Gordon Klein, an accounting professor in the Anderson School of Business, has taught at University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) for almost 40 years. He is now suspended and under police protection in his home. The reason? Klein refused to exempt black students from his final exam and sent a pointed rebuttal to students asking for the “no harm” exam. The response was certainly mocking in tone, more so than I would have considered appropriate. The school has launched a formal discrimination investigation. However, the suspension, investigation, and death threats against Klein reinforce the fear of many in the academy of a raising orthodoxy on campus and a lack of support for faculty involved in controversies.
Category: Free Speech
Louisiana State University Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences Alyssa Johnson is under fire this week for asking her colleagues to create a type of listing of students who have engaged in hate speech — a list to be used to bar them from her classes. Johnson appears to see no need for due process in the creation of such a list and her meting out punishment unilaterally.
Figures from Glenn Greenwald to Tucker Carlson have raised the recent posting by University of Chicago Professor Brian Leiter saying that military leaders should “depose” President Donald Trump and jail him. The posting was either a poor attempt at a coup or comedy. The real problem is that in today’s environment it was unclear and, worse yet, unremarkable. On Reddit, readers were directed to “Brian Leiter (UoC professor) calls for a military coup: “Trump should be deposed and jailed” Leiter removed the statement and blamed the lack of a sense of humor on those who objected. He was not calling for a coup d’état, just musing about the possibility of a coup d’état.
Dr. Mike Adams, a professor of sociology and criminology, has long been a lightning rod of controversy. In 2014, we discussed his prevailing in a lawsuit that alleged discrimination due to his conservative views. Now Adams has triggered a firestorm — and a petition for his removal — after an inflammatory tweet calling North Carolina a “slave state.” As will come as no surprise again on this blog, I am inclined to view this as a free speech matter that should be protected. However, the university is threatening possible action against Adams.
Continue reading “North Carolina Professor Triggers A Free Speech Fight Over Inflammatory Tweet”
We have often discussed how advocating for free speech often places us in troubling company. Those who are targeted for arrest are often the loudest and most obnoxious among us. Ace Burns is one of those people. Burns, 34, whose real name is Israel Burns,, is the self-proclaimed leader of the “FTP movement (which he defined in various ways including “Fire To Property”). Burns was taken into the police station after alluding to the possibility that the Diamond District in New York would be burned to the ground. It is a prototypical violent speech cases and, as many on this blog will not be surprised to read, I believe it raises a serious concern for free speech.
I have been writing about concerns over the current protests are impacting free speech and free press values. Those concerns are equally present in the arrest in Valdosta, Georgia a young woman protesting with a sign containing obscene language. Particularly at a time of legitimate anger and demands for reform after the killing of George Floyd, such arrests contravene core political speech by treating the content of the message as a matter of “disorderly conduct.”
Continue reading “Arrest Of Anti-Trump Protester In Georgia Raises Free Speech Concerns”
In an act that virtually stands alone in the abandonment of self-defining values, the New York Times last night caved to protests from its own writers to apologize for publishing a conservative opinion piece by a ranking Republican senator. On Thursday, the editors had rightfully held firm on the need for the paper to hear all viewpoints as publishing a column by Sen. Tom Cotton (R, Ark.) calling for the use of military troops to quell rioting. Times editorial page editor James Bennet and Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger issued defenses of the use of the opinion section to hear all sides of such national controversies. We discussed that position yesterday and many of us heralded the editors for their courage despite the overwhelming calls for private censorship. Then, the newspaper and its journalistic ethics entirely collapsed with an announcement that effectively declared an original sin “mea culpa, mea culpa, mea máxima culpa” (“through my fault, through my fault, through my most grievous fault.”
The New York Times is under fire today for publishing the opinion of Sen. Tom Cotton (R, Ark.) on the use of troops to quell the unrest following the death of George Floyd. Journalists and opinion writers have insisted that such views should not be even published because they disagree with it. I have strongly opposed the suggested use of federal troops on both legal and non-legal grounds. It would be an unnecessary escalation of the tensions and curtail the exercise of important free speech activities. However, this view is shared by many and the use of troops has occurred previously in our history. The call for effective censorship of opposing views from journalists is a chilling example of how much ground has been lost in the protection of free speech values. Continue reading “New York Times Reporters and Writers Condemn Paper For Publishing Cotton Editorial”
I have written for years on the crackdown on free speech in France, Germany, and England though hate speech laws and speech regulations. As many on this blog know, I am unabashedly against limits on free speech and have opposed most public and private forms of censorship for decades. This often means that, like everyone in the free speech community, I find myself opposing actions against some of the most obnoxious, juvenile, or hateful people in our society. That is the case with this story. Three British teenagers have been arrested for a Snapchat video mocking the death of George Floyd. It was a deeply offensive and stupid act, but the question remains whether society is criminalizing a wider and wider scope of speech.
Continue reading “Three British Teenagers Arrested For Mocking Floyd Death”
While many have condemned Antifa and similar groups for destroying Minneapolis and other cities, Minneapolis city council member for Ward 5 (and son of the Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison) Jeremiah Ellison tweeted Sunday that he is not among them. Indeed, he is declaring his support for Antifa. Some of us have long opposed Antifa as a vehemently anti-free speech group. Ellison does not seem to include free speech among his priorities for voters in Ward 5. While most Democratic members have correctly condemned Antifa attacks, Ellison is one of those who continue to support the controversial group.
Continue reading “Minnesota City Council Member Declares Support For Antifa”
Below is my column in USA Today on the fight between Trump and Twitter. As discussed below, this is a fight not for free speech but who will control free speech. Democrats want speech controls through private companies while the Administration wants speech controls through government agencies. The choice is between Little Brother and Big Brother.
Here is the column:
By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
Having seen the weather outside to be both glorious and inviting, I suddenly realized it was necessary for me to engage once again in “essential travel necessary to maintain critical infrastructure within the state’s economy”. So I hitched up the boat and took it to a scenic lake.
Once on the pond, I realized I should have brought my fishing pole as in some areas near shore the fish were occasionally jumping out of the water–just begging to be caught and eaten for dinner. Sadly I couldn’t accommodate their aspirations. Nevertheless the water was surprisingly warm and the air was filled with a pleasant waft of the forest and something that was blooming. A couple bald eagles circled in the distance, keeping their watch. I do not speak “Eagle” so I could not introduce him to the fish I saw earlier.
Still, it was as it always is, enjoyable to be away from it all, and snap a few shots.
Click each to enlarge
President Donald Trump’s executive order on social media is framed around the effort to remove protections under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. For those of us who teach torts, Section 230 has been a long controversy in its shielding of companies from liability in defamation and other lawsuits. As I write today in my Hill column, Twitter is dangerously wrong in its action against the Trump tweets and Trump is right that this represents a serious attack on free speech. However, I was also critical of the threat to “shut down” or “strongly regulate” media companies. Putting the retaliatory language aside, this is not a change that will likely succeed without congressional action. However, there are some legitimate questions that Congress should consider while, in my view, erring on the side of protecting free speech. Continue reading “The Trump Executive Order and the Section 230 Option To “Strongly Regulate” Social Media”
We have previously discussed the effort of students and faculty to bar federal agencies like ICE from job fairs despite the strong interest (and need) of students to seek such jobs. Now the American University College Democrats have demanded the banning of Customs and Border Protection despite widespread unemployment and the dire need of many fellow students to find positions with such agencies. The interesting twist is that this was not even an on campus event but a virtual event. Even without the government stepping on campus, the students objected to other students being able to speak with Customs in a virtual space.
I have a column criticizing Twitterfor its labelling of tweets from President Donald Trump as presumptively false. Twitter has yielded to demands in Congress to censor and regulate political speech. In signature style, however, Trump promptly bulldozed the high ground in the controversy by threatening to close down social media companies through retaliatory regulations. The First Amendment was written to bar that very authority in either the President or Congress or both. The President cannot be the putative victim of private censorship while claiming the authority to engage in government censorship. In fairness however Democratic leaders have threatened such a regulatory crackdown in the past. The coverage on Trump’s threat telling omits the fact that Democratic leaders and presidential candidates have made the same threat in the past.
Continue reading “Trump Threatens To “Shut Down” Social Media Companies”