My chat with Sam Harris! Life in prison for offensive speech in Canada! Is the poutine really worth it? (Answer: possibly)

Bringing you the latest free speech news (5/26/24)

Stories of the week

• Canada’s Assault on Free Speech by

  Jeffrey Cieslikowski
  (former FIRE researcher!)

Considering the trajectory of Canadian law regarding free speech, then, the Online Harms Act is not a departure from an historically speech-protective society but a continuation of Canada’s tendency to subordinate free expression to other values. The extremes of the Online Harms Act, however, call into question not only the wisdom of Canadian jurisprudence, but the entire legal tradition that permits such sweeping exceptions to free speech. 

• I joined Sam Harris for a wide ranging conversation about free speech, cancel culture, censorship, and technology among other topics on his ‘Making Sense’ podcast. If you're not a paid subscriber, you can still get the full episode by clicking the link and entering your email address. Enjoy!

This week in ERI

• The mental health consequences of social justice fundamentalism by me &

  Andrea Lan

This week on ‘So to Speak’

• FIRE’s executive vice president and host of

  So to Speak
  ,
  Nico Perrino
  and director of public advocacy, Aaron Terr, speak with J.P. Messina about his new book, ‘Private Censorship.’

This week in FIRE’s blog

• DEI in higher ed: when it’s constitutional and when it’s not

• Hundreds of books removed from Florida public school libraries based on constitutionally suspect guidance by Carrie Robison

• CNN editor Celina Tebore to keynote FIRE’s free press workshop

• REPORT: Americans don’t trust the government to make social media content decisions

‘Canceling’ in the news

• I joined the Hub Dialogues podcast to talk about cancel culture and the importance of remaining principled when fighting for free speech

International free speech story of the week

• Tunisia sentences journalists to a year in prison for criticizing the government (AP News) by Bouazza Ben Bouazza

FIRE in the press!

• Dark days for free speech at Hobart and William Smith Colleges (Syracuse.com) by

  Graham Piro

London Calling: Ronnie’s First Amendment Rundown

Mahoney v. U.S. Capitol Police Bd.

This week is grant of permanent injunction on a constitutional challenge to a near-total ban on expressive activities on the Eastern Senate, House, and Capitol steps, i.e., the lower steps leading to the Capitol buildings’ eastern entrances (upper steps are barricaded), where the public could formerly demonstrate but have been barred since 9/11 – that is, except for members of Congress and their invitees, so long as it’s done in the members’ “official capacity,” is “organized or sponsored” by them, and they remain in attendance at all times.  The court rejects a “half-hearted effort to take the First Amendment out of the equation” via the government speech doctrine, then holds the steps’ lower portions are the kind forum traditionally associated with public speech that the government cannot render nonpublic “on its own say so,” such that making them a “No Demonstration” area is unconstitutional, as the near-total speech ban fails for lack of tailoring, regardless of level of judicial review applied.  As the court holds, the ban is “troublingly overinclusive” in preventing even a quiet, single-person vigil or a duo joined in support of or opposition to a given issue, and “seriously underinclusive” in allowing members of the public to merely sit, stand or congregate in numbers large enough to threaten security – and worse still – allowing members of Congress to invite untold numbers of private individuals to join in expressive activity without any security vetting, while “the number of alternative regulatory options” are “so vast as to confirm” the rules violate the First Amendment.

Documentary of the month

The Free to Choose Network recently released the director’s cut of their new docuseries ‘Free to Speak’ hosted by FIRE Senior Fellow Nadine Strossen. Here’s a clip featuring yours truly: