Finding Comfort in the Uncomfortable (A Discussion on Free Speech)
In this episode, we discuss free speech and expression. We begin by giving philosophical background to free speech as a liberty by analyzing the works of John Stuart Mill. We then dive into the American free speech tradition by reading the text of the First Amendment and discussing the meaning of landmark Supreme Court cases such as Schenck v. United States, Abrams v. United States, Whitney v. California, and Brandenburg v. Ohio. Next, we apply the meaning and history of free speech to current events. We discuss the attack of free speech on college campuses, citing Yale, Berkeley, and Middlebury as examples. We discuss the causes of these events, some of which being the lack of ideological diversity (especially in liberal arts colleges), the creation of safe spaces, and political correctness. These things create a (typically liberal) ideological echo chamber in which students’ opinions are affirmed and never challenged. Within these examples, we speak about the dichotomy between what we believe politically/morally and constitutionally and the importance of open and free discourse and debate.
We then shift gears to discuss the recent controversy that has arisen over the YA novel “The Black Witch” by Laurie Forest. We speak about the dangers of censorship and social media in the context of free speech. In our last segment, we talk about the events in Charlottesville surrounding the Unite the Right rally this past weekend. We discuss how this serves as an example of a violation of the freedom of assembly due to its violent nature.
Overall, we would like to impart that the real test of the First Amendment is whether we are able to stand up for people and ideas we hate and that the truth will only emerge through free speech and expression.
Since free speech is such a large topic, we hope to do subsequent episodes on net neutrality, campaign finance (and the dangers of equating money with speech), the First Amendment in public schools, search engine algorithms, one newspaper towns, and more. As always, we link articles down below for further reading. We highly recommend reading some of these enlightening articles!
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Links!
www.nytimes.com/2016/12/10/opinio…mpus.html?mcubz=0
www.youtube.com/watch?v=9IEFD_JVYd0
www.huffingtonpost.ca/james-di-fiore…b_9799938.html
www.vox.com/2015/6/3/8706323/co…ge-professor-afraid
www.theatlantic.com/politics/archiv…-campus/532965/
www.theatlantic.com/education/archi…iolence/533970/
www.nytimes.com/2016/11/20/opinio…y-liberalism.html
www.nytimes.com/2017/07/14/opinio…0&utm_source=fbia
theatln.tc/2u44g6a
www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archiv…utm_source=fbia
www.wsj.com/articles/hard-truth…wsj&utm_source=fbia
www.nytimes.com/2017/08/01/opinio…nytimes&smtyp=cur
www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/t…eaching-rape-law
b00kstorebabe.blogspot.com
www.vulture.com/2017/08/the-toxic…f-ya-twitter.html
www.nytimes.com/2017/04/21/us/ber…ulter-speech.html
www.nytimes.com/2017/02/02/us/uni…yiannopoulos.html
www.theatlantic.com/politics/archiv…iolence/518667/
www.nytimes.com/2017/06/01/opinio…s-on-its-own.html
www.nytimes.com/2017/06/03/opinio…n-state.html?_r=0
www.vox.com/identities/2017/8/1…protests-nazis-vice
