Monthly Archives: March 2015

Colorado Editorial Roundup

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A sampling of recent editorials from Colorado newspapers:

The Gazette, March 10, on defending free speech:

Suppose a member of the Westboro Baptist Church walks into a bakery demanding a cake that features the organizations infamous slogan God Hates (Gays). The baker refuses. She will sell the man cake but will not design an obnoxious message.

Most would sympathize with the baker. In a country protected by free speech, no one should be forced to write, say or otherwise depict something the person deems offensive. Free speech means freedom to express what we desire. It also means the government cannot force us to express anything - whether it is popular or unpopular.

We cannot discriminate against a black person or Muslim in a place of business. For that, our country has become an oasis of liberty in an international environment abundant with slavery and discrimination. But a business owner cannot be forced to pledge agreement with or opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Expression is different than the sale of a good, service or commodity. Most newspapers would sell an ad to any religious extremist. Few would produce an ad that denounces a chosen demographic as infidels. We are allowed to discriminate against messages deemed inappropriate.

Though our hypothetical cake shop dilemma depicts an extreme, something similar happened in Colorado recently. Bill Jack of Castle Rock asked three Denver-area bakery owners to create Bible-shaped cakes and adorn each with a scripture opposing homosexuality. The bakers refused, and Jack filed a complaint with the Colorado Civil Rights Commission. Colorados civil rights statutes forbid discrimination on a basis of creed. Jacks creed involves opposition to homosexual relationships.

Jacks requests for anti-gay expressions came after two men asked the owner of Masterpiece Cake Shop in Lakewood to create a cake celebrating their marriage in another state. The baker, Jack Phillips, politely declined. He offered to sell them cakes and any other products but said his religious convictions precluded him from creating an expression that celebrates same-sex marriage. Whether one disagrees with Phillips should have no bearing on his First Amendment rights to free expression and exercise of religion.

The men complained to the Civil Rights Commission. The commission ordered Phillips to create whatever expressions same-sex couples demand. He must file quarterly compliance reports for the next two years and re-educate his staff that Colorados Anti-Discrimination Act means that artists must endorse all views.

That means pro-choice activists must design cakes that denounce abortion. Pro-life bakers must create expressions celebrating Roe v. Wade. Endless conundrums come to mind.

A person forced by a state commission to endorse or denounce same-sex relationships has no freedom of speech. She has only the obligation to say what the state demands.

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Colorado Editorial Roundup

Lawyer: OU had to balance free speech and protection from racism

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Two students were expelled from the University of Oklahoma this week after a video of them leading a racist chant went viral. The response from David Boren, the president of the university, was swift and decisive the video went public Sunday night, and by midday Tuesday the university had announced the expulsion.

[Read the students' apologies.]

The incident raised heated questions about race relations and how to balance free speech with protection from discrimination and harassment. Many applauded Borens strong stance as a good means to ensure the campus wasnt a racially hostile place. But others cautioned he had not given sufficient consideration to the students First Amendment rights.

College officials have to carefully navigate those competing claims.

Olabisi Okubadejo, a lawyer who specializes in higher education issues in Ballard Spahrs Baltimore office, writes about the tensions for colleges trying to keep their campuses inclusive even when theres divisive speech:

The announcement of the University of Oklahomas recent decision to expel two fraternity members who allegedly were involved in chanting a racist anthem on video has ignited widespread discussion at educational institutions nationwide.

At issue, in large part, is the tension that often arises when student organizations engage in race-based conduct on the one hand, many students and faculty are offended and outraged by the behavior, while on the other hand, perpetrators and individual rights groups vocally claim that the speech is constitutionally protected.

Educational institutions are caught in the middle, as they grapple with how to meet dueling obligations under the First Amendment and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits racial harassment.

The U.S. Department of Educations Office for Civil Rights (OCR) in its published guidance to schools makes clear that the mere offensiveness of speech, standing alone, is insufficient to establish a racially hostile environment on campus.

Instead, to constitute harassment, when viewed from the perspective of a reasonable person, the speech must be sufficiently serious to deny or limit a students ability to participate in the schools educational program.

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Lawyer: OU had to balance free speech and protection from racism

REKS @ Blackout 21st Birthday rapping with no sound system – Klub KSET Zagreb – Video

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REKS @ Blackout 21st Birthday rapping with no sound system - Klub KSET Zagreb
The sound engineer turned down the sound system on police order but REKS kept on rapping his song 25th hour practically a cappella. This is what real HipHop is all about. Freedom of speech...

By: 1LAgangbanger

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REKS @ Blackout 21st Birthday rapping with no sound system - Klub KSET Zagreb - Video

Move to ban US flag at California university sparks uproar, free speech-vs.-hate speech debate

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IRVINE, Calif. When student government representatives at the University of California, Irvine voted to ban all flags including the American one from their tiny office, they thought they had found a solution to a battle over freedom of speech that began when someone first tacked a U.S. flag to the wall in January. The flag had been at the center of an increasingly bitter game of cat-and-mouse, with some students taking it down repeatedly and others replacing it in the dark of night.

Last week, six student legislative council members passed a resolution banning all flags from their office space, saying the U.S. flag could be viewed as hate speech because some consider it a symbol of colonialism and imperialism. The executive cabinet of the Associated Students organization vetoed the legislation two days later but it was too late.

The vote prompted a furor: Taxpayers protested on the campus plaza, the school was bombarded with angry comments on its social media sites, and one state lawmaker proposed a constitutional amendment that would prohibit state-funded colleges and universities from banning the U.S. flag on campus. On Thursday, student government meetings were canceled for the second day in a row because of an unspecified threat.

The debate resonated on the ethnically and religiously diverse suburban campus south of Los Angeles, where tensions over freedom of speech have taken the national stage several times before. For years, Jewish students and members of the Muslim Student Union have sparred in a dispute that came to a head in 2011, when 10 Muslim students were arrested and prosecuted for disrupting a speech by Israeli ambassador Michael Oren. In 2007, federal civil rights investigators looked into complaints of anti-Semitic speeches given at the university by invited Muslim speakers, but they found the comments were directed as Israeli policies, not Jewish students.

"It's the nature of young minds questioning and activism at a young age. I think people notice it at UCI more because they think, 'Oh, that's the quiet conservative campus in the middle of Orange County.' But the reality is the students are from all over the place, and they're testing out their ideas just like they are at any other campus," said Cathy Lawhon, a university spokeswoman. About 14 percent of the university's nearly 30,000 students are from other countries.

The tension between Muslim and Jewish undergraduates has calmed recently, and President Barack Obama gave the university commencement speech last spring. So current students said they were dismayed to be in the national spotlight again on freedom of speech issues. Some students and professors reacted to the national criticism by defending the six students in an online petition that said, in part, that the "resolution's perspective has been completely borne out by recent events."

Daniel Kellogg, a fourth-year cognitive sciences major, wore a muscle shirt emblazoned with the American flag as he walked across campus to drop off a term paper. The attention was unsettling, he said, particularly because UC Irvine was being portrayed nationally as a hotbed of anti-American fervor because of the actions of six students.

"We have a lot of international students, and I could see how somebody could possibly be uncomfortable by a gigantic flag in the middle of the common area. But at the same time, this is the United States, and they should just get used to that," Kellogg said.

Meeting minutes show legislative council members grappled with whose rights were more important as they voted: those offended by the flag or those who were offended by its removal. One council member noted that an anonymous letter that criticized the flag was free speech but taking it down was impinging on the free speech of others who wanted it left up.

Associated Students President Reza Zomorrodian did not respond to emails nor did any of the legislative council members involved in the vote or the resolution's author. But in a statement earlier this week, three of the six students who passed the resolution said that they were grateful to be "privileged enough to even have these kinds of conversations" and said they had meant to create a "safe, inclusive space" for all students.

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Move to ban US flag at California university sparks uproar, free speech-vs.-hate speech debate

Flag flap at California school raises free speech debate – Quincy Herald-Whig | Illinois & Missouri News, Sports

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By GILLIAN FLACCUS Associated Press

IRVINE, Calif. (AP) - When student government representatives at the University of California, Irvine voted to ban all flags - including the American one - from their tiny office, they thought they had found a solution to a battle over freedom of speech that began when someone first tacked a U.S. flag to the wall in January. The flag had been at the center of an increasingly bitter game of cat-and-mouse, with some students taking it down repeatedly and others replacing it in the dark of night.

Last week, six student legislative council members passed a resolution banning all flags from their office space, saying the U.S. flag could be viewed as hate speech because some consider it a symbol of colonialism and imperialism. The executive cabinet of the Associated Students organization vetoed the legislation two days later - but it was too late.

The vote prompted a furor: Taxpayers protested on the campus plaza, the school was bombarded with angry comments on its social media sites, and one state lawmaker proposed a constitutional amendment that would prohibit state-funded colleges and universities from banning the U.S. flag on campus. On Thursday, student government meetings were canceled for the second day in a row because of an unspecified threat.

The debate resonated on the ethnically and religiously diverse suburban campus south of Los Angeles, where tensions over freedom of speech have taken the national stage several times before. For years, Jewish students and members of the Muslim Student Union have sparred in a dispute that came to a head in 2011, when 10 Muslim students were arrested and prosecuted for disrupting a speech by Israeli ambassador Michael Oren. In 2007, federal civil rights investigators looked into complaints of anti-Semitic speeches given at the university by invited Muslim speakers, but they found the comments were directed as Israeli policies, not Jewish students.

"It's the nature of young minds questioning and activism at a young age. I think people notice it at UCI more because they think, 'Oh, that's the quiet conservative campus in the middle of Orange County.' But the reality is the students are from all over the place, and they're testing out their ideas just like they are at any other campus," said Cathy Lawhon, a university spokeswoman. About 14 percent of the university's nearly 30,000 students are from other countries.

The tension between Muslim and Jewish undergraduates has calmed recently, and President Barack Obama gave the university commencement speech last spring. So current students said they were dismayed to be in the national spotlight again on freedom of speech issues. Some students and professors reacted to the national criticism by defending the six students in an online petition that said, in part, that the "resolution's perspective has been completely borne out by recent events."

Daniel Kellogg, a fourth-year cognitive sciences major, wore a muscle shirt emblazoned with the American flag as he walked across campus to drop off a term paper. The attention was unsettling, he said, particularly because UC Irvine was being portrayed nationally as a hotbed of anti-American fervor because of the actions of six students.

"We have a lot of international students, and I could see how somebody could possibly be uncomfortable by a gigantic flag in the middle of the common area. But at the same time, this is the United States, and they should just get used to that," Kellogg said.

Meeting minutes show legislative council members grappled with whose rights were more important as they voted: those offended by the flag or those who were offended by its removal. One council member noted that an anonymous letter that criticized the flag was free speech but taking it down was impinging on the free speech of others who wanted it left up.

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Flag flap at California school raises free speech debate - Quincy Herald-Whig | Illinois & Missouri News, Sports

Hubble finds an underground ocean on Jupiters largest moon

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Lindsey Caldwell

The possibility of life on other planets just became more probable with NASA's Hubble telescope's latest discovery. Hubble uncovered evidence of a giant underground ocean on Jupiter's largest moon, Ganymede. Ganymede is the largest moon in our entire solar system and has long drawn the focus of astronomers as they search for conditions that could be hospitable to life on other planets. The theory of underground oceans on Ganymede was first proposed on in the 1970's, but it wasn't until now that scientists uncovered solid evidence.

This latest discovery was made Joachim Saur and his team at the University of Cologne in Germany. Ganymede has its own magnetic field which produces aurorae, not unlike earth's aurora borealis. Ganymede's magnetic field interacts with Jupiter's magnetic field. Whenever Jupiter's field changes Ganymede's is changed as well. Hubble measured that Ganymede's magnetic field did not react as predicted. Ganymede's field seemed to resist the changes from Jupiter's magnetic field. This could be explained mathematically if Ganymede had a saltwater ocean that resisted any changes from Jupiter's magnetic field.

Scientists were even able to calculate the size and depth of this newly discovered ocean. Ganymede's underground ocean is suspected to be over ten times deeper than any ocean on earth. The ocean would have more water than all of the combined oceans on earth. The ocean is likely buried under a 95-mile frozen crust of ice.

When scientists search for conditions conducive to life on other planets, they look for water. When Hubble identified Ganymede's underground ocean, scientists found a moon within our own solar system that has at least one of the quality necessary to sustaining life. I wouldn't wait for the alien mothership just yet, but we can look forward to other exciting discoveries from Hubble and NASA.

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Hubble finds an underground ocean on Jupiters largest moon