Monday, April 24, 2017
#FreeSpeech in the News: April 24, 2017
As the Citadel of Free Speech here in Cleveland, we work to protect and promote the basis of our democracy by sharing related stories, commentary, and opinions on free speech in the 21st century. Here's what's making the news - and what you should know about - this week.
“There is no question that Trump’s decision to use his bully pulpit to actually bully protesters and to rile up his crowds against them is morally despicable. But legally, deciding whether what happened in that crowded theater rises to the level of incitement is a trickier task.”
Donald Trump Has Free Speech Rights, Too, ACLU
“As a legal matter, even at public universities where the First Amendment applies, some hate speech can be lawfully sanctioned, provided it’s being prohibited as part of a course of discriminatory conduct.”
What Wellesley Students and Critics Got Wrong About Free Speech, BloombergView
“I think it's a most important case… I sense that it goes to the heart of the First Amendment, to hear things or to see things that we hate test the First Amendment more than seeing or hearing things that we like. It wasn't designed for things we like. They never needed a First Amendment."
#TBT: Texas v. Johnson and free speech’s trial by fire, CNN
“Assaults on college free speech have been waged for decades, but they used to be top-down, origination with government of school administrators.”
War on campus, CNN
“The idea of freedom of speech does not mean a blanket permission to say anything anybody thinks. It means balancing the inherent value of a given view with the obligation to ensure that other members of a given community can participate in discourse as fully recognized members of that community.”
What ‘Snowflakes’ Get Right About Free Speech, The New York Times
“There is an unbreachable distance between the debates professional commentators initiate and maintain — and the real lives of most Americans.”
The truth about the campus “free speech wars”, Salon
“The Open Campus Initiative is very much needed at Harvard to promote free speech and expression.”
New Harvard club courts controversy to foster free speech on campus, USA Today
“It was the beginning of a seismic shift in American culture… [the] energy the FSM [Free Speech Movement] unleashed spread through campuses across the country, with protests and ‘takeovers’ everywhere from San Francisco State to the University of Michigan to Columbia and abroad.”
Berkeley gave birth to the Free Speech Movement in the 1960s. Now, conservatives are demanding it include them., The Washington Post
