Category Archives: Free Speech

A better civil discourse in letters to the editor

There currently is a crisis underway that began prior to when life as we knew it changed with the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

It has permeated every inch of our lives, online and offline. It has divided the nation, fractured political parties, severed friendships and pitted family members against one another.

It's misinformation, a faceless enemy born in part through foreign and domestic efforts to discredit legitimate news entities, in addition to widespread news illiteracy.

When the need for reliable information has been no greater, misinformation permeates social media, and we find ourselves clinging to information that substantiates our beliefs, regardless of whether it's true. The line between what's opinion and what's fact is more than blurred, and many of us can no longer discern the difference between the two.

Recently, the biggest culprits of spreading misinformation are a vocal minority of society that captures news headlines with efforts disguised as patriotism but riddled with political straw man arguments that having nothing to do with the public health crisis at hand.

Don't believe me? There literally are people who believe the coronavirus is a hoax. Never mind that thousands of Americans have died. Nevermind the consensus from our health care and science communities. Never mind the facts. Whatever bolsters our beliefs, right?

Part of the blame lies with media, including newspapers. In the 2000s, we ushered in an era where we allowed anonymous comments on all of our sites. The result was a toilet bowl of mean, uneducated and irresponsible "free speech" versus a robust exchange of constructive ideas and criticism.

It took us a while, but most newspapers have moved to using Facebook to moderate comments, so as to remove the anonymity that I firmly believe contributed to the downfall of civil discussion.

Seemingly simultaneously taking place was the belief that it's not polite to discuss hot-button issues such as politics and religion. By removing those topics from America's dinner tables, we lost the ability to have courteous, thoughtful and productive conversations.

And through it all, there have been economic and societal changes that have affected newsrooms of all sizes, including our Daily News.

Newsroom layoffs haven't just affected the front page. They have impacted sports, photography, design and editorial departments in all markets, from the big metros to the small community newspapers.

One casualty that has resulted from the obstacles I outlined above is the quality of local opinion pages. Some newspapers have clung to running columns from talking heads in New York City and Washington D.C. Others, including the Daily News, have worked to localize opinion content to make it relevant to our local communities.

But all of us have struggled with letters to the editor in recent times. In fact, some community newspapers have done away with opinion pages because, in all markets, we have lost subscribers who have disagreed with opinion content. What's the point of dividing our communities and losing readership over someone's opinion? Why should we continue offering readers a platform to air their opinions when they can do so on social media at the click of the button? Online, they aren't subject to word limits and other rules outlined in a newspaper's letter-to-the-editor policy.

When I came to the Midland Daily News last summer, I spoke with multiple subscribers and a common complaint I heard was that there was no consistency on our opinion page, particularly that some people were given a platform to write long columns about national issues, while others had to adhere to the letter-to-the-editor word limit. This was from fans of both sides of the political aisle. Some subscribers said they didn't want to read long columns from local residents extolling the virtues of the president and others said they didn't want to read lengthy columns and letters criticizing President Trump.

It was clear there was no consistency regarding who was allowed to write a column and who was subject to the letter-to-the editor word limit. It was also clear people felt very constricted by the 250-word limit.

When I came on board, I met with the editorial board here (which consists of the editor, managing editor, digital editor and a reporter). We talked about what the Daily News was currently doing, and what it could improve. We also conducted a reader survey of paid subscribers. The feedback from that echoed what subscribers told me when I got here: They wanted consistency in terms of what platform residents are given on the Midland Daily News' opinion page.

Our editorial board discussed our overall mission, which is to inform and connect, and decided that we will give local non-profits and other organizations a platform via Community Connections on our opinion page to run columns about their group and what they are doing in the local area, as well as local issues that are of importance to our entire readership.

The idea was to bolster the value of our opinion page for our entire readership. But we felt there still is value in publishing local letters to the editor. We still feel that way, however, we want to make sure our opinion page is not used as a weapon for "gotcha" pieces by local political operatives. We want to ensure we are not disseminating falsehoods in the guise of "but it's just an opinion."

We know there is a greater need for fact-checking, and we've tried thinking outside the box. On two occasions, we have given subjects of letters to the editors a chance to respond on the same day a letter has run. The idea was we would do this on the front page, why not on the opinion page?

The affected letter writers were not pleased with the decision, and it was a lesson learned for us, as we found this is not a sustainable solution to the concerns at hand (fairness, quality and access). What we needed to do, and what we have since done, is update our letter policy to address those concerns.

New updates we have made to our letter-to-the-editor policy include that the Daily News will edit letters for length (the limit for letters is now 350 words), conciseness and clarity. If a topic has been thoroughly debated in the letters column, subsequent letters will not be published if they do not add new information or ideas to the debate. Letters that are libelous, malicious, inaccurate, in bad taste, demonstrably false, contain conspiracy theories or those that make attacks on private or public people will not be published.

While we are aware some letter writers may feel this infringes on their right to free speech, we believe the majority of our subscribers will appreciate the improvement in letter quality that will result from a more stringent selection process.

Another recent change we've been implementing is better sourcing on news releases that we publish in our paper and online. There have been questions from many online readers about authorship when it comes to items that are submitted for publication in the Daily News.

All items received are processed by our newsroom staffers and then edited by our editors. For greater transparency in print and online, we will be publishing which staffer processes each release, along with their contact information, so readers have a local contact to call or email if there's a question about a release.

I'm very much interested in hearing what our readers think of these changes. Please give me a call or shoot me a letter or email with your thoughts.

Or you can always write a letter to the editor.

Kate Hessling is the editor of the Midland Daily News. She can be reached at khessling@hearstnp.com.

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A better civil discourse in letters to the editor - Midland Daily News

Websites using .org domain names fear they could lose their web addresses as intense backlash over the domain registrys proposed sale continues.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann), the not-for-profit organization that coordinates the internets domain name system, is deciding whether control of .org will be sold to a private equity firm about which little is known.

The change of hands has raised concerns about censorship and how internet infrastructure affects free speech.

Websites using .org can be registered by anybody, but over the past decade the suffix has become the go-to domain term for not-for-profits and charities. The transfer of control of .org domains has left many concerned that a new owner could raise the price of addresses on the .org registry, making it prohibitively expensive for not-for-profits that have come to rely on its name recognition.

The not-for-profit Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), along with the Domain Name Rights Coalition, Access Now, and others, wrote to Icann last week urging it to stop the sale.

Essentially it means selling censorship, Mitch Stoltz, a senior staff attorney at EFF focusing on free speech and trademark issues, said of the sale. It could mean suspending domain names, causing websites to go dark when some other powerful interest wants them gone.

These concerns were exacerbated when in 2019, Icann removed the cap on the price customers could be charged for a .org domain, having previously prohibited charging more than $8.25.

Until now, .org has been managed by the not-for-profit Public Interest Registry (PIR) created by the Internet Society exclusively for the purpose. Icann awarded control of .org to the Internet Society, another not-for-profit, in 2002.

Icann is deciding if it will approve the sale of the domain registry to Ethos Capital, a private firm that emerged recently. Ethos has stated that it will keep prices low, but critics say because it is a for-profit company, it has no economic incentive to do so.

Icann abruptly delayed its decision on Monday after receiving a scathing letter from the California attorney general, Xavier Becerra, on 15 April about the potential sale of .org.

Becerras letter came after not-for-profits and other internet freedom advocates said privatizing the domain registry would saddle it with more than $300m in debt.

Because Icann is incorporated in California, Becerra is in charge of ensuring it is living up to its commitments. It will provide an update on 4 May.

There is mounting concern that ICANN is no longer responsive to the needs of its stakeholders, Becerra wrote.

The attorney general of Pennsylvania is also reportedly investigating the deal. Because PIR, the organization selling .org, is incorporated there, the state would have the power to stop it from happening.

Andrew Sullivan, the CEO of the Internet Society, said those using the .org domain registry would be better served by Ethos, which would have more resources than a not-for-profit to fund them.

He noted that the firm had been making changes responsive to criticism about the potential sale. Commitments include a cap on price increases for eight years from the start of the current contract and a stewardship council that will have a say over policies affecting .org sites.

This shows Ethos is trying very hard to be a good steward of this resource, he said.

Former members of Icann disagree. On Monday, its former CEO, Michael Roberts, and other former members wrote a letter criticizing the decision and imploring his successors to delay the transaction for six months.

We write to express our deep dismay at ICANNs rejection of its defining public-interest regulatory purpose as demonstrated in the totally inappropriate proposed sale of the .org delegation, they wrote. ICANN has not meaningfully acted to address the likely proposed service cuts, increase in prices or trafficking of data of non-profits to obtain additional revenue.

The debate has taken on new life amid the coronavirus pandemic. Advocates for not-for-profits are concerned about the debt incurred by the sale as coronavirus creates economic uncertainty.

In his letter to Icann, Becerra said the $300m in debt will change the relationship .org has with its sites.

If the sale goes through and PIRs business model fails to meet expectations, it may have to make significant cuts in operations, Becerra said. Such cuts would undoubtedly affect the stability of the .org registry.

This is of particular concern as not-for-profit sites have become more important than ever during the coronavirus pandemic, said Amy Sample Ward, CEO of the technology not-for-profit NTEN.

Most of the entities leading in data and information aggregation, scientific investigation and developments, community resourcing and response are all non-profits with .org websites, she said. Those organizations also stand to lose a great deal if this deal proceeds.

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'Selling censorship': proposed sale of .org web registry sparks fears for non-profits - The Guardian

From his offices inside the bleak walls of the Carcere dei Penitenziati palace in Palermo, the great inquisitor Luis de Paramo seemed to barely notice the Black Death had begun to sweep across the Spanish empire in 1596, killing hundreds of thousands. His mind was fixed on an even more dangerous disease that threatened his world, corrupting not just the bodies of men, but their minds. The holy offices of the Inquisition annihilated the heretical plagues, he smugly recorded two years later.

God reserved his worst torments, Paramo solemnly wrote, for the heresy: Nestors tongue was eaten by worms; Marcus Ephesus reduced to excreting ordure from his mouth; Calvins body overrun by great swarms of lice as he coughed out blood this before the eternal torments of hell. Protecting people from poisonous ideas, thus, was at least as important as guarding against plagues.

Inside the dungeons of the inquisition, the agents of heresy intellectuals, witches, dissident priests and nuns were quarantined to secure the health of the Kingdom of God.

As the greatest pandemic in a century continues its grim progress, India is seeing the unfolding of an unprecedented campaign to ensure the Republics intellectual hygiene.

Thousands are facing prosecution for something they wrote or said: Left-wing intellectuals and journalists like Siddharth Varadarajan, right-wing television anchors like Arnab Goswami, Islamic activists, Hindu nationalists, even plain-vanilla panicked citizens. For years now, the criminal justice system has become ever more focused on silencing thought and speech; a climax could be nearing.

Luis de Paramo would have found this world almost indistinguishable from his own. For any democracy, this is evil news. India needs much more free speech even evil, toxic speech not less.

***

Even though the term has become entrenched in public debate, the idea of hate speech rests on less-than-firm ground. Bengaluru Member of Parliament Tejasvi Suryas now-infamous tweet 95 percent Arab women have never had an orgasm in the last few hundred years, attributed to the gadfly anti-Islamist agitator Tarek Fateh is a useful prism to examine the issue. Erased from the internet after furious protests from Saudi and Kuwaiti commentators and demands for the Prime Ministers intervention, the tweet has been cited as a textbook example of hate speech.

Feminist writing in the Middle-East, though, has made much the same argument for decades. In a 2005 paper, for example, anthropologists Abdessamad Dialmy and Allon Uhlmann examined the cultural memes that ensured the sexuality of the respectable wife is confined to satisfying her husbands desire and producing a large number of male offspring.

In the Fez region, Dialmy and Uhlman noted, a proverb held that if the wife were to move during intercourse, she would be divorced because her movement would indicate the presence of desire and pleasure.

Fatahs polemic is an agit-prop rendering of the work of generations of Middle-East feminists among them Mai Ghoussoub, Afsaneh Najmabadi, Haleh Afshar, Haideh Moghissi, and Hammed Shahidian who have long critiqued the use of religion and culture to repress womens freedoms.

The Muslim man conceives woman as uncontrollable and untameable: a being who can therefore only be subdued by repression, Ghoussoub famously argued in a seminal essay in The New Left Review, back in 1987. It is difficult to utter your frustrations if a veil seals your lips.

Little intellectual insight is needed to see that Surya like Fatah is a propagandist. Neither, for example, acknowledges that feminists have also shown how Hindu texts and cultural norms like Christian and Buddhist texts sustain tyrannical phallocracies.

The lines between crude propaganda and serious critique arent, however, as well-etched as we might imagine.

In 1924, the Arya Samaj activist Mahashe Rajpal published Rangila Rasul in Urdu, the colourful prophet a polemic on the Prophet Muhammads sexual mores. Lower courts condemned Rajpal to prison. Lahore High Court judge Dalip Singh, however, reasoned that if the fact that Musalmans resent attacks on the Prophet was to be the measure, then a historical work in which the life of the prophet was considered and judgment passed on his character by a serious historian might [also] come within the definition.

Tejasvi Suryas now-infamous tweet is a useful prism to examine the issue of hate speech. Here the BJP MP is seen with journalist Arnab Goswami. File Photo

Legislators responded to the Lahore High Courts admonition by amending the Indian Penal Code to outlaw deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings of any class. That law continues to be used to ban an array of serious books, and persecute atheists and heterodox religious sects.

Propagandist polemic, it could be argued, can be distinguished from serious speech because of their intent and consequences. This argument, however, leads to another cul-de-sac. The purpose of all political text, after all, is to incite. The Bible, the Quran, the Mahabharata and the works of Karl Marx and Mao Zedong have all been cited as inspiration for large-scale killing at various points in history; so, too, have Batman and Catcher in the Rye. Abul Ala Maududis Jihad has indeed been read as a manifesto for violence by Islamists but millions of others have encountered the text without being moved to swat a fly.

To characterise Suryas tweet, or other chauvinist propaganda, as a form of illegitimate speech is to make a moral judgment about politics valid or otherwise. To allow moral judgment to decide whether speech ought to be illegitimate, history tells us, ought to lead to perdition.

***

For decades, the case against free speech has assailed by pointing to the apparent role of mass media in engendering genocides and mass violence. The role of Radio Television Libre des Milles Collines in inciting genocide in Rwanda is often cited as evidence for this claim. The rigorous empirical work of political scientist Scott Strauss, though, has demonstrated that that data does not show RTLM was the principal vector by which the genocide spread and by which most ordinary Rwandans chose to participate in genocidal violence.

Indeed, scholar Mary Franks, has pointed out, laws outlawing propounding wickedness or inciting hatred are now used by the Tutsi-dominated Rwanda Peoples Front to persecute of the very journalists and NGOs who fought the genocide. Leading opposition figure Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza and her lawyerwere imprisoned for arguing that communal reconciliation required acknowledging not only Tutsi victims, the primary target of the genocide, but also Hutu victims.

For Franks, the real problem in Rwanda lay in the fact that power actors held near-monopolies on discourse through Radio Television Libre des Milles Collines prior to the genocide, and through the shutting-down of dissenting media platforms thereafter. The answer to hate speech, she proposes, isnt silence: its a loud, cacophonic media.

Lazy claims that the rise of German Fascism illustrates the power of toxic propaganda are similarly misleading. For one, Nazi propaganda grew despite the existence of the expansive hate speech laws of Weimar. Perhaps more important, Richard Evans magisterial work shows us, Nazi propaganda failed to persuade anything resembling a majority of Germans before the coup of 1933. The hegemony of Nazi ideology was ensured by stamping out of all alternate voices and points of view.

In India, the case is often made that hate speech propagated and amplified through digital media has accelerated communalisation.

The evidence, though, is far from unambiguous. Even a cursory glance at Violette Graff and Juliette Galonniers summary of communal riots shows that the intensity and frequency of communal violence in India has diminished not intensified. The largest chauvinist mass-mobilisations in India the Ram janmabhumi movement, for example, or the Kashmir jihad took place long before most homes even had a telephone.

Even though hate-speech is claimed to be sharpening the divisions between Hindus and Muslims engendering ghettoisation of the mind, as it were theres plenty of reason to be suspicious of such claims.

In a study of the 1974 riots in Delhi long before the evil influence of Facebook emerged three out of every 10 Hindus and almost two out of 10 Muslims, reported never even meeting with members of the other religious community in any social context political, casual, or even business. An investigation by the Peoples Union for Democratic Rights in 1987, similarly, noted that old Delhi was sundered into caste and communal agglomerations whose inhabitants understood each other, in the main, through communal invective.

The rise of social media has done little other than to provide a new platform for voicing the long-held prejudices and hatreds of a society hatreds earlier voiced within the family, during social interactions, or in the village square. Put another way, hate speech is an artefact of a dysfunctional society, not its cause.

***

Indias urge to police thought crime impulses predate the birth of the republic, the Rangila Rasul debates demonstrate. Less than two years after independence, though, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru amended the Constitution to carve out restrictions against free speech and embedded the inquisitor at the heart of the Indian state. Free speech, it was argued, made India vulnerable to the dangerous tides of communist propaganda and communal hatred; words could even explode into war with Pakistan.

The debris from those decisions is all around us. Wendy Donigers provocative readings of Hindu text; Aubrey Menens irreverent retelling of the Ramayana; DN Jhas The Myth of the Holy Cow, James Laines history of Shivaji, or Paul Courtrights exploration of Hindu mythologys fraught sexuality. We still cannot read an uncensored text of the path-breaking Urdu collection Angaarey, proscribed in 1933.

Salman Rushdie, MF Husain and Taslima Nasreen are the best-known victims of the Indian inquisition, but theyre not the only ones. The progressive cultural organisation Sahmat came under attack in 1993, merely for recording the existence of variant texts of the Ramayana in which Ram and Sita were siblings; Narendra Dabholkar and H Farook were assassinated.

Book-bans, prosecutions and killings have not, however, engendered pluralism: India remains a mosaic of warring religion and caste-based agglomerations, and the petty tyrannies which run them.

Propaganda, history teaches, succeeds only when it is unchallenged: The real answer to hate speech is plurality, not censorship. Ensuring that Indians hear a diversity of voices is a formidable challenge. Large swathes of the media, increasingly dependent since the 1980s on government advertising for survival, have surrendered their role as a space for the exchange of ideas. Efforts to create alternatives have, for the most part, floundered, with even lite audiences proving unwilling to pay for independent news and opinion.

The only kind of censorship which is legitimate in a democracy is the right each of us has to turn off our television sets. To give that power to the state is to assent to bodies, and minds, being broken on the wheel.

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Hate speech in the time of a pandemic: Answer to malevolent, incendiary language is plurality, not... - Firstpost

Jerry Falwell, Jr., president of the evangelical Liberty University, has long positioned himself as a torch-bearer of free expression. "Free speech and intellectual diversity are two of the most important pillars of a college education," he wrote last June. "That's why I urge every college and university in the country to encourage open political discourse on their own campusesjust as we do at Liberty University."

Falwell is now demanding the arrest of two reporters he accuses of painting his school in a negative light.

In an interview with radio host Todd Starnes, Falwell derided reporters at The New York Times andProPublicafor how they covered his decision to partially reopen Liberty amid the COVID-19 outbreak. Both pieces, he claimed, unfairly portrayed Liberty's attitude toward the coronavirus as flippant and careless. He singled out, for example, Times journalist Elizabeth Williamson's characterization of a conversation she had with local physician Thomas W. Eppes, Jr.: Williamson wrote that Eppes told her "nearly a dozen Liberty students were sick with symptoms that suggested Covid-19." Although one eventually tested positive, Falwell said the presumptive cases never numbered as high as 12a depiction he cast as "sensational click-bait."

And so the university president secured arrest warrants for Times photographer Julia Rendlemanand ProPublica reporter Alec MacGillis for trespassing, a Class 1 misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail. He told Starnes that an additional warrant is coming against someone affiliated with another "big time liberal news organization." (There is no warrant against Williamson because she did not take any photographs, so there's no physical proof that she was on campus.) Falwell also maintained that "lawsuits will be filed" against The New York Times if a retraction or Liberty-friendly correction isn't issued regarding the contagion numbers.

It's possible that Falwell is just trying to engage in some crisis PR. It's also possible that Williamson misunderstood or mischaracterized Eppes' comments. The veracity of the story isn't the point here. The point is Falwell's attempt to arrest people associated with reports he feels are biased against himnot the recourse you'd expect from someone who seriously sees his university as a bulwark of free expression.

"It is clear that Falwell is engaged in a campaign of petty retribution against journalists who write articles critical of the university," says Ari Cohn, a free speech lawyer and former director at the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE). "But that's actually completely in line with Liberty University's faux concern for freedom of expression. Falwell's idea of freedom of expression on campus includes only expression that he approves of."

The trespassing charges aren't likely to hold up in court: The reporters involved were photographing a student who invited them to campus for an interview. But who really believes that the alleged trespassing is Falwell's concern here? He wants to intimidate people who criticize his school.

That same browbeating culture is alive and well within the institution's walls. Calum Best, the student interviewed by both The New York Times andProPublica, described an angry phone call he received from Scott Lamb, the college's senior vice president for university communications, after he wrote a Facebook post arguing for tuition refunds amid COVID-19. Lamb included Best's work-study boss on the call.

"I thought I was in deep trouble for some professional failure," Best wrote on Medium. "But, as the call went on, I realized my boss had no need to be there, and had no connection to the matter at hand."

That heavy-handedness tracks with how Falwell and his associates oversee Champion, Liberty University's student paper. Will E. Young, the former editor-in-chief, wrote last year that Falwell actively got in the way of Trump-critical coverage, at one point removing a student op-ed lamenting Trump's Access Hollywood tape. The author of that erstwhile column, Joel Schmieg, took to Facebook to air the grievance and was promptly contacted by a faculty adviser, who reprimanded him for doing so. Schmieg then resigned.

As a private institution, Liberty University can set its own rules of conduct. But it's the height of hypocrisy to muzzle student speech while making a show of opposing censorship. And the university president isn't just dealing with a newspaper on its own turf: With these warrants, Falwell is leveraging state power to try to stop speech by private actors whose only connection to his school is to write about it. It's a bad approach for anyone to take, but especially someone who claims to support free expression and intellectual diversity.

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Jerry Falwell Jr. Has a Free Speech Problem - Reason

An online forum hosted by PEN Americas Campus Free Speech Program

NEW YORKThis week, PEN Americas Campus Free Speech Program launched a webinar series, Free Speech and the Virtual Campus, with an inaugural session devoted to What Professors Need to Know about Online Hate and Harassment. Hundreds of participants viewed the session from seven countries, as panelists discussed online attacks and abuse that faculty can prepare for, defend against, and combat.

Viktorya Vilk, program director for digital safety and free expression at PEN America, discussed how online abuse can be defined and outlined the chilling, censoring effects it can have on writers and journalists. She summarized recent trends and offered advice, drawn from PEN Americas Online Harassment Field Manual, on how to protect ones identity, how to document online abuse, and how to be a supportive ally to those targeted. She explained that women, people of color, and members of the LGBTQ+ community are disproportionately targeted by abuse and hate, which risks silencing the voices of those who have historically been marginalized in higher education and society writ large. She emphasized that offering institutional support and allyship to students, faculty, and staff targeted by online abuse is critical to ensuring that higher education is more equitable and diverse.

Oren Segal, vice president at the Center on Extremism at the Anti-Defamation League, discussed the rise in white supremacists and extremists using online spaces to spread hate, and their efforts to use the pandemic to reach new audiences. Segal noted that just like everyone else, extremists are also home now, engaging in online aggression, like Zoombombing. Despite some extremists affiliating themselves to hate groups, Segal emphasized that the majority of offenders are lone actors, making some of their actions hard to predict. Segal shared ADLs tips on preventing Zoombombing as well as their hate symbols database, as a reference for faculty to familiarize themselves with.

Cynthia Miller-Idriss, Professor of Education and Sociology at American University, spoke about the current threat of youth radicalization, with K-12 and college students now spending greater amounts of time online. She detailed how faculty members could prepare for such threats proactively, by updating their awareness of hate symbols and familiarizing themselves with digital platforms, as well as getting to know their security settings and available restrictions. She also offered advice for faculty and administrators in the aftermath of an incident of hate or harassment, elaborating on how faculty might deal with the after-effects of a Zoombombing incident in an online class.

Various questions and concerns were also taken up by panelists, as posed from the audience, including:

Continued here:
[RECAP] What Professors Need to Know about Online Hate and Harassment - PEN America

Mi-Ai Parrish (top left), Kyle Pope (top right), and Suzanne Nossel (bottom middle)

Screenshot from Zoom

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, the local news industry was a patient who already had all the underlying health conditions, said Mi-Ai Parrish, the former publisher of the Arizona Republic.

Now, local news is a patient in critical condition. Each day brings a new round of layoffs and pay cuts for journalists, a new slowing down of a printing press, and a new silence in communities that need accurate, updated, and tailored information. This is the tragic irony of our current moment: The COVID-19 pandemic is underscoring the critical importance of local news while also decimating it.

Considering this contradiction and examining paths forward were at the heart of Future Tenses most recent web event in our yearlong Free Speech Project series, which is examining the ways technology is influencing how we think about speech.

In communities across the U.S., local journalists have kept their communities informed throughout the pandemic about things like how many tests are available, where to go to get the resources they need, whats happening with their schools, what shortages their hospitals facethe sort of crucial, community-level coverage that large national publications like the New York Times cant.

Local news coverage during the pandemic hasnt just been about tallying cases. Kyle Pope, the editor and publisher of Columbia Journalism Review, noted that outlets have also shone a spotlight on social problemsthings like existing issues in county jails, the lack of capacity for digital learning in schools, and resource gaps at hospitals.

We think of local journalists as first responders, said Suzanne Nossel, the CEO of PEN America, a membership organization of writers dedicated to protecting free expression. Indeed, news organizations have been widely designated as essential businesses during the pandemic.

Recognizing the importance of their work to their communities, many news organizations have taken down paywalls for their COVID-19 coverage, an honorable decision which highlights an interesting conundrum, said Parrish, currently the Sue Clark-Johnson Professor in Media Innovation and Leadership at Arizona State University. (Disclosure: ASU is a partner with Slate and New America in Future Tense.) Outside of emergency situations, people often argue against paywalls by claiming that journalism is so vital that it should be freebut whats lost in that argument is that precisely because journalism is so vital, it needs the financial backing of its audience.

Unfortunately, convincing people to pay for journalism, particularly online journalism, is difficult.

Theres still sort of a hangover from the days where everything on the internet was free and people expected it to be free, Nossel said.

In a November report, PEN America found that over the past 15 years, newspapers have lost over $35 billion in ad revenue and 47 percent of newsroom staff. In many cases, the report notes, the digital shift has collapsed local newsrooms business models.

Without even taking into consideration the impact of our current pandemic, $35 billion represents a massive funding gap, one not easily bridged. Doing so requires recognition among the public that journalism is a necessary public serviceand perhaps government funding.

The most recent stimulus bill, as Nossel and Viktorya Vilk recently highlighted in Future Tense, includes almost no support for the journalism industry. But several organizations, including PEN America, are calling for future stimulus funding to include a special focus on local news organizations.

Government funding for journalism is controversial in the U.S., with critics citing concerns over editorial independence. But there are successful models for maintaining independence despite government funding in areas such as scientific research and the arts, Nossel said.

Perhaps this stimulus phase can kind of destigmatize the idea of expanding public funding and catalyze a robust, in-depth debate, she said.

One thing thats clear is that solutions are urgent. More than 2,100 newspapers have disappeared since 2004, according to University of North Carolina professor Penny Muse Abernathy. And that was before the pandemic. Once they disappear, they do not come back, said Nossel. So theres a finality at stake here.

Ultimately, said Pope, the problem local news faces is so daunting that theres no rescue big enough thats going to come from the outside. Rescuing local news requires community buy-in and community boots on the ground.

To get their communities to rally around them, said Pope, its incumbent on these news organizations to humanize themselves.

There are lots of ways to do this. It may involve sitting with your critical readers to discuss concerns over barbecue. It may involve, as Pope once did, parking an RV on the streets of Manhattan and opening the doors to community members with concerns, comments, questions, and tips. It wont always be easy.

But luckily, local news organizations have two big things going for them on this front. First, the majority of Americans trust local television, newspapers, and radio (more so than national news sources), and this trust increases with increased contact with local reporters.

The second, Parrish highlighted, is that among local journalists there is still so much heart for the work, despite constant challenges. After the 2016 election of Donald Trump, journalism schools across the country saw a surge in class sizes, and the panelists said it was reasonable to expect a similar reaction in the months following the pandemic.

Pope said his largest source of hope is local journalists commitment to telling stories that matterthe type of commitment that has them emailing CJR the day after theyve been laid off with an idea for a new, important story that theyre ready to report.

This hope is especially important in the face of the industrys uncertain future.

Its like everything that were living through right now. None of us know where the other side is, Pope said. I live in New York City and every day I look for glimmers of hope in the data, and some days I see it and some days I dont [W]e have to get through that phase first, and then we can start looking at the battlefield and sort of say, Where do we go now?

Future Tense is a partnership of Slate, New America, and Arizona State University that examines emerging technologies, public policy, and society.

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The New York Times Is Great, but Wholl Cover Your Community? - Slate

Senator Bernie Sanders has suspended his campaign for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, making former Vice President Joe Biden the presumptive nominee to face Donald Trump in November. Sanders says he will stay on the ballot in remaining primary races and continue to assemble delegates.

DN plays highlights from Sanderss speech to supporters in a live stream on Wednesday. Together, we have transformed American consciousness as to what kind of nation we can become, and have taken this country a major step forward in the never-ending struggle for economic justice, social justice, racial justice and environmental justice, he said.

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.

2020 Democratic Presidential nomination Amy Goodman Bernie Sanders Democracy Now! Donald Trump Free Speech TV Joe Biden

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Suspending the Campaign, Not the Movement: Bernie Sanders Pulls Out of 2020 Race But Will Stay on Ballot - Free Speech TV

The Foundation for Individual Right in Education (FIRE) says that it will defend the rights of college students in online college classes to ensure thatacademic freedom and freedom of expression are protected during the Chinese virus pandemic.

The free speech organization vows to continue to defend the rights of students as universities transition toward greater use of technology to ensure that basic civil liberties are not compromised.

FIREs statement arrives on the heels ofrecent Zoom bombings a type of cyber attack in which Zoom video conferencing meetings are hacked by unwelcome visitors.

The video conference app which has surged in popularity due to an increase of virtual meetings across the country in response to the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic has garnered an influx of complaints from users who have had their virtual meetings hijacked.

The incidents have even elicited a response from New YorkAttorney General Letitia James, who sent a letterto Zoom with a number of questions to ensure the company is taking appropriate steps to ensure users privacy and security, according to a spokesperson.

Now, FIRE has issued reasonable steps for students, faculty, and administrators to take in order to protect their virtual classrooms while ensuring that the First Amendment rights of students are upheld.

Reasonable steps may include controlling students microphone access; imposing reasonable, viewpoint-neutral requirements on student use of virtual backgrounds; and asking students to disable their camera, said the organization in a recentstatement.

Faculty, or the administrator of the virtual classroom if not the professor, may restrict the ability of unauthorized individuals to access and disrupt class sessions using the platforms security settings, protecting their and their students right to a disruption-free environment, FIRE added.

The organization went on to state that faculty should recognize that students attending classes from their residences or remote locations may have limited control over their immediate physical surroundings, and should take reasonable steps to accommodate students in the manner that best approximates an in-person classroom experience.

Like faculty, studentsexpressive rights in the virtual classroom should mirror those afforded to them when attending class on campus, added FIRE. Students must be given the opportunity to participate in online learning free from discrimination, harassment, and other undue interference with their educational pursuits.

As is always the case, students must not be subjected to discrimination by their professors based on their viewpoint or opinion, which strikes at the core of both the First Amendment and liberal education, the organization affirmed.

You can follow AlanaMastrangelo on Twitter at @ARmastrangelo, and on Instagram.

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Campus Free Speech Organization FIRE Is Protecting the Rights of Students Online - Breitbart

LOUISVILLE, Ky. Both Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear and Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer have recommended faith leaders not to host in-person services as the coronavirus outbreak continues.

During his Thursday press briefing, Beshear said 54 positive cases and six deaths were linked to a church revival in Hopkins County. He encouraged leaders to host services or studies online instead.

Still, one Bullitt County pastor said he refuses to comply as his First Amendment rights are at stake. Pastor Jack Roberts at Maryville Baptist Church said he's offering an online option but continues to hold services in-person, including a Wednesday night bible study.

Attorney Mat Staver, who represents Roberts, called the orders unconstitutional.

"Home Depot has no right to exist under the Constitution, churches do," Staver said. "You don't throw that out simply in times of crisis, you have to balance that right with the safety of the people."

While the First Amendment does protect freedom of religion, the University of Louisville law professor Sam Marcosson said the governor is in the right.

"The only First Amendment right that the church has is not to be singled out for differential treatment," Marcosson said. "So, if the governor was allowing sporting events but not churches, then they had a claim."

Marcosson compared churches remaining open during the pandemic to a person yelling fire in a theater.

"You're not allowed to falsely yell fire in a crowded theater," Marcosson said. "Yes, you have a right to free speech, but you can't exercise that right in a way that puts other people in danger."

Dr. Albert Mohler Jr., president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, said the governor is within his rights.

"There's not a First Amendment violation here," Mohler said.

He did, though, have a problem with Fischer saying no to drive-thru services. While Beshear supported Fischer's decision, he did not say he would make that recommendation for the state. Mohler said not allowing drive-thru services would single out churches.

"Religious liberty at the very least means that religious institutions cannot be singled out, if you can [have a] drive-thru a liquor store, you should be allowed to do a drive-thru service," Mohler said.

RELATED: Maryville Baptist Church holds Bible study against Gov. Beshear's recommendation

RELATED: Some churches to hold Easter services despite Beshear, Fischer's recommendations

RELATED: Passover, Good Friday and Easter: How to celebrate virtually during the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic

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Telling churches to cancel in-person services is not a violation of the First Amendment, expert says - WHAS11.com

Elections commissioner says social media posts were a threat to ASU and President Michael Crow

Illustration published on Monday,March 20, 2017.

All seven Undergraduate Student Government Senate candidates in the United Voices for ASU coalition received three infraction points on their campaigns after a complaint was filed against their members' social media activity.

Judah Waxelbaum, chairman of the Arizona Federation of College Republicans and a junior studying political science, filed the complaint on April 5 citing the Arizona Board of Regents code of conduct that says behavior that could "present a risk or danger to the health, safety or security" of ABOR, the University, students or University property is prohibited.

"The Elections Department has reasonable evidence to believe that the United Voices for ASU Senatorial Ticket has raised reasonable concern for the risk or danger of the University community due to their tweets related to ASU President Micheal Crow," the decision says.

The decision, made by Elections Commissioner Carla Naranjo, recognizes that students have a right to free speech and political expression but says the social media posts contained in the complaint are threatening toward Crow.

The decision points out that USG is a nonpartisan governing body for all undergraduate students, something that the coalition's interactions on social media make hard to believe they would carry out, said Waxelbaum.

Waxelbaum said he was "disturbed" by the content in social media posts by members of the coalition which include profane language toward Crow, the University and suggest yelling to uphold their platform. The complaint also highlights tweets that depict violent actions toward federal presidential candidates.

"They don't seem interested in listening to those who they disagree with," Waxelbaum said. "And they're endorsed by community members and organizations that have no interest in civil dialogue."

United Voices for ASU's four-point platform demands refunds from the University for in-person tuition and housing, curved grading, free internet and transparency surrounding their response to COVID-19.

A week into campaigning, endorsements and coalitions are forming around candidates. The United Voices for ASU coalition and all of the candidates running have been endorsed by political student clubs like ASU Young Democratic Socialists of America, Students for Socialism and MECHA de ASU.

Other groups rallying around an issue like Students for Justice in Palestine and ASU No Mas Muertes have also endorsed the coalition. Clubs representing cultural groups like the African Students' Association, the Association of Latino Professionals for America and El Concilio have all voiced their support.

The coalition wants to represent what they call a minority at the University by building grassroots relationships and "representing the interests of all."

"When all of us stand together with unity, we have more chances of seeing a drastic change," said Alexia Isais, senatorial candidate for The College, member of United Voices and a sophomore studying political science.

While the coalition admits that they're proud of their resilience, other political clubs on campus haven't been too sure of their motives.

"I'm concerned that students might vote on the platform of reform due to COVID-19," said President of ASU College Libertarians, David Howman, a graduate student studying justice studies. "It's a talking point, not a real plan for unity."

Howman voiced that he was worried that those running with the coalition were in "pursuit of their own ideologies" and would set a "double-edged precedent" if people with partisan ideas joined a nonpartisan organization.

But United Voices members believe that other senatorial candidates had been more political than them. Members of the coalition said that their endorsements only represent niche groups of people who say they have never been heard before by USG or the University administration and might have a chance now.

"We're the underdogs in this election," said Bridget Saidu, senatorial candidate for The College, member of United Voices and sophomore studying philosophy and justice studies.

Another member added that the argument that the group was too political had no real grounds.

"USG is not apolitical, it's nonpartisan," said Daniel Lopez, senatorial candidate for The College, member of United Voices and junior studying philosophy and political science. "It's for helping students," he said, with everything from housing, food insecurity to discrimination, all things that he said are inherently political.

A campaign for USG is effectively suspended when the candidate receives nine infraction points.

"The level of punishment is unfortunate," Waxelbaum said. "The commissioner needs to take a serious closer look."

Campaigning began on March 30 and will end on April 14 when voting begins. Students will vote digitally on April 14 and 15 and results will be announced on April 16.

Editor's Note: Alexia Isais worked as an opinion columnist for The State Press in 2019. She was not involved in the reporting or editing of this story.

Reach the reporter at pjhanse1@asu.edu and follow @piperjhansen on Twitter.

Like The State Press on Facebook and follow @statepress on Twitter.

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United Voices for ASU candidates receive three infraction points - The State Press