All Posts Tagged With: "free speech"
Facebook criticism lands UCalgary in court
Students placed on probation for criticizing a professor on Facebook are asking a judge to review the case
Twin brothers, both students at the University of Calgary, were in court Friday asking a Court of Queen’s Bench judge to affirm their right to publicly criticize a professor. Keith and Steven Pridgen were reprimanded in 2008 under the University of Calgary’s student code of conduct for creating a Facebook group that the university says was defamatory towards Aruna Mitra, a former law instructor in the interdisciplinary department of communication and culture.
The group titled “I no longer fear Hell, I took a course with Aruna Mitra,” contained comments from at least 10 other students, one of whom compared Mitra to a shoe. Another comment said that Mitra “got lazy and gave everybody a 65.” Yet another alleged the instructor said that the Magna Carta was signed in 1700 when it was signed in 1215.
After Mitra, who had discovered the Facebook page, informed the dean, the brothers were placed on six-months probation. The university lifted the requirement that the students write an apology letter after they refused to do so.
The brothers are viewing the case as a fight for their constitutional right to free expression. “I’m happy to fight for what I believe in is right,” Pridgen (Keith) was quoted as saying by the CBC. In asking the court to review their case, Pridgen said he wants to ensure no other students find themselves in a similar situation. “The injustice that was done to us, first in having to bear with this specific professor in the class . . . all the way through to having to bear with the different issues all the way along, the appeals process, the denials, the delays . . . for that to not be forced onto another student, that’s what I think would be right is the solution.”
The Pridgen’s lawyer argued on Friday that while the university believes the Facebook group was defamatory the Pridgen’s should have been given the opportunity to demonstrate that the comments on the site were justifiable under the truth and fair-comment defenses permitted in defamation cases. However, because the students were only reprimanded with probation, the university said that there was no obligation that an appeal be heard.
UOttawa president finally talks Coulter
Says, “Freedom of expression applies. Even when it’s painful”
University of Ottawa president Allan Rock has finally addressed that itchy little PR debacle that stung the university a few weeks ago.
In an address to the university senate, Rock discussed the cancellation of right-wing commenter Ann Coulter’s speech on March 23. Coulter’s talk was called off after student protests prompted security concerns.
“From the moment we learned about Ms. Coulter’s intended presentation, there were groups and individuals who insisted that we prohibit her from speaking on campus,” Rock said. “We rejected those demands, asserting that Ms. Coulter had every right to appear and to speak.” Coulter has been criticized as being overly inflammatory and offensive.
“Freedom of expression applies,” he said later. “Even when it’s painful.”
And for Rock, it seems it was pretty painful. He said he turned to the Internet to learn more about Coulter and admitted to “using intemperate language in exchanges with colleagues” in her regard.
And then there was the infamous email from Provost François Houle–the one sent a few days before Coulter’s visit, essentially warning her to watch her mouth. “I share responsibility for the letter from the Provost to Ms. Coulter,” Rock said. He explained that the letter was sent with his knowledge on behalf of the administration.
Rock later added: “I acknowledge that there are other, and indeed better ways, of achieving the letter’s stated purpose.” He also confirmed that the university did not cancel the event; it was indeed Coulter’s representatives.
So what have we learned? Well, it seems the administration champions freedom of expression. That’s a good start! Even though they paradoxically encouraged self-censorship and incited uproar with a preemptive cautionary email (not so good), which culminated to a hostile situation beyond their control—a situation of which they really haven’t yet taken ownership. But hey, at least we know Rock did some solid Googling before that “welcome basket” popped up in Coulter’s inbox.
Ann Coulter and student reactionaries
She’s relevant because we are making her relevant
Until this week I knew very little about Ann Coulter and I liked it that way. I was vaguely aware of her as a deliberately provocative, talking-head right-winger. I had the sense that she was good at antagonizing people. That was about it. I had about as much interest in following her “work” as I do in Rush Limbauch’s oeuvre.
This week I can’t hide from her. She’s everywhere. Elections just ended at U of T with the usual accusations and counter-accusations, students at UTSC just approved an unprecedented and massive levy to fund a world-class athletics facility for use in the 2015 Pan-Am Games, wrestling continues unabated over the fate and status of First Nations University of Canada, and all I can bloody well hear about is this screwball American provocateur who has just about nothing relevant to say to Canadians and nothing informed to say to anyone. Someone please tell me why I’m supposed to care?
The freedom of expression angle I get. It’s important to pause once in a while to reflect on the importance of free speech and also on the occasional limits necessarily imposed on it. But honestly, can’t we have that debate in context of someone who is at least relevant? Ezra Levant is a home-grown topic of debate, speaking to and about Canadian issues. Ann Coulter is just a traveling gong show promoting nothing other than her own celebrity. And we let her! We even help her! Every line I’m writing this very moment gives her more of the commodity she’s so successfully selling — her own profile. She doesn’t care if we like her or what we say about her just as long as we keep listening and paying attention. And we sure are doing that.
The fact that this is playing out on our university campuses is no coincidence. Students make fantastic reactionaries. There’s a whole lot of good intentions there but not a lot of direction. So with very little of their own to say, student activists simply argue about what someone else is saying. Coulter opens her mouth and gets the whole thing rolling for us. She says something outrageous, some students argue she shouldn’t be allowed to say it, others defend her right to say it, and all of a sudden that’s the whole debate. Students aren’t saying anything at all–or at least nothing of their own. They’re just arguing over what Coulter said. And that’s just sad.
Maybe I’m bitter because the spat of Ann Coulter articles here are the biggest thing for On Campus in ages. Even the strike at York didn’t attract this much attention or this many comments. Students do have a lot of power and can set the agenda for discussion of post-secondary issues if they want to. But taking on real and complex topics is difficult. Getting all outraged about Coulter–or alternatively, getting all outraged over the suppression of Coulter–is easy. And as long as we keep getting distracted by every circus sideshow that comes to campus, it’s going to remain that much harder to bring attention to the real issues affecting post-secondary students in Canada today.
But hey, in the spirit of giving everyone what they want, here’s a video of Coulter saying outrageous things. Enjoy.
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Questions are welcome at jeff.rybak@utoronto.ca. You can also follow me on Twitter.
Problems with free expression
The U of T blackface case raises important questions about the complex nature of freedom.
Elsewhere, my fellow blogger Scott Dobson-Mitchell notes the irony whereby in one comment I acknowledge that I occassionally edit comments on my blogs, while in another comment, I defend the right to free expression.
I’d be flattered that someone is reading me so closely, even if it is only other OnCampus bloggers, except that I’m pretty sure Dobson-Mitchell thinks I’m a douchebag. To wit:
I believe that racism, even those acts of racism that an educated, white, university professor of English literature deems to be otherwise, continues to be a “real problem” in today’s world.
Well, of course, racism itself is a real problem, but is the writer really suggesting that some guys wearing poorly thought-out costumes to a halloween party is an important issue? Compared to what? If Dobson-Mitchell can’t find plenty more serious problems than that in the world, he’s not paying attention.
As for the supposed contradiction over free speech, my colleague, I would say, misunderstands the freedom part of the expression. The right to free speech does not guarantee the right of anyone to say anything anywhere anytime. I am free to write a book, but publishers are free to refuse to publish it. I am free to speak my mind about politics, but Global Television is not bound to put me on the air. A reader may think that I’m an asshole, but unless he finds a nicer word for it, it’s not going in the comments on my blog; they call them moderated comments for a reason. He can call me immoderate names on his own blog. What the right to free speech should guarantee is that third parties should not be able to intervene and force others to speak and think as they would prefer.
Which brings us back to the halloween costumes. In my view, these guys had the right to wear their ridiculous costumes, and the party organizers would have been within their rights to say, “sorry guys, not at this party.” But where the whole thing changes is when some other group of people comes along — government, special interests, whoever — and starts holding meetings, demanding public apologies and the like. Then we start to move away from people choosing for themselves as to what they find offensive, and we move towards the policing of free action and opinion — and that becomes a very real problem indeed.
PS: why does Dobson-Mitchell point out my own race in his comments? What difference does it make that I am white? I certainly hope that he does not mean to imply that someone like me could not be expected to understand the issues involved.
Scholar’s son pleads not guilty to stealing identities
Son of Dead Sea Scrolls academic is accused of using Internet aliases to trash his father’s rivals
New York City lawyer Raphael Golb has pleaded not guilty to stealing identities and using them to try to discredit his father’s academic rivals on the Internet, according to a report by the Associated Press.
Golb is the son of controversial Dead Sea scrolls scholar Norman Golb at the University of Chicago, who, against common historical thought, contends the scrolls were written by Jewish scholars in Jerusalem. For more on the back story from The Chronicle, click here.
According to Manhattan’s district attorney, “Golb engaged in a systematic scheme on the Internet, using dozens of Internet aliases, in order to influence and affect debate on the Dead Sea Scrolls.”
Defence lawyer Martin Garbus says the case is about free speech and that no crime was committed.
Judge Carol Berkman has set bond at $15,000 and ordered the 49-year-old to surrender his passport.
UBC cracking down on free speech, says liberties group
University says rule is intended to prevent “predatory commercial marketing practices”
The British Columbia Civil Liberties Association says free speech is being threatened at the University of British Columbia, where the group says students have been forbidden from posting signs and posters on dorm buildings or in dorm windows “visible from the Thunderbird Winter Sports Centre.”
According to a press release issued by the group, the school has asked students who live on campus to sign a tenancy agreement that obliges them not to post “signage or displays that create a false or unauthorized commercial association with the Olympics.” In response, the BCCLA says it will be working with students in September to “overturn this prohibition on speech,” similar to agitation that took place during 1997′s APEC protests at the school.
“Canada, B.C. and Vancouver said in our bid documents that we would honour our constitutional commitment to free speech, but they forgot to mention this right was reserved for Olympic sponsors alone,” said Robert Holmes, BCCLA president in the release. “It’s time for a sober second look at these anti-free speech activities.”
UBC spokesperson Stephen Owen told the CBC that the university is not trying to suppress anyone’s right to political protest.
He says the clause in question is intended to protect the commercial interests of games organizers.
“There’s absolutely no impact on free expression of personal or political views. It’s very strictly limited to predatory commercial marketing practices,” says Owen.
OttawaU’s “solution in search of a problem”
Editorial says new anonymous tip line will create a toxic workplace for faculty
An editorial in The Ottawa Citizen has taken aim at a local university’s new anonymous tip line.
Last week, the University of Ottawa announced the launch of a new security reporting tool, called ClearView Connects, that will allow employees to anonymously report theft, fraud, vandalism and unethical behaviour, either over the phone or on the Internet.
“It is the duty of each employee to immediately report any incidents of wrong-doing related to University activities,” said a spokesperson for the school. She said the technology was just part of “good governance.”
But the editorial staff at the Citizen disagree.
“The University of Ottawa says it does not have a problem with employee misconduct, yet has created an anonymous tip line for staff to report on one another. Sounds like a classic case of a solution in search of a problem,” reads the article. “Tip lines can be abused to settle personal scores or to make life miserable for unpopular colleagues whose crime is simply that they rub people the wrong way.”
The editorial also highlights the recent furor over Queen’s University’s failed dialogue facilitator program, which intended to catch racist, homophobic, and other kinds of offensive language, after allegations that the program constituted an invasion of students’ privacy.
“The University of Ottawa tip line is different from the eccentric Queen’s proposal, but the effect on the campus community could be similar. This is an idea that would have been best left on the drawing board.”
Porn 101: UMaryland students’ porn film protest
The surest way to drum up interest in a porn movie on campus is to ban it
As reported by Time Magazine:
Silly politicians. Don’t they know the surest way to drum up interest in a porn movie on campus is to ban it? When a state senator threatened to strip funding from the University of Maryland over its plans to show a XXX-rated film in the student center, school officials nixed the event. But fired-up students responded on Monday by holding a free-speech demonstration that drew media coverage from as far away as Thailand and Australia.
The brouhaha is the result of a marketing strategy by porn company Digital Playground, which last summer started offering complimentary copies of Pirates II: Stagnetti’s Revenge (a hardcore homage to Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean, animated skeleton pirates and all) to students on 100 college campuses. Many schools have already screened the film in venues ranging from a dorm room at Southern Connecticut State University to an 850-student audience in December at UCLA, where the film’s stars responded to questions and criticism about the porn industry.
Don’t hate me for defending the hateful
Numerous blogs have not only condemned Hossain but have called him such charming names as “camel humper” — and now the students’ government wants him kicked out of the University of Toronto
University campuses have a way of exploding into irrationality. Whether it is kicking anti-abortionists off school grounds because they are no better than “Nazis,” railing at tuition increases, or slurring students who vote Conservative, you can bet on knee-jerk emotional reactions to just about any issue.
The latest comes in response to University of Toronto-Mississauga (UTM) student Salman Hossain who the National Post revealed two weeks ago to be under investigation by the RCMP for internet postings that appear to advocate the killing of Canadian soldiers on Canadian soil. Such actions, Hossain argues, are “legitimate” and “well-deserved,” because of Canada`s role in Afghanistan. His detractors have been apoplectic. Numerous blogs have not only condemned Hossain but have called him such charming names as “camel humper,” while others have called for his deportation. Well then, perhaps we should boot out everyone who doesn’t embrace the legitimacy of the Afghan war!
Okay, Okay, before I go any further convention requires that I make some sort of statement like, I don’t actually agree with Hossain, he is indeed hateful, or something like that. So here goes: I assure you that I wish to grant no comfort to Hossain. There! is that satisfactory? Am I in the clear for having my own patriotism questioned?
Moving on then.
A Facebook group (with over 600 members) has been set up by University of Toronto Mississauga students titled “Expel or Suspend Salman Hossain.” And, yesterday the Post reported that Walied Khogali the president of the student government wants the university to look into disciplinary action against the Bangladeshi-Canadian.
However, there are few things that would be more inappropriate for a university administration to do, than to discipline a student for commenting on a website that is affiliated in no way with the university. Can it be proven that Hossain was using university computers to post his comments? Does it matter? Should we be spying on casual conversations in the hallway? Should we be disciplining students who want a Leninist revolution that would assuredly involve the killing of Canadian soldiers on home soil? Free thought be damned!
That a student government would even consider this an option is appalling and nonsensical. Across the country residents fed up with boozy students interrupting their sleep and urinating in the streets have begged universities to enforce codes of conduct off campus. Until now student governments have condemned such calls. And, more importantly, university administrators have for the most part (admirably) resisted the urge to overstep their authority into areas that are rightfully the responsibility of the police. Hossain’s case should be no different, and Khogali should seriously consider the ramifications of what he is advocating.
What’s more, if Hossain is found to have committed no crime, and based on what has been made public it is not clear that he has, then so be it.
