouTube videos for two weeks. In his discussion, gravity never came up.

Jarvio offered small 2D models of the Earth and a list of his sources to those willing to hear him out.

The university is the 12th campus Jarvio has visited since he started presenting his thoughts on the moon landing and the shape of the Earth. Jarvio said compared with other universities the response from USI has been positive.

A member of The Shield staff reported a memorable reaction from Steven Williams, associate professor of sociology.

Williams responded to Jarvios presentation Nov. 8 by pointing and loudly laughing at Jarvio in the University Breezeway. Students have also been trying to find ways to avoid Jarvio.

Austin Whitledge, a sophomore accounting major, was leaving the Rice Library and trying to get to class when he saw Jarvio. He said he tried to look away and hope for the best.

I was walking by him, and he kept trying to get my attention, even though I was showing him I wasnt interested, Whitledge said. He then made loud comments to a bunch of students about coming to college to learn but not listen to him.

Jordan Teusch, a sophomore business administration major, said she didnt really care what Jarvio was saying.

His message didnt bother me, Teusch said. It was more about the way he shared it.

Teusch said Jarvio was pushing his thoughts on her and was not friendly in the way he got students attention. I personally dont mind if people like this are on campus, but Id hate to have students change the way they walk to class because of them.

The Eastern Progress and The Indiana Daily Student, the independent student publications for Eastern Kentucky University and Indiana University, both reported Jarvio speaking on their campuses in the last 2 months.

According to the universitys Freedom of Speech Policy, any speaker who has been invited by university student organizations, administrators, staff or faculty members has the right to speak on campus.

Steve Baquette, director of Public Safety, said Jarvio cant be asked to leave campus because Jarvio was scheduled in the free speech zone in accordance with the free speech policy.

Speakers are encouraged to contact Jennifer Hammat, the Dean of Students, if they wish to talk within the free speech zones on campus. Hammat could not be reached for comment as of Wednesday.

On Monday, Ben Luttrull, media relations specialist, said Jarvio is not affiliated with any group on campus and was not invited to speak.

Jarvio said Tuesday he was invited to campus but then retracted his statement saying he invited himself.

A virtual presentation on common conspiracy theories will be held from 4:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. Nov. 30, 2021 on Zoom.

Link:
Man claiming the moon landing is fake speaks on campus - Shield

From violent protestors heckling speakers to restrictive speech codes and trigger warnings, its never been a more challenging time to express an unpopular opinion on campus. According to recent studies by both the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education and the Knight Foundation, more than half of all college students have stopped themselves from sharing an idea or opinion in class and almost a third have self-censored in class because they thought their words might be considered offensive to their peers.

Its not surprising that students feel this way. In recent years, colleges have adopted various policies including speech codes, safe spaces, and free speech zones with the goal of shutting down unwanted speech. The message is clear: students with unconventional ideas should shut up and keep their opinions to themselves.

Censoring speech infringes the rights of students to express their opinions on campus. Just as important, it harms the rights of other students to listen to the speech to challenge, debate, and learn from the views of their fellow students.

Unfortunately, when students speech rights on campus are violated, its tough to fight back. A lone student doesnt stand a chance against a school with a huge endowment and an army of lawyers. Its like David versus Goliath and students feel powerless.

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Speech First - Free speech on campus matters

When the brand-new president of the University of Austin announced the establishment of a brand-new institution dedicated to the fearless pursuit of truth last week, he painted a bleak picture of American academia.

So much is broken in America, wrote Pano Kanelos, the former president of a small liberal arts college in Maryland in a post on the Substack of the noted New York Times self-canceller Bari Weiss. But higher education might be the most fractured institution of all.

Traditional universities have abandoned the pursuit of truth to embrace illiberalism and censoriousness, Kanelos argued. On our quads, faculty are being treated like thought criminals, he added, before citing the cases of three academics who have in no way been treated like thought criminals though more on that later.

In the interest of truth, here are a few hard ones: the founders of the University of Austin have launched a website, not a university. They have no campus, no student body, no degree programs, no accreditation, no faculty and no army of graduate students and adjunct professors to do all the dirty work of actually, you know, teaching classes.

They do have a nice website though, and that website does (or did) include a fairly impressive list of bold-faced names. We count among our numbers university presidents: Robert Zimmer, Larry Summers, John Nunes, and Gordon Gee, and leading academics, such as Steven Pinker, Deirdre McCloskey, Leon Kass, Jonathan Haidt, Glenn Loury, Joshua Katz, Vickie Sullivan, Geoffrey Stone, Bill McClay, and Tyler Cowen, boasted Kanelos. We are a dedicated crew that grows by the day.

When I read the roster of academics attached to the University of Austin (or UATX as they apparently hope to be called) last week, I wondered whether any of those exalted figures would actually be resigning from their sinecures at such truth-abandoning institutions as Harvard, Brown, New York University and the University of Chicago. Over the past eight days a lifetime, really, if youre an eight-day-old baby the dedicated crew has shrunk to a smattering.

Gordon Gee, the president of West Virginia University (WVU), was first to bail on the project, writing a letter to faculty and students at the institution that pays his $800,000 base salary to assure them that WVU is his only priority; that he has no intentions of placing [his] energies elsewhere; and that he did not agree other universities are no longer seeking the truth.

Founding Faculty Fellow Kathleen Stock, a British philosophy professor, assured her Twitter followers that she would not be leaving the UK for Texas.

Haidt declared of UATX that he want[s his] kids to go there a far cry from wanting himself to go there. (As a faculty member at NYU, Haidts generous benefits package includes a 50% to 100% waiver of tuition should those kids elect to pursue an education at NYU rather than a university that lacks a course catalog, degree-granting ability or accreditation, let alone a thriving a cappella scene, improv troupe or student housing.)

And on Monday UATXs one-week-iversary both Zimmer and Pinker resigned from the schools advisory board. Zimmers statement noted that the universitys quite critical statements about the state of higher education had diverged very significantly from his own views, while Pinker declined to offer an explanation beyond the fact that hes concentrating on the (presumably more profitable) endeavors of promoting his book and podcast.

The problem with attempting to recruit among academias superstars is that such faculty members are in actuality treated not like thought criminals, but kings. Tenured professors at private institutions like Pinker and Haidt enjoy job security and remuneration that the vast majority of Americans can only dream of. While most American workers labor under at-will employment a legal regime that obviates any hope of freedom of speech in the workplace tenure protects Pinker from ever facing any kind of material consequences from his employer for, say, serious lapses of judgment in his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.

Few thought criminals enjoy the kind of soft landing granted to UATX advisory board member Summers, whose ill-fated tenure as president of Harvard was notable primarily for his sexist views on women in science, his dismantling of one of the best African American studies departments in the country, his alienation of the majority of the faculty, and his series of lapses of judgment in his relationship with Epstein. Following a one-year sabbatical, Summers was rewarded with a Harvard University professorship, the schools highest honor for a faculty member.

Imagine giving up all that institutional security for a chance to work at a startup whose founding trustee and presumed moneyman, Joe Lonsdale, calls men who take paid paternity leave losers. What does the University of Austin think its faculty advisers are, adjuncts?

Speaking of the fearless pursuit of truth, its worth taking a moment to interrogate Kaneloss characterization of the campus climate in relation to the three thought criminals he cited:

Dorian Abbot, a University of Chicago scientist who has objected to aspects of affirmative action, was recently disinvited from delivering a prominent public lecture on planetary climate at MIT. Peter Boghossian, a philosophy professor at Portland State University, finally quit in September after years of harassment by faculty and administrators. Kathleen Stock, a professor at University of Sussex, just resigned after mobs threatened her over her research on sex and gender.

Abbot did indeed suffer the embarrassment and inconvenience of having a prestigious lecture cancelled, and MITs decision is certainly open to critique. However, he remains a tenured professor at the University of Chicago and retains the steadfast support of his institution hardly the eight years in a gulag endured by actual thought criminal Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, or even the loss of income suffered by Matt Hawn, a public school teacher in Tennessee who was fired for thought offenses that included assigning his students to read an essay by Ta-Nehisi Coates and listen to a poem about white privilege.

Ironically, Hawns employment appears to have fallen victim to the very movement that Boghossian has aggressively promoted this year the banning of critical race theory by Republican-controlled state legislatures. Meanwhile Boghossians own case is significantly more complex than Kanelos would have us believe. The philosophy professor fabricated papers in order to engage in a major academic hoax aimed at discrediting various fields he considers to be grievance studies, was subsequently found to have committed research misconduct by his institutional review board, and yet maintained his position until he chose to resign facts that are at least worth mentioning when presenting him as a victim of institutional harassment.

As for Stock, Kaneloss assertion lacks a citation for any actual mobs or threats, while raising questions about whether students at the University of Austin will have the right to express their views through the decidedly non-violent means of putting up posters and flags, which was the student activity that preceded Stocks resignation from Sussex.

If any of these free speech warriors wanted to actually take a stand for their stated beliefs, they would move to Texas, not to teach at a fake university, but to get a job at a public high school. They could then set about assigning their students to read one or more of the 850 discomfort-causing books that a state lawmaker, apparently invigorated by the anticritical race theory movement promoted by Boghossian and Weiss, has placed on a list for investigation by the Texas Education Agency.

The minimum salary for a Texas public school teacher with 20 years of experience is $54,540, however, so forgive me if I dont hold my breath.

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Free speech warriors founded an anti-woke college. But theyre keeping their tenured day jobs - The Guardian

Republicans are set to claim the House majority in next years midterm elections with help from heavily gerrymandered congressional district maps in states nationwide that could shape politics for the next decade, securing Republican wins even as the partys popular vote shrinks at the national level, says Mother Jones reporter Ari Berman.

The same states that are pushing voter suppression are also pushing extreme gerrymandered maps to lock in white Republican power for the next decade at the state and federal level, says Berman.

Democracy Now! produces a daily, global, independent news hour hosted by award-winning journalists Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzlez. Our reporting includes breaking daily news headlines and in-depth interviews with people on the front lines of the worlds most pressing issues.

On DN!, youll hear a diversity of voices speaking for themselves, providing a unique and sometimes provocative perspective on global events.

Missed an episode? Check out DN on FSTV VOD anytime or visit the show page for the latest clips.

#FreeSpeechTV is one of the last standing national, independent news networks committed to advancing progressive social change.

#FSTV is available on Dish, DirectTV, AppleTV, Roku, Sling, and online at freespeech.org.

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Ari Berman: With Extreme Gerrymandering, the Republicans Are Rigging the Next Decade of Elections - Free Speech TV

Student protests on campus are nothing new and trying to deny controversial speakers a platform is not a recent invention. Protestors have, over the years, argued that some speakers pose a threat simply by being allowed to spout their unpalatable opinions.

Speaking as someone who has been denied a platform, and been on the receiving end of abuse and aggressive behaviour for my support for Palestine and its people, especially from pro-Israel students, in my opinion, it is wrong to ban speakers. Nevertheless, I see no reason why students or other groups should not be allowed to protest peacefully to make their views known before, during and after meetings with speakers whose opinions they disagree with. This form of activism on university campuses is a sign of healthy debate and free speech.

Students should not be treated like delicate hothouse flowers what we call snowflakes these days to be protected from all things unpleasant. The whole point of going to university, surely, is to learn and share knowledge, thoughts and ideas; importantly, to be taught to listen to all sides of an issue before reaching conclusions.

Being exposed to new and possibly challenging views is all part of the educational experience; without it, how can real academic freedom exist? In the past, I have protested against invitations given to controversial speakers, sometimes successfully, other times less so. The point is that we were allowed to protest, whether events went ahead or not.

It was entirely predictable that when students at the London School of Economics (LSE) invited controversial Israeli Ambassador Tzipi Hotovely to speak on campus there would be opposition. After all, Hotovely is well known for promoting all that is wicked about the apartheid state of Israel and, in terms of being offensive towards religious and racial groups, she's up there with the worst extremists ever to have spoken on public platforms anywhere.

OPINION: Rushing to support the 'ugly, extremist face of Israel' does not defend 'free speech'

As my fellow MEMO columnist Asa Winstanley wrote in a recent article: "[Hotovely] is a far-right religious extremist who claims that God gave the 'Land of Israel' (historical Palestine) to the Jews, and to the Jews alone. 'The land is ours all of it is ours. We did not come here to apologise for that.'"

Indeed, she is the living proof that a one-dimensional education and ideological upbringing churns out extremist thinkers. There must be educational establishments in Israel which follow the Golda Meir line that Palestinians are either non-existent or raging anti-Semites; Palestinian history is simply not mentioned in textbooks.

The ambassador has expressed similar sentiments, so it would have been interesting to hear her speak in the LSE Student Union's debate on Middle East peace titled "Perspectives on Israel and Palestine". Sane people generally condemn Holocaust deniers and I can't imagine the LSE ever giving the podium to such an individual and yet the Israeli ambassador in London was given a platform despite being a Nakba denier. She describes the well-documented catastrophe of the ethnic cleansing of 800,000 Palestinians in 1948 as a "popular Arab lie". It's worth noting that the term ethnic cleansing was first applied in this context by an Israeli historian.

The Likud parliamentarian has churned out endless insults over the years after being recruited and mentored by the equally odious Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel's longest-serving Prime Minister. She is much loved and admired by the far right in the Zionist state, including the 600,000 illegal settlers in the occupied West Bank, and her extremist ideology resonates with far-right groups around the world. In my opinion, Hotovely has the potential to be a very dangerous person in terms of inciting hatred and trashing human rights, and is almost certainly a poster girl for Zionist extremists and white supremacists in Britain.

She is also a divisive figure within Jewish circles. When she's not targeting Palestinians for abuse, she reserves some of her worst bile for Jews living outside the Zionist state, especially those who have integrated or hold views that clash with hers. Courtesy of Winstanley's research, we also know that she will even invoke anti-Semitic tropes about Jews, as this 2019 video during the Likud election campaign reveals.

READ: Protests as LSE hosts Nakba denying Israel envoy

"Jewish supporters of Palestinian rights in Hotovely's video were attacked in grossly anti-Semitic terms," wrote Winstanley. "They were depicted as being paid agents of a Jewish conspiracy against Israel who, when punched out by Hotovely (depicted as a superhero), scream: 'Oy vey! My German Euros!"

It was thus inevitable that pro-Palestine, pro-justice protestors turned up in force outside the LSE event where Hotovely was given a free rein to express her racist, anti-Palestinian views. Although organised by the LSE Debating Society, there was no debate. No opposing views were on offer, allowing the ambassador to speak without being challenged.

After the event, she was ushered out by Israeli security guards while police officers formed a thin blue line between them and the protestors. The latter were very vocal, as you can imagine, in the presence of a far-right racist who had rocked up to speak before an unquestioning audience filled with like-minded supporters of Israel and, who knows, even racist extremists like herself.

The ambassador's exit took less than 30 seconds but it was followed by an astonishing narrative, with Home Secretary Priti Patel accusing the protestors of intimidation. The right-wing media jumped on the bandwagon, as did other government ministers and their shadows in the opposition, led by Zionist Labour leader Keir Starmer and his foreign affairs sidekick Lisa Nandy. At least one observer has described their comments in support of the right-wing ambassador of the apartheid state of Israel as "fact free".

All of these pro-Israel cheerleaders seemed to overlook the fact that this is the age of the smartphone. Had they bothered to check social media before speaking they would have heard nothing more than jeers, boos and a chorus of "Shame on you!" from the protestors outside the LSE. There were no punches thrown, no injuries or violence and no arrests. Check here for yourself. Despite this evidence, somewhat unbelievably the LSE is now conducting a formal investigation.

The anti-Palestinian Jewish Chronicle ran a comment piece that is at odds with the evidence, claiming that, "Hotovely, was forced out of the LSE by violent racists on the hunt for a Jew to attack." This was an outrageous slur against people exercising their right to protest against the official representative of an apartheid state. However, if the libel payouts for sloppy, vindictive smear campaigns against pro-Palestine individuals and even charities that provide humanitarian aid to Palestinians are anything to go by, then there is a strong case to say that the community newspaper has a long-distance relationship with the truth.

The "violent racists on the hunt for a Jew to attack" claim has to be a new low for the Jewish Chronicle. Little wonder, then, that on Thursday at the LSE library at midday, staff, students and their supporters are planning a solidarity rally. This should not only serve as a reminder to the university that it has a duty of care for all students to "have the unquestionable right to express their political views and organise demonstrations on our campus", but it should also serve notice to the media that we all have a duty to report responsibly without whipping up hate and fear. The right to protest in a democracy like ours is just as precious as the right to freedom of speech.

Tzipi Hotovely had her time at the podium without interruption; those who disagree with her odious views had every right to express their opposition afterwards. The protest was no anti-Semitic "hunt for a Jew to attack"; it was a pro-Palestine, pro-justice demonstration against someone who denies the people of Palestine their legitimate rights. Why would anyone want to attack the protestors for that?

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.

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The right to protest is as precious as freedom of speech - Middle East Monitor

Among the unprecedented moments for Indigenous participation in the U.N. climate summit in Glasgow were the protests to protect the Amazon rainforest, the largest remaining rainforest on the planet, that activists argue is on the brink of ecological collapse.

We cannot win the battle against climate unless we protect the worlds remaining rainforests, Atossa Soltani, founder and president of Amazon Watch, tells Democracy Now!

DN also speaks with Uyunkar Domingo Peas Nampichkai, Indigenous Achuar Nation leader from the Ecuadorian Amazon, who is demanding an end to logging, mining and oil drilling. We dont want more extraction, says Nampichkai.

Democracy Now! produces a daily, global, independent news hour hosted by award-winning journalists Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzlez. Our reporting includes breaking daily news headlines and in-depth interviews with people on the front lines of the worlds most pressing issues.

On DN!, youll hear a diversity of voices speaking for themselves, providing a unique and sometimes provocative perspective on global events.

Missed an episode? Check out DN on FSTV VOD anytime or visit the show page for the latest clips.

#FreeSpeechTV is one of the last standing national, independent news networks committed to advancing progressive social change.

#FSTV is available on Dish, DirectTV, AppleTV, Roku, Sling, and online at freespeech.org.

Amazon Amazon Rainforest Amazon Watch Amy Goodman Atossa Soltani COP26 Democracy Now! Free Speech TV Glasgow Indigenous Indigenous People U.N. Climate Summit

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Indigenous Amazonian Leader: We Must End Fossil Fuel Extraction to Protect the Lungs of the Earth - Free Speech TV

Supporters rally around "Trump Won" banner on 30-A

Supporters rally around a "Trump Won" banner hanging from a home along County Road 30-A in Seagrove Beach.

Northwest Florida Daily News

SEAGROVE BEACH Just days away from a hearing in front of Walton County's code compliance magistrate, Seagrove Beach homeowner Marvin Peavy remains adamant that he won't take down two large banners hanging from his Walton County Road 30Ahomeexpressing support for former President Donald Trump.

One of the banners reads "Trump Won," while the other reads "Let's go Brandon," a veiled insult to President Joe Biden.

Bidendefeated Trump in the 2020 presidential balloting. But Peavyis among the significant numberof people across the country who contend the election was rigged against Trump, despitethe failure of numerous lawsuits to prove electoral irregularities.

'Not going to take it down': 30A property owner hangs 'Trump Won' banner on home despite fines

Nonetheless, a recent poll by the political news website Politico and the data intelligence firm Morning Consult noted that just22% ofself-identified 2020 Trump voters believethe 2020 elections were free and fair, with 72% saying that balloting was either probably or definitely not free and fair.

"I'm going to stand up. I won't go down until I win," Peavy, a south Georgia real estate and property management businessman who lives in the Seagrove Beach housefour days each week, told a wildly supportive crowd at Thursday night's meeting of the South Walton Republican Club.

"I'm here for one thing:my freedom of speech," Peavy said as hegot a standing ovation from an audience ofnearly 100 people. "I'm not taking my sign(s) down."

Peavy was cited bythe county code compliance office in July for the "Trump Won" banner the first to be installed at the house under provisions of the county land development code that limit signage for properties adjoining CR30A in connection with the route's local status as a scenic corridor.

The code section, which does not address political content of signage, prohibits display of "streamers, feather flags, pennants, ribbons, spinner and other similar devices" on property adjacent to the beachside route.

"It couldhave said 'Minnesota Vikings' " and still have been subject to a citation, county code compliance manager Mike Lynch said Friday.

At an Oct. 20 hearing, county Code Compliance Magistrate Hayward Dykes Jr.foundPeavy in violation of the county's land development codeand set a compliance hearing for Nov. 17.

The upcoming Wednesday hearing at which Peavy could face fines of as much as $250 per day, starting with the Oct. 25 date whenDykes ordered that fines start being calculated if the "Trump Won" banner didn't come down is set for 2 p.m. in the South Walton Courthouse Annex at 31 Coastal Centre Boulevard in Santa Rosa Beach.

A defiant Peavy installed the "Let's go Brandon" banner, which also hangs down three stories on the west-facing side of his home, within a week of Dykes' order becoming effective.

The county code office subsequently received a complaint about thatsecond banner, and code officials at the upcoming hearing will advise Dykes of that complaint, leaving it to him to determine how the issue of the second banner will be handled, Lynch said Friday.

County Code Compliance Director Tony Cornman said recently that there are additional sanctions that could be applied in Peavy's case, but he did not say specifically what theymight be.

Meanwhile, amove is underway to fill the meeting room atthecode magistrate hearing with Peavy's supporters.

"We want to pack that room, and we want to tell them what free speech means to the people of Walton County," Miramar Beach businesswoman and staunch Peavy supporter Suzanne Harris told the crowd at Thursday's Republican Club meeting.

Peavy has retained a Tallahassee law firm to represent him at the hearing, and said Thursday that he will speak if given a chance.

'Let's go Brandon': Second banner joins 'Trump Won' banner on Seagrove Beach house

He spoke for a little more than five minutes at Thursday's Republican Club meeting, alternating between stand-up comedy and an impassioned plea for free speech.

"I'm a good southern Georgian, but I'm fixing to be a north Floridan and I'm fixing to join up with y'all because I love fighting for what is right," he said. "It's the right thing to do.

"My wife is even more of a fighter than I am," Peavy continued. "... She looks real sweet, but she's mean as hell sometimes. I know y'all probably got one of those at home, too.

"It's about free speech, guys," he said. "... If they take this from us, guys, who the hell are we? Will we be able to say, 'I pledge allegiance to the flag,' or will we be able to say the Lord's Prayer? I mean, what do you want to do? What do you stand for?"

In the dayssince his citation, people have offeredto payor help to paywhatever fines might eventually be assessed against Peavy. One of those people, hesaid Thursday, was a young girl.

"This little girl came up to me, and she was like 12 years old, and she wanted to give me money," Peavy said. "I'm like, 'I don't need no money,' but her daddy told me, 'You're going to take the moneybecause she believes in your cause.' I don't cry for nothing, and it brought tears to my eyes."

Peavy has also seen other signs of support, including people who have gathered in front of his house on recent Sundays to wave Trump-themed and free speech-related flags and signs, and otherwise express support for his stand. That support routinely prompts motorists passing by to waveor honk theirhorns, and has also included people stopping by with pizza and barbecue for the people in front of Peavy's house.

"I've got great people backingme.I've had great people out at my house," Peavy said during his speech at the Republican Clubmeeting. "I've eaten some damn good food, from barbecue places, pizza places.

"Y'all are all just like me," headded. "We're all the same kind of people. We love God, we love our country and we're here to fight for it."

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'Here for one thing: my freedom of speech': 30A homeowner remains defiant on pro-Trump banners - The Northwest Florida Daily News

Harvards Pinker has kept quiet about why hes ending his affiliation, but the University of Chicago chancellor Zimmer made it clear: Hes all for free expression, but not the direct attack on existing higher education that attended the universitys launch, saying in his statement that the new university made a number of statements about higher education in general, largely quite critical, that diverged very significantly from my own views. West Virginia University president Gordon Gee, another adviser, kept his affiliation but said even more directly: I do not agree other universities are no longer seeking the truth nor do I feel that higher education is irreparably broken.

The discord reflects the inconvenient contradiction at the heart of an ambitious project: Despite the University of Austins claim to independence from the political minefield that is higher ed in 2021, its almost impossible to see the project as anything but political in its own right. Kanelos, a former St. Johns College president, announced its launch on the Substack of Bari Weiss, another founding fellow who is not an academic, but a journalist who specializes in lancing the liberal consensus. Co-founder and trustee Joe Lonsdale, also a co-founder of the data analytics company Palantir with Peter Thiel, defended the project in the conservative New York Post, and Ferguson wrote acidly in Bloomberg that academic freedom dies in wokeness.

The University of Austins explicitly stated ideological commitment is to a pluralistic, classically liberal freedom of expression. But as Zimmer and others have pointed out, the universitys project as constituted today rests on an inherently political critique of schools as they are. And for an intellectual vehicle so committed to diversity of thought that it cant even exist in the current academic landscape, its affiliated thinkers comprise a near-monoculture in their own right: Theyre nearly all icons of the same confrontational, non-progressive liberal rationalism.

In American politics, to claim the mantle of open inquiry and a merit-based, rationalist freedom from ideological dogma is to claim the moral high ground. But in doing just that, UATX has accidentally affirmed the criticism of the most left-leaning culture critics who loudly protest that theres no such thing as truth or objectivity. Based on its current intellectual coterie, the universitys self-proclaimed independence looks a lot like an attempt to re-assert the dominance of its participants own values.

One doesnt have to totally surrender to relativism to acknowledge that kind of moral high ground is more of a goal, or aspiration, than a state that one can ever actually reach. When conservative figures like Sens. Ted Cruz or Josh Hawley cry that American institutions are captured ideologically and need to return to some Edenic, pre-woke ideal or when progressive thought leaders like Nikole Hannah-Jones claim an objective factual basis for a project thats fundamentally ideological they twist that ideal for their own political purposes. Thats all part of the back-and-forth of American life. But in claiming to be outside it, UATX and its boosters set an almost impossibly high bar for their project.

None of which is to say its structural or ideological critique of academia is inherently wrong one would be hard-pressed to find anyone who isnt a well-paid university administrator willing to say the current system is working just perfectly as it is. But the launch of UATX, and the vociferous reaction it has inspired, already serve as a cautionary tale about the notion of objectivity in modern American life how seductive the claim to neutral ground can be, and how powerful, but perilous, a tool its become in the culture-war toolbox.

***

Although the universitys founding advisers might be uniform in their opposition to a certain brand of progressive rhetoric, theyre something of a fractious bunch. For all the bile that Ferguson mustered in his Bloomberg op-ed, theres the circumspectness of someone like Cowen; for the oak-paneled gravitas that a figure like Gordon Gee brings, theres the bare-knuckled punditry of Andrew Sullivan. It includes a playwright (the Trump-supporting David Mamet) and a geophysicist (Dorian Abbot, who co-wrote an op-ed criticizing affirmative action policies and was disinvited from a prestigious MIT lecture for his troubles).

What leaves the project most vulnerable to critique in these early stages, however, is whos not present namely, anyone from the progressive left they believe threatens free speech in the academy. In an email, spokesperson Hillel Ofek said the school will not hold any political or ideological test for its faculty. We believe a fundamental part of liberal education is engaging rigorously with radically alternative views and ideas, including those that challenge freedom of speech. We would certainly welcome someone who was a critic of freedom of speech from the left or the right, as long as they abided by our university operating principles of open inquiry and civil discourse.

So what, then, explains the center-right lean of the schools initial roster of advisers? For critics, the most charitable view might be that the universitys founding trustees fear progressive censoriousness as too much of a threat or hindrance to include (see: Karl Poppers paradox of tolerance). But to deploy Occams Razor, its much easier to imagine that no one on the left especially in the cutthroat world of higher education, where reputation is currency might have been willing to sign on to a project that their peers would inevitably write off as a reactionary sop to anti-political-correctness dinosaurs.

It seems to me that for somebody who, for lack of a better terminology, is progressive, I doubt that they would welcome the opportunity to serve on the board of advisers, said Nadine Strossen, a professor at New York Law School and a former president of the ACLU who believes robust free speech protections are paramount to not just the flourishing of liberalism, but racial justice in its own right. Strossen, a UATX advisor, said shes had many long conversations with [university president] Pano [Kanelos], and I have absolutely no doubt that he would welcome advice from somebody who would speak out and be critical of everything, including the fundamental mission.

As it happens, they do in fact have someone willing to criticize the fundamental mission of free inquiry. But its not a critic from the left: it is Sohrab Ahmari, the arch-conservative Catholic and self-described post-liberal. In an essay for The American Conservative, Ahmari wrote that they welcomed the prospect of a traditionalist internal dissident with a seat at the table I think its just about time that we orthodox believers returned the favor to liberal institutions and to treat our presence within them as a test of their liberality, according to their own principles.

An endorsement from someone like Ahmari an admirer of Viktor Orbans illiberal democracy who once famously wrote that conservative Christians should seek to use [the values of civility and decency] to enforce our order and our orthodoxy, not pretend that they could ever be neutral is pretty stark proof of the schools claim that no idea is too dangerous to go un-explored in the classroom. But in the absence of any theoretical counterpart on the left, it also paints an easy target on the university as simply a vehicle for grievances against so-called wokeness, the only otherwise plausible affinity Ahmari might have with its mission.

***

In 2018, the historian David Greenberg wrote in this magazine of the end of neutrality, arguing that without trust in the government and other neutral bodies to provide reliable information and to adjudicate fairly among viewpoints, we risk losing one of our democracys greatest virtues: the ability to wage our debates freely and contentiously while knowing that ultimately most of us will accept the resolutions as legitimate.

Even in the absence, or weakness, of these traditionally neutral institutions maybe because of it the claim to openness and fairness remains a powerful one, often conflated with objectivity itself. A rhetorical claim of what any reasonable person would say, or what any fair interpretation of events would conclude, such as are bandied about in political discourse, includes assumptions about neutrality that its speaker might not be aware of. Even critics who claim to be savvy enough to realize that true neutrality is most likely impossible still invoke it, almost like a Freudian slip.

For some people, like the architects of the University of Austin, the mere stickiness of that idea in our intellectual life isnt enough. So they attempt to re-construct the type of institutions that Greenberg described in their own image, to be sure, with all the inherent biases they carry, but a stated commitment to combat them. And that, ultimately, is why the project arouses such ire: In a world where everyone claims the rational and moral high ground in service of their ideological commitments, taking the mantle of a referee isnt just overly hubristic. Its threatening.

Which is also why its somewhat understandable that the left finds the project so much more of an affront than the right does. Everybody loves free speech until their own personal line is crossed, and absent any leftist secure in their reputation who might agree in the future to be the University of Austins resident woke button-pusher, the accusation of an intra-right-centrist lovefest carries a semblance of truth.

For now, however, the University of Austin exists mostly as an idea. At some point, its commitment to its core mission will be tested just as it has been at every other university and its impossible to predict if its leaders will handle it with the fairness and intellectual equanimity its founders claim. In practice, the rational-minded independence it champions might be less a reachable condition than just that: a practice, and an aspirational one at that.

If it fails in that practice more often than not, every flavor of ideologue or critic who cares enough to notice will circle their wagons in the exact same manner they did at its announcement last week. If they succeed, and by doing so prove those critics wrong, theyll have achieved something authentically new in American intellectual life and retroactively justified not just the sound and fury surrounding a mere Substack post, but the place of rhetorical leverage its stated values hold in politics and culture today.

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Its the University of Austin Against Everyone Including Itself - POLITICO Magazine

If you have good articles on free speech law, pass them along to us. Our first issue was just posted on Westlaw (it took two months to do this, because it was the first issue, but they tell us that future articles will be posted much more quickly); it contains articles by top scholars such as Jack Balkin (Yale), Mark Lemley (Stanford), and Christopher Yoo (Penn), and many more. We're about to publish an article in several weeks critiquing New York Times v. Sullivan, and we expect to be getting two more articles from prominent free speech scholars in the next couple of months as well.

And, as the subtitle notes, we publish fast. If you submit it to us now, you'll get an answer within two weeks (we have consistently kept this promise), and then we can have it online within four weeks of that, if you'd like, or perhaps even faster.

Please submit to us at ScholasticaHQ; exclusive submissions only, please. For more on the journal, see JournalOfFreeSpeechLaw.org.

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Submit Your Articles to the Journal of Free Speech Law Now, - Reason