That is a silly statement! You make me LOL!
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Well, at least you are finally laughing.
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That’s a pretty fine hair you are splitting.
The college presidents stated that whether a call to genocide violates school codes of conduct is context dependent. You state that if context indicates a call to genocide is genuine, then it is a violation.
You might see a significant difference but I doubt that Stefanik would.
Sure, but this is where universities have gotten into trouble, and deservedly so IMO. I believe freedom of expression is fundamental to learning at the university level. However, I also believe that a higher priority is freedom from personal harassment and threat of violence. These have reasonably good legal definitions and can be defined in a code of conduct. While these limit free speech, they are not antithetical to it.
Problems occur when universities become overly protective and assume there is a right for students to not be offended. It is the nanny society on steroids. Free speech cannot exist without the potential to offend. Problem is, when two groups disagree, both sides are offended. This forces the university to pick a side. As a consequence, universities lose credibility. Instead of objective bastions of education they are seen as institutions of indoctrination.
And who should determine whether the majority is in the wrong? The university president? An elite group of scholars? It doesn’t work. Censorship rarely facilitates learning. Discussion almost always does. calls for genocide, racism, antiSemitism, Islamophobia, etc need to be brought out into the open and discussed. That is what universities are for. Students should be asking themselves and each other the hard and hurtful questions that need to be addressed in order to find understanding and common ground.
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No. A person who was openly advocating for apartheid at Harvard would almost certainly be found to be violating their code of conduct regardless of whether their advocacy crossed into “conduct” or “bullying.” Setting up the informal “Students for Apartheid” club, holding weekly meetings to discuss the benefits of apartheid and how they can use activism to make apartheid happen in Cambridge, handing out fliers and trying to get new members…none of those things would be bullying or “speech as conduct” scenarios. But those students would certainly be disciplined for violating the code of conduct.
Which is why Pres. Gay’s response caused so much uproar - the idea that calling for the genocide of Jews wouldn’t be in the same box as calling for a return to slavery or instituting apartheid or a host of other horrible things.
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Not really.
My law firm has policies that prohibit sexual harassment. If someone asks me whether sexual harassment is prohibited at my law firm, the answer is “yes.” Not that it is “context-dependent.”
Whether any specific interaction between employees at my firm is sexual harassment can be a very complicated question, and that can be context dependent. But the fact that sexual harassment is prohibited at my firm is most assuredly not.
An excellent question, but generally whoever sets University policy and governance should make those calls. They already set a whole host of rules and regulations that govern student behavior within the university - because they run the university. Like any organization or institution, there are rules that come with being a member/customer/participant in that organization. Which might require you to forego engaging in some horrible speech.
Calls for genocide and racism don’t need to be welcomed on campus for learning to happen. Jewish students don’t need to walk past swastikas on their way to class, black students don’t need to stroll past nooses emblazoned with confederate flags. Classroom discussions of the horrors of genocide and racism, public discussions of how harmful anti-Semitism and Islamophobia are - those are things that can contribute to an academic environment. Letting your students engage in anti-Semitism and Islamophobia and racism on campus absolutely does not.
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Sorry - I should have made clear that I was talking about private colleges. Public colleges are considered state actors under the Fourteenth Amendment, and so they have more stringent limits on the degree that they can regulate student (or invitee) speech.
Makes my point. “Calling for genocide” is a specific interaction that may or may not violate the code of conduct depending on context.
No doubt the college presidents would have had no problems saying yes if the question was whether harassing students violated the code of conduct.
They don’t because I think a reasonable historical argument can be made that the swastika and noose represent an implicit threat of violence. But that is the standard…an implicit or explicit threat of violence. That is different from being simply offensive or controversial.
A Black Power poster showing a raised fist is acceptable. One showing a black guy beating up a white guy would not be.
Is chanting “Intifada” or “Stop the genocide in Gaza” anti-Semitism? Is criticizing the treatment of women in Muslim countries Islamophobia? Once you start censoring stuff “for the good of society” it is awfully hard to stop. There will always be another group justifiably asking “Why aren’t you sensitive to our feelings”?
My feelings on this matter are mostly in line with that of the ACLU, in words written way back in 1994:
To be clear, the First Amendment does not protect behavior on campus that crosses the line into targeted harassment or threats, or that creates a pervasively hostile environment for vulnerable students. But merely offensive or bigoted speech does not rise to that level, and determining when conduct crosses that line is a legal question that requires examination on a case-by-case basis. Restricting such speech may be attractive to college administrators as a quick fix to address campus tensions. But real social change comes from hard work to address the underlying causes of inequality and bigotry, not from purified discourse. The ACLU believes that instead of symbolic gestures to silence ugly viewpoints, colleges and universities have to step up their efforts to recruit diverse faculty, students, and administrators; increase resources for student counseling; and raise awareness about bigotry and its history. Speech on Campus | American Civil Liberties Union
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I disagree. “Calling for genocide” does (or should) always violate the code of conduct, regardless of the context. Whether any specific interaction is a call for genocide is a context-dependent question. “Calling for genocide” is the category, not the instantiation.
Pretty unlikely. Certainly not under the First Amendment - merely displaying a swastika or a noose, without more, doesn’t constitute an imminent threat. And the same holds if you just substitute posters or flyers with vile statements - “God hates f@gs” or “Bring back slavery.” There’s no benefit to education or learning in allowing those sorts of things.
Those are good and tough questions. But you’re not censoring stuff “for the good of society” - you’re censoring stuff for the good of the university. For private universities, you don’t have to - and probably shouldn’t - land at the same place, because the purpose of the university is narrower than the purpose of “society.” Here at TMF, for example, there’s tons of stuff that’s prohibited, like pron or commercial links, even those things are perfectly legal elsewhere. Private colleges and universities don’t have to follow the same rules as government - so if you walk around campus carrying a sign calling for the restoration of slavery, they can punish you, and should - because you’re making it harder for other students to fulfill their educational needs without any benefit to the university from allowing that.
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Calling for the murder of a fellow student is not context dependant.
It would be like saying rape is ok in a certain context. NO.
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Hitler’s landing in London was okay under certain contexts. He just needed full control first.
In your warped mind perhaps, but otherwise it has nothing to do with your example. We are talking about speech, not conduct. If speech threatens an individual or is deemed likely to incite an illegal act then it is definitely a violation of school codes of conduct. But such evaluations are determined by context. And what really matters is the linkage with conduct.
From the ACLU:
At the same time, freedom of speech does not prevent punishing conduct that intimidates, harasses, or threatens another person, even if words are used. Threatening phone calls, for example, are not constitutionally protected. Freedom of Expression | American Civil Liberties Union.
A satirical call for genocide does not. A call for genocide in a private conversation does not. The only way to tell whether such conditions are met is to consider the context.
Pretty likely. Painting swatikas on walls or using the symbols of the “3 times K” to intimidate are considered hate crimes in most places. There are reasons for that.
When I say for the good of society I mean the social structure of the entity doing the censoring. Obviously a church will have a different code of acceptable behavior than a biker bar. The education mission of a university is best served by optimizing freedom of expression while keeping students physically safe. Whether students are offended should not be a priority. New ideas are often initially offensive. But new ideas are what universities should be about.
case of Brandenburg v. Ohio: The Court made clear that speech promoting unlawful action loses First Amendment protection only if it is directed to and likely to produce imminent lawless action
When a mob of 20,000 carries poles and banners that could be charged with assult with deadly weapon chants " kill all jews, murder the jewish race"
I submit that is a call to unlawful action.
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The genocide of the Jews is not a “new” idea
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I thought war was conduct.
Last I heard Hamas was a terrorist organization.
If I zoom out this is a proxy war between the US and Russia. Israel and Greater Syria dueling it out over the long haul.
Were any of the Palestinian students here to learn about democratic republics to overturn Hamas? Were any of them simply asking for peace with Israel? Not a cease-fire to reload but peace and a two-state solution? Nope nope nope nope
No one said it was. The hope is that new ideas about how to more effectively deal with anti-Semitism will arise by frank discussions on the issue. In contrast, censorship rarely produces new ideas.
For those interested, here are a couple of editorials that support the position of the college presidents. One from a Jewish publication:
What they were asked is whether “calling for genocide against Jews” — more on that phrase in a moment — violates university harassment policies. And the correct answer is exactly the answer that they, coached by their lawyers, provided: It depends on context…If someone says “Israel must be pushed into the sea” in a college political science seminar, that may be a genocidal statement, even an antisemitic one, but it isn’t harassment. But if someone spray-paints it on a synagogue, or shouts it at a group of Jews, that’s harassment.
In other words, the presidents were right. University presidents were right and Jews' moral panic is wrong – The Forward
In a similar vein is one from New York magazine.
And finally an interesting take from the Washington Post:
If universities announced policies of punishing expression deemed genocidal — in the absence of harassment or incitement of imminent violence — they would be committing themselves to refereeing the meaning of various anti-Israel slogans associated with the Palestinian movement.
And not only anti-Israel slogans. Speech supportive of Israel’s war in Gaza could also be deemed genocidal by activists; see how the University of Southern California briefly barred a professor from campus for saying Hamas members should be killed. Creating a new “genocide” category of punishable speech would suppress and distort debate on the Israel-Gaza war. Debates about China and Russia, also accused by some of genocide, would also be chilled. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/12/07/university-antisemitism-stefanik-culture-war/
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Actually, that is what you said. The discussion was about the use of the term Genocide for the Jews, and you said, “Whether students are offended should not be a priority. New ideas are often initially offensive. But new ideas are what universities should be about.”
Maybe you meant something that is a ramification to the chant “Genocide For The Jews.” Instead of trying to come up with what that means in a discussion it might be better for these students to read “The Diary of Anne Frank”
Second, it’s interesting that you bring up a Professor who is barred from campus for saying Hamas members should be killed. So, talking about Hamas in terms of homicide is forbidden, but as long as it’s just Jewish Genocide, that’s ok.
Third, very interesting parsing of words here:
But this is not the question being asked. Switching from “Murder all Jews, kill the Jewish race” to “Israel must be pushed into the sea” is switching from a chant against a political entity to a chant to murder a race of people everywhere in the world, in every community, in every nation. The article goes on to explain, "there has to be a direct threat made to another person. When that is present, it is harassment. When it is not, it is protected speech on a university campus, even if it is antisemitic or racist.” And so he is correct, if you make antisemitic statements, or political accusations against Jews, that is protected. The question is, is it ok to mount a protest and say and chant “Murder all Jews, kill the Jewish race”?
Switching from, “I want Israel to be pushed into the sea”, to “Murder all Jews, kill the Jewish race”? is stepping from political attacks to holocaust invocation. The writer goes on to say, “Debates about China and Russia, also accused by some of genocide, would also be chilled.” that is so far from the truth. A war between nations is not a call to genocide. Genocide is the selective treatment of a race for extermination.
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Replace “Jews” (etc) with “Palestinians” and what happens? LOL !!!
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But Palestinian Arabs are an ethnonational group. Jews are a particular race. Now if you were to replace Jews (etc) with “Muslims” then you’re on track. Give it a try on a college campus and you’ll be barred.
Jews are not a race, they are a religion.
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