The Christian Science Monitor has been a good and impartial source of journalism. But the author is attempting to make equivalent concepts that are anything but equivalent comparing the Right and Left in free speech issues. Let me explain.
“Younger lawyers nowadays are asking two questions,” says Justin Hansford, director of the Thurgood Marshall Civil Rights Center at Howard University in Washington. “If you have a limited pool of resources – and you do – why spend those resources on a point of pride as opposed to spending them in areas that will help bring about a reality closer to what your true vision is?”
While the younger attorneys may well be asking the questions, the ACLU still defends "freedom of speech" in principle and in actuality. And not taking ideological positions. When have liberally oriented organizations actually deviated from this?
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"Such problems on American campuses are real, says Kenneth Lasson, a professor of civil liberties and international human rights at the University of Baltimore School of Law. “Those with opinions that might challenge campus orthodoxies are rarely invited, and often disinvited after having been scheduled, or shouted down or otherwise disrupted.”
I am a student at UC Berkeley, why if I were a college administrator would I invite Rush Limbaugh to speak? He may well be disinvited because there were not enough students to provide an audience. I can't explain the behavior of students not giving common courtesy to anyone who is at the lecturn, but that does not mean that I have an obligation to be there or to listen if his lecture were abhorrent to my values and principles.
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"In a 2020 survey, HxA found that 62% of sampled college students agreed the climate on their campus prevents them from saying things they believe, up from 55% in 2019. And students across the political spectrum expressed reluctance to share their ideas and opinions on politics, with 31% of self-identified Democrats, 46% of Independents, and 48% of Republicans each reporting reluctance to speak their mind."
Discomfort is not the same as being legally prevented from speaking whatever your opinion happens to be. Of course, if you go around singing the praises of Rush Limbaugh or Adolf Hitler in Berkeley, you are going to feel uncomfortable and not particularely popular, who would not be surprised?
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To be continued....
Now let's look at the Right
During the past year, Republicans in 20 states have enacted some 36 new restrictions on the right to peaceful assembly, with 58 new bills still pending in other states across the country, according to a tracker at The International Center for Not-for-Profit Law.
Florida, along with Oklahoma and Iowa, have also passed new laws giving immunity to drivers who strike protesters. States including Arkansas, Tennessee, and Texas have added new penalties for protesting near pipelines and other critical infrastructure, among other new restrictions. Other states have increased the fees necessary to obtain permits to assemble for a protest.
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How do you give blanket immunity to drivers striking protesters without considering the intent of the driver?
As long as public thoroughfare is not interfered with or the group has a permit, there should be no issue with peaceful demonstrations and protest, but that is not the way of the Rightwinger?
What is the purpose of increasing fees for legal assembly, as laws are on the books against the desecration of property? The Right, as always, resists any form of dissent from its agenda, and don't want any expression, otherwise.
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"Now there’s literally laws being passed ... to stop people from thinking and expressing ideas about race and racial justice at these very same campuses,” Professor Hansford says."
"Republicans in 26 states have introduced bills to restrict teaching critical race theory or limit discussions of race and social justice. Nine of these states, including Florida, Idaho, Tennessee, Texas, and New Hampshire have passed such legislation."
"Last week, too, Florida Governor DeSantis signed a bill meant to stand against the “indoctrination” of students in public universities. It requires administrators to survey students and faculty about their viewpoints. The stated goal is to discover “the extent to which competing ideas and perspectives are presented” in public institutions and whether students and faculty “feel free to express beliefs and viewpoints on campus and in the classroom.”
So why are we LEGALLY limiting discussion and the free exchange of ideas? Is American history to be reduced to fables and folklore? George Washington cuts down the Cherry Tree or American slavery defined as immigrant workers who obtained beneficial skills while being given free room and board? That CRT threat is just so much BS and is a smoke screen. What was Lord DeSantis' explanation? We cant discuss these issues in such a way as to make certain students uncomfortable? Who cares about their "discomfort", history is not pretty. That is a pretty broad highway, don't you think? Which is another way of saying that this history is not to be discussed at all. He enshrines it all in Florida Law, where has the LEFT had as much gall?
In conclusion, from where I am sitting, DeSantis is both an indoctrinator and a tyrant. Also, that the Right's assualt on free speech rights is far worse relative to the Left, in comparison.
