Below is my column in The Hill on the rise of a generation of censors with attacks on both academic freedom and free speech throughout our educational system. This trend has reached law schools, which is ominous since these students are the future judges and lawyers who are expected to defend these core principles.
Here is the column:
Free speech on American college campuses has been in a free fall for years. From high schools through law schools, free speech has gone from being considered a right that defines our society to being dismissed as a threat. According to polling, the result is arguably one of the most anti-free-speech generations in our history. The danger is more acute because it has reached law schools where future judges and lawyers may replicate the same intolerance in our legal system.
A recent controversy at Duke Law School highlights this danger. “Law & Contemporary Problems” is a faculty-run journal that recently decided to do a balanced symposium on “Sex and the Law” — including transgender issues — and asked Professor Kathleen Stock of the University of Sussex (who has criticized transgender positions) to participate.
Protests erupted over allowing such intellectual diversity.
The new set of student editors demanded that Stock be removed from the symposium. The faculty board issued a statement explaining the importance of freedom of speech and academic freedom, particularly on a journal that serves as a forum for debates on contemporary issues. Students resigned rather than associate with a journal offering both sides of such issues.
Some legal columnists echoed calls to ban those with opposing views. The legal site “Above The Law” (ATL) published an article denouncing the faculty for supporting free speech. ATL editor Joe Patrice ran a factually inaccurate tirade against Duke for using academic freedom as “a shield for professors to opine and behave in ways that marginalize others.”
The ATL criticism of Duke was illustrative of the new anti-free-speech movement that is now taking hold in law schools and legal publications. Academic freedom and free speech are denounced as tools to “marginalize others.” Patrice sums up why both the student editors and the Duke faculty must be condemned: “A ‘vigorous and open exchange of ideas’ is valuable only to the extent it improves the academic mission of improving the human condition. Is Trans skepticism within that field? It shouldn’t be, but here we are.” In other words, you are entitled to free speech so long as you cannot be accused of “marginalizing” others.
While calling for professors like Stock to be barred from the publication for “marginalizing” others, ATL editors and other writers often stigmatize and denounce whole groups as requiring containment and condemnation. Elie Mystal, who writes for ATL and is The Nation’s justice correspondent, for example, lashed out at “white society” and how he strives to maintain a “whiteness-free” life. On MSNBC, Mystal declared, without any contradiction from the host, that “You don’t communicate to [Trump supporters], you beat them. You do not negotiate with these people, you destroy them.”
In such campaigns, there is little time or patience with trivialities like free speech.
Mystal was celebrated for his declaration: “I have no intention of waiting around for them to try to kill me before I demand protection from their ‘free speech.’”
Dangerous thoughts are ill-defined beyond being rejected by these writers. Under this approach, free speech becomes like pornography under the famous test of Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart: “I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material … and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it.”
Of course, free speech demands bright lines so that professors are not chilled in what they write or say. However, that is precisely the point. Whether Patrice and others can block the publication of Stock is immaterial. The fact is that most students and faculty do not want to be the subject of such a public campaign. Academics are notoriously risk-averse. They need conferences and publications to advance their careers.
The threat is to lose everything that academics need to be active intellectuals. This is the one-year anniversary of the move to force a criminology professor named Mike Adams off the faculty of the University of North Carolina (Wilmington). Adams was a conservative faculty member with controversial writings who had to go to court to stop prior efforts to remove him. He then tweeted a condemnation of North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper for his pandemic rules, tweeting that he had dined with six men at a six-seat table and “felt like a free man who was not living in the slave state of North Carolina” before adding: “Massa Cooper, let my people go.” It was a stupid and offensive tweet. However, we have seen extreme comments on the left — including calls to gas or kill or torture conservatives — be tolerated or even celebrated at universities.
Celebrities, faculty and students demanded that Adams be fired. After weeks of public pummeling, Adams relented and took a settlement to resign. He then killed himself a few days before his final day as a professor.
Law schools have seen repeated disruptions of conservative speakers with the support or acquiescence of faculty. CUNY law school dean Mary Lu Bilek insisted that law students preventing a conservative law professor from speaking was itself free speech. She also insisted that a law student threatening to set a man’s Israel Defense Forces sweatshirt on fire was simply “expressing her opinion.” Recently Bilek actually cancelled herself and resigned after she made a single analogy to acting like a “slaveholder” as a self-criticism for failing to achieve equity and reparations for black faculty and students.
Last year, the acting Northwestern law school dean declared publicly: “I am James Speta and I am a racist.” He was followed by Emily Mullin, executive director of major gifts, who announced: “I am a racist and a gatekeeper of white supremacy. I will work to be better.” Such public declarations can fuel demands for more mandatory demonstrations by others or intolerance for those who dissent. At Rutgers this year, the student government ordered all groups to hold critical race theory and diversity programs as a condition for receiving funds. At the University of North Carolina, student Sagar Sharma, who is a student of color, faced a recall election as the first-year class co-president for simply stating that he did not consider an argument between two fellow students to be racist.
Faculty and editors are now actively supporting modern versions of book-burning with blacklists and bans for those with opposing political views. Columbia Journalism School Dean Steve Coll has denounced the “weaponization” of free speech, which appears to be the use of free speech by those on the right. So the dean of one of the premier journalism schools now supports censorship.
Free speech advocates are facing a generational shift that is now being reflected in our law schools, where free speech principles were once a touchstone of the rule of law. As millions of students are taught that free speech is a threat and that “China is right” about censorship, these figures are shaping a new society in their own intolerant images.
For now, the Duke symposium will include the offending article — but the resignations and condemnations show why this small degree of diversity in viewpoint is increasingly rare on our campuses.
This is a single (and close) victory for free speech, but make no mistake about it: We are losing the war.
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. You can find his updates on Twitter @JonathanTurley.
Turley claims that Joe Patrice of “Above the Law” published a “factually inaccurate tirade” against an anti-trans author. Turley claims that Patrice misrepresented how the law journal is run, which is by the faculty that has the final say, instead of students who have the final say, which is not the case. Here is what Joe wrote: ” (CLARIFICATION: It’s worth noting — as explored in the NCAA analogy below — that this journal bills itself as having faculty editors… it just makes the students do all the work for no pay). Apparently the student editorial board voted overwhelmingly not to include this article but the Faculty Board is refusing to let the article move forward without it. We’ve been told 5 student editors have already resigned and at least 14 more are considering following.” Patrice did not misrepresent the facts, and the issue over this author is not freedom of speech, either. It’s about academic credentials being used to suborn ignorance and discrimination that is hurtful to other people.
Patrice pointed out that student editors objected to the academic credentials of this anti-trans author being used to lend credence to discrimination against transgender people, and multiple student editors wanted no part of this. (FYI to those who haven’t been to law school: usually only the top students are involved with law review). It’s sort of like how Turley’s credentials are being used by his employer to prop up the Republican party, now being led byTrump: to downplay Trump’s immorality, incompetence and failures, to ignore the Big Lie, attack mainstream media and Democrats whenever and wherever possible and to publish pieces that keep the disciples stirred up. Same thing.
Only the top students… well, that makes a difference. Only the top educated have gotten this nation in one mess after another. Top anything lends me little comfort these days.
Well, many of those top students will become judges, members of Congress, Senators, partners in major law firms that handle major litigation, and some go to the ACLU that looks out for the rights of those who can’t hire expensive counsel. To lure the faithful followers of Trump, who statistically are not college educated, the spin masters try to get you to believe that education is a waste of time and that educated people are responsible for all of society’s bad things. Think about that the next time you need a physician. Only the top college students get into medical school. Think about engineering schools that only accept the best and brightest the next time you get stuck in traffic on a bridge that you might worry could collapse.
A list of well-documented trends and positions of the Left:
– censorship
– anti-police, defund the police
– open borders
– they openly tell people to come illegally, and that Trump was a xenophobe for being against illegal immigration, or for building walls to keep them out
– Congresspeople like Tlaib call to abolish ICE, BP, and DHS
– they oppose Trump’s efforts for asylum seekers to apply in the closest safe country and STAY THERE during the review process
– most asylum applications are declined. Living in a poor country or a bad neighborhood does not qualify for asylum under international law, otherwise all of Compton could seek asylum in Sweden
– sanctuary cities oppose the deportation even of violent convicted felons, including rapists and murderers
– their policies have led to massive surges in illegal immigration
– if it takes years for an immigration court to finally get to a case, and then rule for deportation, they still oppose it, because the person has had time to get established. There does not appear to be any circumstance in which the Left would support deporting anyone.
-riots
-arson
-looting
-bailing out rioters, arsonists, and looters
-Antifa
-CHOP
-burning of a police precinct
-“mostly peaceful protests” with businesses burning in the background
-policies that led to an increase in single motherhood and the ensuing poor outcomes of offspring
– against school choice
– Critical Race Theory, which teaches that virtue and guilt are inherent, and skin deep
-BLM and its antisemitic, anti-cop, pro-criminal, racist rhetoric
-failing schools that cling to failed curriculum such as blended learning
-the Democrat politicization of public schools
-censorship and harassment of conservative and/or Christian students at K-grad school
-support for the castration and sterilization of children
-forced speech, including forcing people to say that a man who suffers from gender dysphoria is actually a woman
-disenfranchising female athletes by allowing biological males to compete in their sports divisions and telling them to shut up about it
-racism is encouraged, mainstreamed, and normalized against whites and black conservatives
-racist identity politics in which someone’s worth is judged by skin color
-racist discrimination against Asians in school admissions as being “too successful” or “acting white”.
Democrats want you to disbelieve your own eyes. Due to the low polling of CRT, Democrats have claimed that CRT is not being taught in school, ludicrously at the same time that the American Federation of Teachers pledges to teach CRT in schools across America. The union stated “We oppose attempts to ban critical race theory and/or The 1619 Project.” It also included a provision to jumpstart a study into that “critiques empire, white supremacy, anti-Blackness, anti-Indigeneity, racism, patriarchy, cisheteropatriarchy, capitalism, ableism, anthropocentrism, and other forms of power and oppression at the intersections of our society.”
New Business Item 39 discussed way to combat “anti-CRT rhetoric”
Los Angeles School District will require “Ethnic studies” as a condition to graduate. The first draft of this curriculum was blatantly anti-semitic, supported BDS, and
These are the same schools who can’t seem to manage to teach students to be grade level proficient in math or reading.
Wow, you actually spent time putting that venal list together. Too many outright falsehoods to comment upon. But I’m having fun visualizing you spitting on yourself as you were typing.
eb
You are correct, Anonymous. With Karen: where to start? No matter how many references to actual facts you would provide, it wouldn’t make a dent, because she is immune to facts. All Democrats are evil. The Left is evil. All bad things that happen are aided and abetted by Democrats and the Left. She believes the Big Lie. She’s either being paid to write the drivel she puts out or doesn’t have much of a life. Oftentimes, she just repeats what she heard on Hannity, Tucker, Laura and Levin the night before.
Just curious, seems the Turley blog censor has kicked in once again. I posted the link to the NYT doc on 1/6 to Karen such that she could watch it while being in great distress when faced with a time stamped, blow by blow account of what she claimed to be an event where someone got excited and broke a window….
Was that because of content or an automatic reject based on the fact it was from the NYT. It posted for a bit before coming down…
eb
Anonymous:
The window I referenced was when they broke in from outside.
Instead of assuming you know what I’m talking about, why don’t you just ask me?
I’ve watched one of the videos of Babbit getting shot, the one taken from the rear of the crowd.
Does this or any other perspective of the shooting answer my questions?
– Why hasn’t the name of the police officer who killed Ashli Babbit been released when such names are so rapidly released in cases that involve a black victim?
– Why haven’t all those thousands of hours of security footage been made available?
– Why are the Jan 6 arrestees held in solitary confinement when most of them are charged with trespassing and illegally parading?
– Why wasn’t the law similarly applied to the Leftist rioters, arsonists, looters, and other law breakers who caused millions of dollars in damage, destroyed businesses already suffering during a pandemic, engaged in sedition when they created “autonomous zones” where people were raped and murdered while police were barred from entry?
The law should be applied fairly and equally to the Jan 6 rioters, as well as those who have laid siege to Blue cities for around a year.
If you don’t believe the law should be applied to the Leftie rioters, why not? Do you agree with most of them being uncharged, and those who are charged being diverted to counseling, while the Jan 6 rioters languish in solitary confinement?
What about the Lefties who broke into the Capitol and Senate Office Buildings during the Kavanaugh hearing? Are they guilty of sedition? Are the Lefties who hurled bombs at federal buildings for all those months and burned a police precinct guilty of sedition? Why aren’t they in solitary?
All I hear are excuses and deflection.
Anonymous – the list contains entries which are all well-documented. That’s why you restored to ad hominem. What else can you say?
Elvis ; yet again you throw mud and falsehoods and unlike the commentator you disparage provide zero rebuttal but your knee jerk partisanship. Again thank you for the vacant post…as usual.
Karen, thank you again for your efforts to frame the truth in a manner that even cowardly morons like Anonymous could grasp if they could excise the lefty bias from their inefficient brains.
All America needs now is law enforcement, beginning with strict enforcement of fundamental law.
This IS the censor in the United States under the dominion of the U.S. Constitution:
1st Amendment
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
_______________________________________________
“…courts…must…declare all acts contrary to the manifest tenor of the Constitution void.”
“…men…do…what their powers do not authorize, [and] what they forbid.”
“[A] limited Constitution … can be preserved in practice no other way than through the medium of courts of justice, whose duty it must be to declare all acts contrary to the manifest tenor of the Constitution void. Without this, all the reservations of particular rights or privileges would amount to nothing … To deny this would be to affirm … that men acting by virtue of powers may do not only what their powers do not authorize, but what they forbid.”
– Alexander Hamilton
@svelaz
Not a “conservative” because they conserve very little. “Conservatives” couldn’t even “conserve” marriage nor the proper bathroom for individuals to use. In another 10 years the National Review will be making the “conservative” case for gay “marriage”. Wait!! Didn’t David French already write such a piece?
antonio
Complaint that the First Amendment is used as “a shield for professors to opine and behave in ways that marginalize others.”
***
We see that same jargon again and again.
I would like to see people who talk like that marginalized.
It used to be that lawyers were as disgusting as the gum on the bottom of your shoe. Now they are worse than that–they are cow excrement.
Something else is going on with social media platforms
Facebook & Twitter are blocking local police & law enforcement postings.
Here’s a hint for leftist censorship advocates. Just start calling mainstream conservatives who support traditional free speech “nazis”. At that point, they will do what mainstream conservatives usually do and fold like a cheap suit. Mainstream “conservatives”, conserve very little.
antonio
“According to polling, the result is arguably one of the most anti-free-speech generations in our history. The danger is more acute because it has reached law schools where future judges and lawyers may replicate the same intolerance in our legal system.”
Don’t worry Svelaz, you will get your beloved ‘hate speech’ laws once this generation in law school moves into positions of power in the legislature and judiciary.
I would respect you more if you will just admit that the desired goal is official, leftist sponsored censorship and European style hate speech laws. Won’t hold my breath though, that may be a bridge too far. You will only admit such only after mainstream politicians take up the cause.
antonio
Antonio,
“ would respect you more if you will just admit that the desired goal is official, leftist sponsored censorship and European style hate speech laws. ”
Despite what you think, that’s not the desired goal at all. The problem is conservatives are having a difficult time understanding the distinction between public and private entities and how the constitution applies to both.
I like to tell the “kids” you will get the future you deserve. The funny thing is, they may not be able to complain about it.
I’ve always been curious about your fairly vigorous censorship policies on your blog here, Turley, so I confess to wondering what is truly behind your ‘free speech’ focus. Since censorship is clearly okay with you on some level, what are your boundaries with it? What subject matter is off limits? I could probably take an accurate guess as to what the trigger points are, but it would be awesome to hear you proclaim them publicly.
I mean sure, I can see the place for some speech regulation, especially during these particularly charged partisan times. In my more disspirited moments I confess to tossing the idea around that traitorous, Capitol-rioting MAGATS would be served well by a round of water boarding in GITMO. Not by my belief in the effectiveness, or righteousness, of the policy, those tactics didn’t work and were immoral…, but rather in a sort of flawed moral equivalency sort of way. That’s what the U.S. did to deal with certain elements dedicated to taking down the U.S. government post 9/11…, why not have the same policy post 1/6? Water board the more organizing/proactive MAGATS just before placing electrodes on their genitalia. But I also know that very statement stands a good chance of being pulled from the blog here.
So it would be awesome for you to flesh out your position past the massive generality of ‘I believe in free speech always’ position that you often share while, in practice, fully standing by certain censorship guidelines.
eb
Professional grievance collectors such as yourself appear to be free to say all sorts of idiot things here
So you’re responding because you’re feeling the idiot vibe? It makes you feel right at home? Notice the punctuation at the end of my sentences — it’s what idiots such as myself to signify an ending of an encapsulated thought. Guess you haven’t reached that level of idiot school yourself though.
eb
Eb vainly asks:
“So it would be awesome for you to flesh out your position past the massive generality of ‘I believe in free speech always’ position that you often share while, in practice, fully standing by certain censorship guidelines.”
Exactly. Turley bleats the virtues of free speech, yada, yada, yada. He cuts and pastes together article upon article citing example after example of liberals censoring conservatives giving the false impression that conservatives never have censored liberals. Any dilettante can point his finger at something and whine, but it takes a teacher to explain the difference between legitimate censorship and illegitimate censorship. We are not being taught that by Turley. I presume he solicits questions in his law class. Would it kill him to respond *generally* to the question- where do you draw the line?
Jeff Silberman
You came from a family that always told you how smart you were. You would have been better off if they told you the truth.
So jeffy ; Do you see “conservatives” burning cities , violently rioting , screaming race hate , screaming class hate ,attacking all police, outright attempting to and ruining careers of people that articulate disagreement with their Marxist doings. And of course the left’s overt “some animals are more equal than others” venality that is undeniable. So in short NO , you do not see anyone on the right side of the spectrum doing this…. meanwhile ‘Rome’ burns due to leftist mantras of racist and class hate mongering . And partisan sycophants such as yourself encourage and revel in this dishonest discord . Yet you types can not see let alone fathom your complete and thorough hypocrisy.
Phergus says:
“So jeffy ; Do you see “conservatives” burning cities , violently rioting , screaming race hate , screaming class hate ,attacking all police, outright attempting to and ruining careers of people that articulate disagreement with their Marxist doings. And of course the left’s overt “some animals are more equal than others” venality that is undeniable. So in short NO , you do not see anyone on the right side of the spectrum doing this…. meanwhile ‘Rome’ burns due to leftist mantras of racist and class hate mongering . And partisan sycophants such as yourself encourage and revel in this dishonest discord . Yet you types can not see let alone fathom your complete and thorough hypocrisy.”
Do you realize that the more you speak, the less you are understood? That’s quite a knack!
Since from now on I won’t be responding to you, there’s no need for you to waste your time writing to me. Let’s just go our separate ways in peace, shall we? That way you’ll have more time to devote reading your magazine, “Duck and Decoy.”
Jeff Silberman
“Since from now on I won’t be responding to you,
Jeff adds another to his cancel list because Phergus stuck to the facts and Jeff couldn’t handle them; “burning cities , violently rioting , screaming race hate , screaming class hate ,attacking all police, outright attempting to and ruining careers of people…”
All these things are real and proven. Jeff can’t handle them so he says bye by. Jeff needs to suckle, so he will seek comfort and support from his substitute mom, eb.
Historically, societies tend to behave as pendulums. When the anti-freedom coalition has won, they will look at each other and try to figure out what to complain about. And freedom will be born again. The question is how long it will take and how many abuses will be perpetrated in the meantime. Without freedom of speech, no other freedom can survive. It is interesting how “Trump” is always the justification for abuses.
Changes are inevitable but they take places slowly so as not to face significant push back while they take tiny steps. At each step, there are a few people who will oppose forcefully, and that few will shrink because others will have gotten accustomed to a new normal. In the end, those who remain fully opposed will die out. And so it is with Prof. Turley and others who are staunch defenders of free speech, by the time free speech has morphed into something unrecognizable as free speech, that group will be long gone.
I relate a story. Security in the name of safety is now viewed as an acceptable fixture. My daughter, who at the time was 27, visited the Minnesota State Capitol but was not quite sure if it was OK to enter the building because there were no visible security assets! In her mind, the building could not possibly be open to the public!
Stalin would be impressed.
Let’s also point out they JT had no problems banning commentators on this page who disagree with him. Noice how there are so few of them and so many Trumpers?
Oralloy
The comments that I have seen deleted were uniformly foul mouthed and rude (“Turley, you POS”, “Turley, for F… yourself “).
I don’t think that they added to the discourse.
Posters are entitled to be angry, vitriolic, and even rude. But those comments brought down the whole blog.
Who cares what you personally think adds, or subtracts, to the discourse?
eb
I’ve been asking JT for some time to define the legal red lines and norms of civility that he could accept as not covered by free speech protections. I would be impressed if he would tackle just one red line, doxxing with intent to intimidate (use of communications to induce fear of threat to harm personally).
If our support for free speech is so radical as to have it protect bullying and threats of harm (reputational, economic, physical), then we set the stage for the unraveling of civil society at the hands of the most militant actors. We’re already noticing the shift of media to giving preferential attention to “loudest voice” actors (DJT’s winning formula in 2016) over those who speak with moderation, nuance and respect. This media preference further coarsens dialog, reinforces entrenched positions, and shifts the conflict toward ad-hominem attacks.
I’m all for free speech, but with a traditional deterrence of false-flag reputational attacks. In the early days of our Republic, the duel served as a deterrent against waging personhood-defamation campaigns. That was replaced by defamation lawsuits. But in the ’60s, the Warren Court naively stripped “public persons” (not defined in law) of equal rights under the law to defamation deterrence.
Then, the techies gave us “anyone can publish” and section 230 indemnifying the platform owner/manager from responsibility for defamation deterrence. An infospace dominated by committed, no-holds-barred infowarriors has taken hold. Civility and respect for disagreement are evaporating before our eyes.
We have to prepare intellectually to define the acceptable limits of free expression in a complex internet environment, and then steel ourselves for enforcing those limits on militant, self-righteous actors who step over the line. I’d like JT is show some leadership on that side of the equation.
Fully agreed, pbinca.
eb
Right back at you bubba ho tep…aka elvis the insect. Your continually vacant posts prove the point of the commentator you so arrogantly reply to.
Monumentcolorado,
Turley is all about unbridled free speech. His solution to the rude and foul mouthed comments should be MORE speech, not censorship. Turley engaged in exactly the same thing Twitter and Facebook do. Censor speech because it violated the TOS.
” Turley engaged in exactly the same thing Twitter and Facebook do.”
Totally wrong.
SM
S. Meyer,
“ Totally wrong.”
Those that get censored or removed on this blog violated the blog’s own TOS.
Twitter and Facebook do the exact same thing. Even the blog’s moderator pointed out this is what Turley’s blog does.
I am not surprised that you cannot tell the difference between a bolder, a rock and a pebble. You were wrong and you are wrong again.
SM
S. Meyer, you clearly are not paying attention. Turley’s blog, Facebook, and Twitter all have their own TOS. They all have the ability and do censor those that violate them.
It’s not a difficult concept. You have not articulated exactly what you are saying is wrong about that assertion.
TOS have little to do with the point made by the professor in the WSJ I posted. It had to do with a Constitutional issue that you failed to grasp.
SM
boulder
But do you also permanently ban those commentators? Do you even let them know you are banning them?
Oralloy and others,
You do not seem to understand how blogs work.
Professor Turley is leasing space on a server, someone installed an instance of WordPress on it, built the page.
Professor Turley does not run his site. He owns it. He posts to it. But he pays someone else to actually run it.
Professor Turley likely does not even read the comments section.
But someone has to in order to make sure it does not get hit by SPAM bots. That requires a back end, server side SPAM plug-in to weed out most of the SPAM (e.g. “I make $1,000 a week working from home!”).
Some people think their comments were deleted. Likely the server has not refreshed, and they think their post was deleted. Or if they are using a VPN, a pair of human eyes have to look and approve the comment. That takes a dedicated, and paid, team. If you post here on a regular basis, using the same computer/device, not a VPN, and dont post stupid stuff, likely your email addy, and IP address are put on a “white” list and your posts go through with no human intervention. If you are new, on a “grey” list awaiting approval, then added to the “white” list. Post stupid stuff or SPAM bot, “black” list.
The fact there are so many so called “Trumpsters” on this site and few . . . lets say not so much Trump, is not an indication of the Professor deleting or banning anyone. Just like people who watch CNN or Fox are not likely to watch the other one. Fact is, free speech rings more to those of conservative leanings.
Someone has made the assertion that Karen S is being paid by some right-wing outfit to post here.
It could be equally said those who are critics of Professor Turley and post here often, are being paid by some left-wing outfit.
You did not answer if you put commentators on a ban list.
As I am not the moderator/sysadmin for this site, I cannot say if there is a ban list.
However, based off the number of Professor Turley’s critics and the fact they have not been banned, I would say no, there is not a ban list.
Unless they say something stupid like death threats.
The owner of a blog I mod/sysadmin for, she get death/rape threats on a semi-regular basis.
Those people get banned.
What is this “Black list” you speak of? That sounds like a ban list.
Does JT also oppose banning the teaching of “Critical Race Theory”?
MollyG,
That’s the biggest free speech issue Turley is ignoring. You literally have state legislatures banning CRT because they think it’s a bad idea.
It’s an unconstitutional attempt at stifling an unpopular idea.
They are banning indoctrination. Keep up with what the largest teachers union advocates and keep up with the racism young children are taught.
how narrow minded of you to assume that anyone who disagrees with you must be a “Trumper.”
Republican or Democrat, left or right, ALL OPINIONS must be aired. That is one of the core values of this country. When we lose core values we lose what binds us together. This censorship MUST STOP!
You are correct! I will add another thought. We are losing what binds is together because of the continuous drumbeat on diversity and inclusion. The proponents of diversity have lost sight of our shared values. As we have seen, there is little interest in diversity of thought.
JT once again posts a one sided partisan rant. The right-wingers are the biggest threat to school free speech because of their uninformed banning of what they claim is CRT.
I DISAGREE TOTALLY WITH YOUR OPINION! But you have my support in the right to say it. I only wish the left would adopt the same standard.
Oh please.
How true. Turley demands that colleges provide a safe space for any and all speech. In Turley’s world, private entities may not discriminate against speech by refusing to listen. We no longer have the freedom to ignore speech we find offensive. We must endure every crackpot idea, like it or not.
Jeff Silbermancom,
I get the strong impression that Turley is confusing a “decline” in free speech with the very notion that he promotes, fight free speech with more free speech. He cited a student journalism staff as demanding the removal of a certain individual because of the views expressed. It’s students that are making the demands. The question I pose is, are students bound to accept the views or opinions of someone they disagree with simply because they are “staff” at a school? Are they paid employees?
Demands for removal from students doesn’t seem to be censorship.
I’m more concerned about Turley ignoring real censorship when it comes to legislatures banning the teaching or discussion of CRT. Turley’s concerns seem to be conveniently misplaced.
CRT was found wanting. If you feel what the students did is free speech, than what the legislature bans is also free speech as it is following the will of the people.
“In Turley’s world, private entities may not discriminate against speech by refusing to listen. “
“In Turley’s world, private entities may not discriminate against speech by refusing to listen. “
Where did Turley say that anyone must listen? This idea that Jeff promotes is a distortion of the spoken word.
Oralloy,
That’s the one thing Turley seems to avoid with prejudice. Schools and state legislatures banning CRT because it’s a bad idea. You would think Turley would address the clear censorship that these legislatures are engaging in by banning the discussion of an idea.
Orally, those opposing the left are primarily against indoctrination. That is something you must have faced early in your life to make the statement you have.
No one wishes to inhibit the discussion of slavery and equality under the law. CRT in our schools is teaching racism and is intolerant of diverse opinions.
Lefties on the whole are a threat to the Constitution.
Read the Lefty posters on the blog and you realize that most Lefties are angry, virulent, and incoherent.
Many are foul-mouthed louts who use insults over wit.
Others just try to bore you to death with voluminous posts that are witless (“+100 EB”).
In either case, they hate America as it exists.
-100
And don’t ever accuse me of hating this country you cretin.
eb
I don’t know if you hate this country or not, but from your many anti-capitalist, anti-free speech, anti-almost everything one can easily come to that conclusion. Nonetheless, you are entitle to your opinion and to voice that opinion however wrong you may be.
Thank you. Although, I don’t agree with how you’ve categorized me, the same goes for you being able to express your opinion.
eb
Agreed. The current crop of Marxists here are emboldened with a Chinese funded puppet as POTUS feel invigorated to let out their bile and ostracize people with their virtuous hate they define as something noble to “freedoms cause” when it is patently quite the opposite.
This is disheartening to say the least. The notion that coerced virtue is “democracy” is ludicrous. Mob rule is in effect.
There should be no conditions on a “vigorous and open exchange of ideas.” The “left” has its story and is sticking to it. Unfortunately, without the possibility of debate, there’s no way to point out to them how baseless, erroneous, factless and downright stupid their story actually is.
“ There should be no conditions on a “vigorous and open exchange of ideas.”
Actually there are always conditions. Even on this blog there are conditions, conditions that result in censorship if they are violated.