Campus clash: Students battle over what constitutes free speech

[Tennis]

Kevin Arriola never thought of himself as an advocate for free speech — but then he found himself waging a court battle over it.

"This really opened my eyes and made me realize that all speech should be protected," says the Ryerson University political science student who started the Men's Issues Awareness Society. "Today it's me that can't talk about men's issues and men's mental health. Tomorrow it might be another group."

Women actually make up most of the group, which is confined to meeting in a tiny room that's more like a closet because the student union refused to give the group official status, saying it was anti-feminist and would make female students feel unsafe.

With the rise in trigger warnings and safe spaces on campuses, where some students say their unpopular, sometimes controversial ideas are being silenced because of what they call political correctness. Others say free speech is being used to justify sexist, racist and anti-LGBTQ views

Arriola says his group is not anti-feminist or sexist.

"I kind of came to the university thinking that it was a place where people could freely exchange ideas, push boundaries," he said. "But really it's just this padded room where everybody is trying to control a message under the guise of making everyone safe — which is BS, honestly."

The student union did not respond to queries from CBC News.

A similar battle is raging at the University of Alberta. Student Amberlee Nicol says security didn't act when protesters disrupted her anti-abortion group's information display in 2015. When she tried to schedule another event the following year, the administration wanted her to cough up $17,500 in security fees.

"I feel like that amounted to censorship," she said. "If you put a price tag on free speech by saying the more controversial you are, the more you have to pay for security fees, that immediately shuts down discourse for people who are either too unpopular or too poor to have their voices heard on campus."

The administration told CBC News that all campus groups have to pay for the cost of security if they hold an event where things could blow up.


That's what happened in Berkeley, Calif., in February, when protests against a scheduled talk by far-right commentator Milo Yiannopoulos devolved into riots, and the event was ultimately cancelled.

Some call it mob censorship. And it happens at Canadian schools, too.

Student protesters pulled the fire alarm at a talk given by Rebel Media founder Ezra Levant at the University of Toronto last year. More recently, Danielle Robitaille, one of the lawyers who defended Jian Ghomeshi, cancelled a guest lecture at Wilfrid Laurier University, citing safety concerns after students vowed to protest her presentation. They said her presence on campus could potentially traumatize victims of sexual assault.

U of T psychology professor Jordan Peterson knows what it's like to have campus events disrupted — his rallies are frequently the target of protesters for his views on free speech. Peterson regularly speaks out against federal Bill C-16, which would make it illegal to discriminate on the basis of gender identity or expression. Peterson sees the legislation as a threat to free speech because it would force him to address people by their preferred gender pronouns.

"It's the first time I've seen in our legislative history where people are attempting to make us speak their language," Peterson said at a rally at U of T in October.
Free speech vs. hate speech

Cassandra Williams was at that rally and says some of Peterson's supporters were being blatantly transphobic. One student took to the microphone and went on a rant against transgender people, calling them mentally ill and unloved.

Williams herself is transgender, and says free speech is being used as a dog whistle to give a legitimate platform to hateful messages.

Lawyer John Carpay says the Criminal Code covers them, just as it covers everyone else.

"University should provide a safe space from assault, from physical harm, but not a safe space from feeling upset about ideas you disagree with," he said. "If you're calling for any person or group of people to be murdered or to have their houses burned down or to be robbed or assaulted, that's already illegal criminal speech. So there's already a healthy boundary there."

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/free-s...eech-1.4058994

Do you think this is an issue or just overblown?

[breadisfunny]

quick tennisace you should go and sign up for the impending war on free speech.

[TwoNineMarine]

People need to quit being "traumatized" over someone's presence at or near their school.

Grow the fuck up.

OT: People should be able to say what they want when they want. You may disagree and think they are a royal prick but it doesn't suddenly make your speech on something > theirs.

[Deleted]

This is why this crowd gets called faggots instead of the PTP (Pronouns They Prefer).

It's just faster to insult them in the old-fashioned way than to let them insult you by forcing you to use some imaginary words about their imaginary state.

[Deleted]

God, this is exactly like the time Miss Rennig, who everyone knows is a total lesbian, made Candice Burton stay behind after PE, started telling her off for gobbing on Sunita Geschwani's hair.

[Endus]

People need to quit being "traumatized" over someone's presence at or near their school.

Grow the fuck up.

OT: People should be able to say what they want when they want. You may disagree and think they are a royal prick but it doesn't suddenly make your speech on something > theirs.

The irony here is that, for the most part, these outcries of being protesting someone's appearance are expressions of free speech.

And because you don't want to hear their message, you want them silenced. How is that any better? It's the same attitude, just aimed in the other direction.

I don't have any issue with a group asking for a speech to be cancelled because they dislike it. But I also fully support the right of the venue-holder to say "no" to that request, and let the speech go ahead. I don't see the need to silence either side in this.

[Trollhammer]

The irony here is that, for the most part, these outcries of being protesting someone's appearance are expressions of free speech.

And because you don't want to hear their message, you want them silenced. How is that any better? It's the same attitude, just aimed in the other direction.

I don't have any issue with a group asking for a speech to be cancelled because they dislike it. But I also fully support the right of the venue-holder to say "no" to that request, and let the speech go ahead. I don't see the need to silence either side in this.

[Endus]

*three videos*

And? I don't support that violence, and I've condemned the violence in those protests every time it's come up. But the idea that they were protesting, that I defend. Because that's explicitly what the concept of free speech is about.

Bringing up violent actions in a thread about free speech is deliberately shifting goalposts.

[Trollhammer]

And? I don't support that violence, and I've condemned the violence in those protests every time it's come up. But the idea that they were protesting, that I defend. Because that's explicitly what the concept of free speech is about.

Bringing up violent actions in a thread about free speech is deliberately shifting goalposts.

I bloded the relevant part. "group asking for a speech to be cancelled " No one is asking for people like Milo to not speak. They are demanding and rioting when they don't get their own way.

How is showing that free speech being suppressed on campus by campus violence moving goalposts?

[Deleted]

How is showing that free speech being suppressed on campus by campus violence moving goalposts?

Endus is the one setting the goalposts. He or she is arguing about the speech aspect, which is 100% symmetrical: calling for a cancellation is an expression of free speech.
If you introduce violence in the equation, you're moving outside of the limits they've set. I'd say you're strawmanning their argument by introducing the extraneous point of violence.

That said, I think that not talking about violence is ignoring the elephant in the room. Today, at least. But I also think that the free speech debate was showing silly tendencies way before it turned violent.

[Trollhammer]

Endus is the one setting the goalposts. He or she is arguing about the speech aspect, which is 100% symmetrical: calling for a cancellation is an expression of free speech.
If you introduce violence in the equation, you're moving outside of the limits they've set. I'd say you're strawmanning their argument by introducing the extraneous point of violence.

The OP is literally about violent mob censorship.

[Endus]

I bloded the relevant part. "group asking for a speech to be cancelled " No one is asking for people like Milo to not speak. They are demanding and rioting when they don't get their own way.

How is showing that free speech being suppressed on campus by campus violence moving goalposts?

Because we're talking about protests, not riots. You want to move the goalposts to include violent riots, to weight the discussion because violence is pretty obviously "bad".

If the protests at Berkely had stopped short of physical assaults and property damage, then I'd have absolutely no problem with them. If we're having a discussion about free speech, then let's talk about speech, not physical attacks.

[Deleted]

The OP is literally about violent mob censorship.

It's about protest, but I can concede that violence was present on most if not every reported instance.
Whatever the case, the the series of responses TwoNineMarine > Endus are not about violence.
Since when is a Tennisace thread kept ontopic anyway?

[Arewn]

The irony here is that, for the most part, these outcries of being protesting someone's appearance are expressions of free speech.

And because you don't want to hear their message, you want them silenced. How is that any better? It's the same attitude, just aimed in the other direction.

I don't have any issue with a group asking for a speech to be cancelled because they dislike it. But I also fully support the right of the venue-holder to say "no" to that request, and let the speech go ahead. I don't see the need to silence either side in this.

This is a misrepresentation of the situation.
Saying "I don't want to be silenced" does not mean they are unwilling to listen to the opposition. In fact, there are many who outright invite opposition to voice their view, or that leave time at the end of their session for opposition to ask questions/bring up counter-points.

It is true that protesting is an expression of free speech. But protesting with the goal of shutting down and/or preventing discourse, rather then engaging in it, is not acceptable. It is not "irony" that people are against being silenced.

There is a difference between protesting against someone's message, and protesting against their ability to so much as voice their message.

The venue holder obviously ultimately has the right to hold/cancel venues based on their interests/to protect their image/etc. But this isn't in the least bit a situation of "one side OR THE OTHER being silenced".
There's only one side being silenced in this case. The side who got cancelled. Unsuccessful cancellation does not equate to "being silenced", because that side can still chose not to attend, can still influence others not to attend, or could still chose to attend and voice disagreement with the message.

You cannot term being unsuccessfully at silencing someone else as, itself, being silenced. That's ridiculous.

[Gamer8585]

Your right to free speech is directly correlated to the degree to which you respect others rights.

If you start spouting off intolerant hateful Nazi garbage then the community around you has the full right (and arguably duty) to tell you to shut your damn mouth and get out.

[GennGreymane]

[Endus]

This is a misrepresentation of the situation.
Saying "I don't want to be silenced" does not mean they are unwilling to listen to the opposition. In fact, there are many who outright invite opposition to voice their view, or that leave time at the end of their session for opposition to ask questions/bring up counter-points.

It is true that protesting is an expression of free speech. But protesting with the goal of shutting down and/or preventing discourse, rather then engaging in it, is not acceptable. It is not "irony" that people are against being silenced.

There is a difference between protesting against someone's message, and protesting against their ability to so much as voice their message.

I don't see that it's a practical difference.

All of that is free speech. Supporting free speech does not mean you oppose certain messages you don't like, such as protests calling for someone's speech to be cancelled. If you want to see them speak, then counter-protest. That's what freedom of speech is. Free speech, as a concept, is not about supporting only certain discourse. Do I think some of these protestors are silly? Absolutely. But it's still their right to protest, no matter how much I might disagree with the content of their message, in some cases. I'm not going to be taking a stand to protect free speech by trying to silence those protests; that's an assault on the principle.

Freedom of speech does not lead to polite discourse. Free speech also doesn't protect access to private venues. Nor does it protect against social consequences. A view that wants to restrict speech to ensure polite discourse can be conducted and protest is silenced is not a view that's based on the principles of free speech.

Free speech means public heckling. Free speech means protests. Free speech means shouted outrage. Whether you agree with the heckling, protests, or outrage is fundamentally irrelevant to the issue.

[Krigaren]

I read through the Twitter and what little there is on the Facebook page for Men's Issues Awareness Society at Ryerson, and I can see why there'd be people who would get the wrong idea about this group.

Where, on one hand, they tweet in support of seminars talking about hyper-masculinity and the way it affects men's mental health, they also tweet about seminars seeking to discuss whether "Men are becoming obsolete" compared to women, or whether there's a "new masculine revolution" coming. There's no context to the re-tweets, so all we can do is take the fact that MIAS tacitly supports these messages.

It's entirely possible that MIAS is just another MRA-style pro-male, pro-masculinity organization that seeks to teach that men are oppressed in speech and representation due to the "evil" feminists and SJWs. It's also entirely possible that they're not, and that people are overreacting to the situation based on generalizations reached from very little information (like the OP). The truth probably lies in the middle.

[Endus]

I read through the Twitter and what little there is on the Facebook page for Men's Issues Awareness Society at Ryerson, and I can see why there'd be people who would get the wrong idea about this group.

Where, on one hand, they tweet in support of seminars talking about hyper-masculinity and the way it affects men's mental health, they also tweet about seminars seeking to discuss whether "Men are becoming obsolete" compared to women, or whether there's a "new masculine revolution" coming. There's no context to the re-tweets, so all we can do is take the fact that MIAS tacitly supports these messages.

It's entirely possible that MIAS is just another MRA-style pro-male, pro-masculinity organization that seeks to teach that men are oppressed in speech and representation due to the "evil" feminists and SJWs. It's also entirely possible that they're not, and that people are overreacting to the situation based on generalizations reached from very little information (like the OP). The truth probably lies in the middle.

I mean, there clearly ARE male issues. I don't think anyone disagrees with that. If you wanted to start a "men's issues" group on a college, though, the best way would be to partner with any extant "women's issues" groups, supporting their views and presenting your group as a supportive supplement, not an antagonistic alternative.

For instance, domestic violence against men is generally underreported and not treated seriously when it IS reported. And that's an issue. But you can take that position while simultaneously supporting the idea that domestic violence against women is also a problem, and the level of harm in such violence is generally higher than in domestic violence against men. The two issues shouldn't be in conflict, and presenting it as such is why mens-issues groups usually get little support.

[Krigaren]

I mean, there clearly ARE male issues. I don't think anyone disagrees with that. If you wanted to start a "men's issues" group on a college, though, the best way would be to partner with any extant "women's issues" groups, supporting their views and presenting your group as a supportive supplement, not an antagonistic alternative.

For instance, domestic violence against men is generally underreported and not treated seriously when it IS reported. And that's an issue. But you can take that position while simultaneously supporting the idea that domestic violence against women is also a problem, and the level of harm in such violence is generally higher than in domestic violence against men. The two issues shouldn't be in conflict, and presenting it as such is why mens-issues groups usually get little support.

Oh, I totally agree on both points. A lot of men's issues are related, either directly or in parallel, to feminist issues, and those two societies can work pretty well together to touch on a lot of the same kinds of topics.

One thing that the MIAS founder mentions in one of his interviews is that he understands and recognizes intersectionality. If that's the case, he should really take this as an opportunity to reach out to other issues groups to explain his group's purpose, and try to work with them, rather than allowing his group to be used as a pawn in the "war on free speech" arena.