“If there is any principle of the Constitution that more imperatively calls for attachment than any other, it is the principle of free thought — not free thought for those who agree with us but freedom for the thought that we hate.”
— Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, United States v. Schwimmer (1929).
On the University of Wisconsin’s flagship Madison campus, the mere utterance of the term “Make America Great Again” would provoke acts of performative outrage, anguished claims of victimhood, and demands that speakers of such “hate speech” be consigned to the gulag along with Fredric March and that 42-ton glacial boulder. Maybe a little vandalism, as accompanied a Young Americas Foundation speaker last year.
When conservative theorists gathered on campus earlier this month, on-line viewers disrupted the proceedings by exposing their genitals and shouting profanities. Mattered not that the offending intellectuals were black.
The ultra-Woke publication Madison 365 is performing muck-raking journalism. The on-line publication demands to know who (Oh, I wonder wonder wonder wonder WHO? !!!) inserted a clause in the University of Wisconsin-Madison freshman orientation guaranteeing freedom of speech!
“University of Wisconsin staff have added a section to the online Our Wisconsin course, which all incoming freshmen and transfer students are required to take, to explicitly teach that “even hate speech is protected speech,” Madison365 has learned.
—- Madison 365
Here’s the clause that is bundling panties on the progressive Left:
Here at UW–Madison, we believe that the ability to exchange, consider, and challenge different ideas is central to the educational process. This means that those who come to UW–Madison must be prepared to have their beliefs and ideas challenged, sometimes in ways they find uncomfortable or, in some instances, even offensive. We recognize that it can be difficult and sometimes even painful to hear points of view with which individuals powerfully disagree. Even hate speech is protected speech.
“University officials refused to say who requested that addition,” Madison 365 thunders. “A student affairs spokesperson refused to say who ‘strongly recommended’;’ that language be added.”
→ 47% of adults questioned said liberals on college campuses have “a lot” of freedom to express their opinion, while only 20% said conservatives do, according to the poll from the University of Chicago and The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs.
→ UW-Madison ranked 104th in free speech — third worst in the 14-member Big Ten conference, by this measure.
Hate speech works both way, kids!
Not that the UW-Madison campus is an outlier; wherever grievance is taught — as it is on most campuses — students will demand the silencing of their “oppressors.” Now it’s the Woke allies of Mark Pocan and his Squad — namely advocates of Palestine and Hamas — who are facing censure.
Over at Ivy League Penn, alum Dick Wolf, creator of the Law & Order television drama franchise, is asking the university president to resign for allowing a pro-Palestinian literature festival. “I am against all forms of hate and hate speech,” Wolf wrote.
It really is head-spinning! Suddenly the people who’ve spent years saying that “offensive” ideas are “violence,” are taking offense at a backlash against many of the same people when they endorse actual violence.
— Jonah Goldberg, “Tolerating the racially intolerant.”
Penalize speech censorship?
Three state legislative Republicans are floating a bill “that seeks to establish freedom of expression and academic freedom standards on University of Wisconsin campuses and technical colleges across the state and outlines due process standards and penalties for those who violate these standards.” They would enshrine into statute UW Regent Policy 4-21. The legislators referenced a UW system-wide survey conducted last year that found many conservative students find their views unwelcome.
Blaska’s Bottom Line: Like Woodward & Bernstein, Madison 365 boasts that it has submitted formal open records demands to determine who is defending the speech their comrades hate so righteously. If no one else steps forward, Blaska will take credit!
9 responses to “Even ‘hate speech’ is protected speech”
I still remember when the ACLU defended a NAZI organization to march in Skokie IL.
I remember them defending the 2nd amendment rights of a person I think in Chicago.
How far we have come.
Now if you say the wrong thing you will be shouted down or even prosecuted for hate speech.
Maybe people should read the 1st amendment to our constitution and understand the three parts of it before trying to tear it up.
“Maybe people should read the 1st amendment to our constitution and understand the three parts of it before trying to tear it up.”
Are you meaning something other than the five (5) parts of the Constitution of the United States of America’s 1A: Assembly, Speech, Petition, Press, and Religion?
“Madison 365 boasts that it has submitted formal open records demands to determine who is defending the speech their comrades hate so righteously.”
They best hope that U.W. doesn’t approach FOIA requests with the same glacially paced lethargy as does the MMSD.
“If no one else steps forward, Blaska will take credit!”
Speaking of FOIA requests and the MMSD……
The Gotch
[…] This post originally appeared at https://davidblaska.com/2023/10/21/even-hate-speech-is-protected-speech/ […]
I’d like to think the UW has rediscovered its values but more likely this was added at the behest of their legal team. Need to cover their asses.
What I am encouraged by is the Reddit thread on this which was overwhelmingly in support of free speech.
Madison365 is gonna Madison365. Ignore them.
I’m sure the addition regarding free speech has been annotated somewhere inconspicuously with the Liberal obligatory “nod, nod, wink, wink.”
Gee. I don’t see any Whites in that group photo of whiney victimhood. A magnifying glass may be helpful.
Ben Shapiro will speak at UW (thanks YAF for hosting him!) in a couple of weeks. Tickets were all spoken for the same day they were made available. Watch for shock and outrage as the tolerant kiddies have fantods. Watch for hapless Admins apologizing to the community for allowing them to be subjected to ideas divergent from their own.
Does Biden have Israel’s back?
Biden and Barack had Iraq’s back until they pulled out and watched ISIS (the JV squad) acquire billions of dollars in arms and two thirds of Iraq. I wonder where ISIS is now?
Biden had our Afghani friends backs in Kabul as well….
“Trust us” we say.”
You have our president’s word, “As a Biden.”
Yes, hate speech is still protected, as it should be. The best counter to it is better speech, as it always has been. But leftists would rather censor, cancel, harass and intimidate those that commit any sort of wrongthink against their narrative, even to the point of the guilty person committing suicide (as has already happened).
I read an opinion yesterday that public university funding should be tied to the institution’s FIRE grade. It’s not the worst idea.