Is calling for genocide protected by free speech?

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NoahA

I never venture into this forum, but I'm at a loss for truly trying to pick a side here. We have all seen how University CEO's were grilled about their policies of calling for the genocide of Jewish people, and whether this is considered free speech. From the clips I saw, all the CEO's didn't answer directly, and if forced, they said it depends on context, etc.

My twitter feed was filled with calls to fire them all and that this was antisemitic, etc. The thing is that these posters aren't the traditional democrats. I thought my twitter feed was mostly free speech advocates, etc. My gut feeling is that any speech should be protected. If you don't like what someone is saying, stop listening to them. Clearly lots of people right now are in the camp of saying kills all Jews, and just as many are in the camp that say to kill all Palestinians. The common thread seems to be that most people are ok with saying to kill other people, as long as they get to choose who.

When it comes to this whole Isreal/Palestine issue, I side with nobody. Hammas did a shitty thing by attacking innocent Israeli citizens, and now, 10 times as many innocent Palestinians have been killed. Sure, all these people would likely kill Jews if given the chance, but what do you expect when you've been oppressed at the hands of Israel for decades? So I could never say I support one side over the other when everyone is out just to kill each other.

But my original question, so I can get a bit of perspective, should a university not always stand up for free speech? A direct threat is of course a different matter, but the expression of an ideology, no matter how flawed, I would think should always be allowed. The issue isn't so much that some people are saying it, but more so that so many people want to listen to it, or act on it. So in a way, I almost support the universities here. If they take that stance that they will squash any mention of genocide, it will be a free speech slippery slope.
 
NoahA said:
I never venture into this forum, but I'm at a loss for truly trying to pick a side here. We have all seen how University CEO's were grilled about their policies of calling for the genocide of Jewish people, and whether this is considered free speech. From the clips I saw, all the CEO's didn't answer directly, and if forced, they said it depends on context, etc.

My twitter feed was filled with calls to fire them all and that this was antisemitic, etc. The thing is that these posters aren't the traditional democrats. I thought my twitter feed was mostly free speech advocates, etc. My gut feeling is that any speech should be protected. If you don't like what someone is saying, stop listening to them. Clearly lots of people right now are in the camp of saying kills all Jews, and just as many are in the camp that say to kill all Palestinians. The common thread seems to be that most people are ok with saying to kill other people, as long as they get to choose who.

When it comes to this whole Isreal/Palestine issue, I side with nobody. Hammas did a shitty thing by attacking innocent Israeli citizens, and now, 10 times as many innocent Palestinians have been killed. Sure, all these people would likely kill Jews if given the chance, but what do you expect when you've been oppressed at the hands of Israel for decades? So I could never say I support one side over the other when everyone is out just to kill each other.

But my original question, so I can get a bit of perspective, should a university not always stand up for free speech? A direct threat is of course a different matter, but the expression of an ideology, no matter how flawed, I would think should always be allowed. The issue isn't so much that some people are saying it, but more so that so many people want to listen to it, or act on it. So in a way, I almost support the universities here. If they take that stance that they will squash any mention of genocide, it will be a free speech slippery slope.
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Hate speech remains protected speech but it hasn't been re-tested w/this new court. While universities should foster a welcoming atmosphere (in which calls for genocide that falls apart), they are also dealing w/adults that need to be prepared for the real world. If a university takes public money, I don't think they can get away w/restricting speech (as has been proven by high school cases recently). I don't know how you prevent neo-nazis from marching through university streets any time they're issued a permit to do so though if they decided to make it a thing.

Keep in mind my read is this was all over a hypothetical. As far as I know, no students were calling verbatim for a genocide but using disputed phrasing depending which group you ask.
 
NoahA said:
If they take that stance that they will squash any mention of genocide, it will be a free speech slippery slope.
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Well, actually, it is not a slippery slope. Students are seemingly allowed to actively promote the endangerment of Jews on campus in the country and have to pull into a lotus position and the university officials seemingly need to pull into a lotus position and medidate for hours to know whether that is right or wrong.

But when it comes to their pet groups- whammo- you and your arse are gone, gone, gone from campus if even tough one of those live wires. No slippery slope there. Those are No-Go Zones fiercely enforced.

So for example there is the battle cry "From the River to the Sea" which is thinly veiled code for the extermination of Jews. Now, in theory one could have in the past argue that that just mean their removal from Israel not their killing but the current protests have lots of calls for their outright killing mixed in so that argument is not going to work.

Now, let's say we have a place called Cambridge Massachusetts- which has a river- the Charles River. And said river, also runs into the sea a few miles away. Boston Harbor. So suppose I have some kind of burr under my saddle about Blacks and Transgenders being on Harvard Campus so I start calling for the annihilation of all Blacks and Transgenders between the River and the Sea (between the Charles and Boston Harbor). And while blabbering and protesting away I am also part of spontaneous and planned mobs to threaten Blacks and Transgenders such that they are caused to be barricaded and hiding for their safety. How long do you think it would take the Ding Dong President there to forumulate an answer to whether that is free speech or not? As I said, yes, there is a slippery slope that needs to be watched when curtailing certain speech but no one needs to worry about it going over to certain pet groups.

There was a Babylon Bee spoof the other day that had a fake news article title that said something like: PROGRESSIVES AT HARVARD TAKE BREAK FROM MICRO-AGGRESSION TRAINING TO GO OUT AND KILL JEWS. Lots of truthyness there.

President of Harvard: FAIL

President of MIT: FAIL

President of UPenn: FAIL

Also lots of legally "protected speech" does not protect the speaker from the consequences - both legally and professionally of the speech. A university president and the students have the right to say all sorts of stupid things out on the street. But when you are representing an organization as is a university president you are also judged on whether or not you are still in service to the university by being a complete fucking idiot even though killing jews seems to be what all the cool kids want these days.
 
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You can hate whoever you want and speak about it with private places having some say where you can say it, but as long as you avoid advocating violence and action, I can live with it under the 1st A.

you want to say Hamas are terrorists.....Israel is practicing genocide..... we take the free speech without filters.

It is not a difficult distinction to make when speech is not absolutely protected when speech crosses over to speciic hate or calls for violent action or speech that foments violence directly (like telling your braindead supporters to go storm a federal building and interrupt a constitutional function.)
 
El OchoCinco said:
You can hate whoever you want and speak about it with private places having some say where you can say it, but as long as you avoid advocating violence and action, I can live with it under the 1st A.

you want to say Hamas are terrorists.....Israel is practicing genocide..... we take the free speech without filters.

It is not a difficult distinction to make when speech is not absolutely protected when speech crosses over to speciic hate or calls for violent action or speech that foments violence directly (like telling your braindead supporters to go storm a federal building and interrupt a constitutional function.)
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you're such an antisemite Ocho for reals.

/s
 
So if you listen to the arguments closely at the Congressional hearing there wasn’t a first amendment argument being made, it was an argument of violation of title VI and each university’s mandatory anti harassment policies.

And the answer is yes, calling for genocide on an American college campus violates title VI and their anti harassment policies they must have to receive public money.

In short calling for murder and/or genocide does not violate the first amendment. However these terroristic threat can violate various other laws within certain context, as many of these universities presidents tried to hide behind.
 
UsualName said:
So if you listen to the arguments closely at the Congressional hearing there wasn’t a first amendment argument being made, it was an argument of violation of title VI and each university’s mandatory anti harassment policies.

And the answer is yes, calling for genocide on an American college campus violates title VI and their anti harassment policies they must have to receive public money.

In short calling for murder and/or genocide does not violate the first amendment. However these terroristic threat can violate various other laws within certain context, as many of these universities presidents tried to hide behind.
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I'm guessing this applies to administration? I can see that by extension it'd apply to student body if they're allowed to go unimpeded. I still don't think there's enough specificity to constitute a threat/harassment personally. Definitely hostile environment.....it was a hypothetical right? The verbatim posited?
 
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