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A basic right in the U.S.A. has been the Freedom of Speech, yet of late it has been under heavy threat. United States Foreign Service Officer (ret.) and author of Hooper's War Peter Van Buren at We Meant Well blogs about Five Bad Arguments to Restrict Speech.
"Open discussion, debate, and argument are the core of democracy. Bad ideas are defeated by good ideas. Fascism seeks to close off all ideas except its own."
The blog entry itself is rather long and contains numerous links to supporting material. Here is the list; below the fold includes an elaboration on the statement and a summary. Read the blog itself for more details and exposition.
- The First Amendment Only Applies to Government?
- What's Said May Provoke Violence in the Room (A Clear and Present Danger)
- What's Said May Provoke Violence Outside (Public Safety)
- Speech Can or Should Be Restricted Based on Content (Hate Speech)
- Free Speech Should Not Be Subject to the Heckler's Veto
[...] 1. The First Amendment Only Applies to Government?
The first fallacious argument used to shut down free speech is that the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights in our Constitution only applies to government, and so universities or other entities are entitled to censor, restrict or shut down altogether speech willy-nilly.
Short Answer: Not really. Public funding invokes the First Amendment for schools, and free speech runs deeper than the Bill of Rights. It's as much a philosophical argument as a legal one, not a bad thing for a nation founded on a set of ideas (and ideals.)
[...] 2. What's Said May Provoke Violence in the Room (A Clear and Present Danger)
Some claim that certain conservative speakers, such as Milo Yiannopoulos, who purposefully use anti-LGBTQ slurs to provoke their audiences, should be banned or shut down. Their speech is the equivalent of yelling Fire! in a crowded movie theatre when there is no actual danger, provoking a deadly stampede for the exits.
Short Answer: The standards for shutting down speech are very restrictive, and well-codified. Milo comes nowhere close.
[...] 3. What's Said May Provoke Violence Outside (Public Safety)
The idea that a university or other venue cannot assure a speaker's safety, or that the speaker's presence may provoke violent protests, or that the institution just doesn't want to go to the trouble or expense of protecting a controversial speaker has become the go-to justification for canceling or restricting speech. Berkley cited this in canceling and then de-platforming (rescheduling her when most students would not be on campus) Ann Coulter, whose campus sponsors are now suing, and New York University cited the same justification for canceling an appearance by Milo Yiannopoulos.
Short Answer: Canceling a speaker to protect them or public safety is the absolute last resort, and some risk to safety is part of the cost to a free society for unfettered speech.
[...] 4. Speech Can or Should Be Restricted Based on Content (Hate Speech)
There are no laws against "hate speech." A speaker can call people names, and insult them by their race, sexual orientation or religious beliefs. What many people think and say is hateful. It is carefully thought out to inspire hate, to promote hate, to appeal to crude and base instincts. Indeed, that is their point. But there is no law or other prohibition against hate speech. Even restrictions on "hate speech" meant to prevent violence, often cited as the justification to restrict such speech, are by design extremely narrow.
Short Answer: You cannot restrict hate speech. Free speech means just that, with any limited restrictions content-neutral.
[...] 5. Free Speech Should Not Be Subject to the Heckler's Veto
Another argument used by some progressives is that the so-called Heckler's Veto is in itself protected speech. Someone may have a right to speak, but someone else has the same right to shout them down and prevent them from being heard.
Short answer: Free speech is not intended to mean whomever can literally "speak" the loudest gets to control what is said. The natural end of such thinking is mob rule, where Speaker A gets a bigger gang together to shout down the gang Speaker B controls.
(Score: 2) by AthanasiusKircher on Saturday August 19 2017, @11:13PM (1 child)
I'm a big supporter of free speech, and generally speaking, I agree with a lot of points the article makes. Except there's some slippage in the first point that shows the author has an agenda to push, rather than evaluating things legally (and, arguably, reasonably).
That is, the first point of the argument seems to go from "government can't restrict speech" to "universities, some of which are public institutions, can't restrict speech" to "any school which receives any public funding of any sort can't restrict speech" to "it's wrong for basically any institution to restrict speech." That's not an argument -- that's just redefining things to make it seem like you have an argument.
The author does have a legit point that Rosenburg v. U Virginia says public institutions (e.g., state universities), which are actually run by the government, can't arbitrarily restrict speech. But that's really as far as this argument goes, legally or logically. Other institutions of higher learning or other random private institutions have no obligation to let anyone use their facilities or spaces as platforms for whatever agenda.
Let me be clear that I'm NOT advocating arbitrary suppression of speech on private college campuses. I'm definitely not, and generally speaking, I think there's a strong educational value in inviting speakers with all sorts of opinions. But that's NOT a "free speech" issue: it's an educational one. And that gets to be determined by the administration of the university and any other empowered parties at the university to create and maintain the kind of campus they want. Nor should the excuse of "a student group invited someone" be suddenly raised to a legal or moral justification. Students do NOT run the university, any more than customers run a store or diners run a restaurant. Certainly they should be given a voice, but the determination of who gets to speak, what facilities get by outside speakers, how scheduling has to work, etc. is certainly within the administration of the university to determine.
And let's be frank here -- at private universities, there are private facilities paid for at least in part the student body as a whole. (Even for "public" universities, the share actually paid for by PUBLIC support vs. tuition dollars has shifted greatly in many places over the past few decades.) We often hear about "student groups" inviting speakers (though I've heard at least one controversial case where a "disinvited" speaker was literally invited by a SINGLE student), but do such groups reflect the interests of the school as whole? How small can a group be and still claim a "free speech" REQUIREMENT that a speaker MUST be heard, making use of private facilities? Again, I think it's great to encourage diverse speakers and viewpoints, but that's something to be guided by the university governance as a whole.
Personally, I think the "free speech" justification argument for private colleges is completely wrong-headed. As I already said, there's an educational value in encouraging diversity of viewpoints, and if conservatives were being honest here, THAT'S what they should be pushing. And that has a legitimate moral (as well as educational) point behind it too. The only legal justification seems based on "government funding" which is often a very nebulous thing that could include everything from direct government support to one professor getting a small grant to do scientific research. IF the federal government or state government wants to tie such funding to invitations of speakers or something bizarre like that, it's within the rights of the government to do so... but most such funding is not restricted in that way, so this is a red herring.
The absurdity of the absolutism about "free speech" in the first point comes across at the end in point 5, concerning the "heckler's veto." I absolutely agree with the author that colleges and other forums need to strike a balance between protest/hecklers and speakers, but NONE of that is a "free speech" issue. It's an issue of social etiquette and decorum. Universities should be teaching that too as part of their educational mission. And they have the right to create forums for certain types of closed events (e.g., a private talk in an auditorium where hecklers are ejected) and other types of more open events (e.g., a public speech in the quad where hecklers are allowed to shout at will). When you try to couch such arguments in terms of "free speech" rather than simple decorum about the nature of the event, you then end up in this stupid debate about "whose free speech matters more," which isn't the point. Of course invited speakers should probably be given an appropriate forum, which might include some policing of the audience -- and protesters also should probably be given an outlet too. But for PRIVATE universities (and even mostly for public ones), the balancing needs to go on in terms of the general policies for events and locations... not framed in terms of "free speech."
Because really, "free speech" in the first amendment sense IS "mob rule." Sorry, but it's true. You have the right to shout to your heart's content in the public square, but if someone else shows up and shouts louder than you do, too bad. "Free speech" doesn't give you the right to force someone else to give you resources to broadcast your views, nor does it require that you have a "safe space" to speak your mind, whether you're a liberal or a conservative. It's really ironic that the exact same justification used here in point (5) to argue against hecklers is the same argument liberals try to use to create "safe spaces" in some places at colleges as well as the logic of "free speech zones" employed by the Bush administration. There can be issues of "time, place, and manner" restrictions on speech, but again, those don't have to do with CONTENT or value, but rather with creating and maintaining social decorum. It's only by admitting NOT to be a free speech absolutist and realizing the necessity of "time, place, and manner" restrictions (for public venues) and general enforcement of etiquette (for private venues) that we can actually make sense out of this muddle.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 19 2017, @11:50PM
It is a free speech issue, because the concept of freedom of speech is much broader than its legal implementation. There are many instances where you are allowed to restrict other people's ability to speak, but the mere fact that you're allowed to do so does not mean it's not a free speech issue.