Regents approve punishments up to expulsion for UW students who repeatedly disrupt speakers

[alp227]

Source: Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel

The University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents on Friday passed a policy pushed by Republican state lawmakers to punish students on UW campuses who repeatedly disrupt campus speakers with opposing views.

The policy to address the so-called "heckler's veto" requires a student twice found responsible for disrupting freedom of expression to be suspended, and a student who disrupts three times to be expelled.

It defines offending students as those who engage in “violent or other disorderly misconduct that materially and substantially disrupts the free expression of others."

The policy further mandates that “protests and demonstrations that interfere with the rights of others to engage in or listen to expressive activity shall not be permitted and shall be subject to sanction.”

Read more: http://www.jsonline.com/story/news/education/2017/10/06/regents-consider-punishments-uw-students-who-disrupt-speakers/738438001/

[turbinetree]

1. Fuck them

your rights do not stop at the door unless you yell fire.
So if the said students come in with signs .....................I hate "republicans"

[brooklynite]

3. Actually, yes they do...when it's not your door.

You have the right to engage with the speaker WHEN the event include a public component. You have the right to book another room to provide a message of your own. You have a right to protest in the common spacesa of the University. But unless you propose to allow evangelicals to disrupt a science class or white supremacists to shout down a meeting of the Muslim Students association, you have to extend the same right to be heard to people you disagree with.

[turbinetree]

6. Wado- Thankyou

[SkyDaddy7]

12. I hope I don't get DU shamed for this...

But I totally agree with you because you are obviously correct. I personally think in a college or University setting there should be some type of regulated forum where you can hear ideas that can be truly nauseating. As long as they're not calling for violence then why not let them speak & exercise their right to make an ass of themselves. I think it works in white Nationalist, alt-right, whatever favor when they are drowned out by rowdy crowds not letting them speak. They spin it to make us look like the instigators & the oppressors.

...I guess I have no fear at all that our message, a progressive all-inclusive message will easily win in the marketplace of ideas so we should act that way confident & sure of ourselves.

[metalbot]

17. I think that's far more sensible than what happens now

I've posted on this before. It's almost like there's a playbook...

1. Campus conservatives in liberal strongholds identify speakers likely to offend as wide a range of people as possible
2. Invite said offensive speaker to give a lecture at a student event
3. Publicize event as widely as possible
4. Administration fears violence
5a. Campus conservatives forced to cancel event
5b. Event takes place and violence breaks out
6. Conservatives use 5a or 5b to argue that liberals can't handle free speech
7. Wait 4-6 weeks
8. Repeat step 1 in new location

The only way to win is to play a different game.

[SkyDaddy7]

41. Yes, I agree. nt.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

35. These bozos were touring campuses thirty years ago

The couple dozen people who wanted to hear Dennis Prager went to listen to Dennis Prager and everyone else managed to ignore them.

The same thing happened when Louis Farrakhan and some other guy showed up, a bunch of interested people (mostly the general public) attended and everyone else just ignored them.

Open conflict was basically confined to a handful of Israel vs. Palestine hardliners and an eccentric bunch of feminists who publicly attacked one another over differences so nuanced that few who weren't among the warring factions would have understood them.

[comradebillyboy]

29. Right on!

[bench scientist]

31. Dean Erwin Cherminsky spoke at my law school on this very topic 2 weeks ago.

All ideas, regardless of how repugnant, should be allowed on campus.
As you note, what one person finds offensive another will not. Without some civility, any idea good or bad becomes held hostage
to a heckler's veto.
His talk was amazing and he's remarkably approachable person given his legal stature.
He's alarmed at the current push to limit free speech.

[alp227]

40. Even genocide?

Even ideas that oppose the very existence of certain people?

[murielm99]

2. Lawsuit coming.

[iluvtennis]

5. Agree

[Still In Wisconsin]

8. It won't matter... Wisconsin Supreme Court is 2/3 hardline Koch conservatives.

The only possibility would be if it went all the way to SCOTUS. And even then...

[murielm99]

22. I know you live there,

but don't give up. Things may be changing.

[Still In Wisconsin]

30. Oh, I won't give up. I intend to be a pain in their collective ass for the rest of my days!

Our best hope, of course, is the chance that SCOTUS could overturn the 2010 Republican gerrymander, a case they are currently considering. If THAT happens then Democrats might once again have a fighting chance to retake the Wisconsin State Legislature, which would help in countless ways.

[safeinOhio]

4. Protecting free speech by

making another form of it illegal?

[Qutzupalotl]

7. Good.

As the ACLU is fond of saying, the answer to objectionable speech is more speech. Which is distinct from shouting down or drowning out speech you don't like.

Free speech cuts both ways. Let people finish their thought, then speak. We would want the same done to us.

[Mr.Bill]

11. And I'm sure in Walker's Wisconsin

the rule will be enforced evenly for both sides.

[groundloop]

14. THAT is what I don't like about this....

As others have said, all viewpoints deserve a right to be heard so long as they're not calling for violence. But I have a sneaking suspicion that right wing speakers will be given preference by the Walker regime.

[Baconator]

19. Are there many cases of right oriented students shutting down left leaning speakers?

[Mr.Bill]

27. I have no idea.

Never even been to a Wisconsin college campus.

[Mosby]

33. it happens a lot to Israeli speakers

The Israeli ambassador was shouted down, he's not a conservative.


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mark-levine/uc-students-shouting-down_b_472187.html

Israeli academic shouted down in lecture at University of Minnesota

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/11/04/israeli-academic-shouted-down-in-lecture-at-university-of-minnesota

[hardluck]

42. Those werent conservatives shouting him down.

[SkyDaddy7]

13. YES!!!

We do far more harm to ourselves in terms of message & PR by shouting down others & not allowing them to speak. I am 100% sure our message will win out in the marketplace of ideas so we should act like...Confident & sure, & let them speak! The freedom of speech typically lets everyone know really quick who the nutters are...We don't have to shout them down. IMHO.

[elehhhhna]

32. And the rule applies to speakers invited by the school or school groups

It doesn't force people to listen to anything . It doesn't prevent peaceful assembly or protest. It certainly doesn't get you thrown out of school for interrupting and chanting loudly at the self-appointed wacko on the corner with the bullhorn!

[ripcord]

36. Thank you

[Initech]

9. RIP Freedom Of Speech. 1791 - 2017. You will be missed.

[Igel]

39. The colleges I've attended had a healthy exchange of views.

The problem was when the exchange of views had to happen in a specific setting.

You get a group of people there to hear a guest speaker, and another self-appointed speaker tries to take over. What happens is the invited speaker doesn't speak and the people who assembled are cheated out of what they intended. It's sort of an undemocratic coup by the self-appointed forces the righteous. That always rankles.

Now, you might say, "But that opposing viewpoint should be heard." And it could be. Outside. In the student paper. During Q&A, if held. Other forms of protest. During other forums held by those opposing speakers. There's no shortage of venues, and often the view of the invited guest speaker got the least air time. Yet the opposers always acted like they were the ones wronged by the mere existence of the view they disliked or felt such a strong need to counter, and get pissed off because people don't pay attention to them when they speak. It's not just that the other side must not speak--they really insist that the people that wouldn't normally pay attention to them be in a position where they can't help but hear their viewpoint. In other words, one side has no right to speak, the other has not only the right to speak but also the right to be heard.

Not sure that expulsion is the way to spread the idea of some sort of civil discourse.

[Mr.Bill]

10. Probably makes a stronger statement

Last edited Fri Oct 6, 2017, 06:42 PM - Edit history (1)

when you simply get up and walk out of the room. Especially when large numbers of people do it. Of course, they'll probably make that illegal, too.

What if every journalist got up and walked out of a Trump press conference whenever he accused them of fake news?

[bucolic_frolic]

15. The Thought Police Suppressing First Amendment Rights

Bring it

[petronius]

16. So long as this is objectively and evenhandedly enforced, I support the rule for

organized events and speakers. (Actually, it seems a bit redundant: there should already be policies to prevent interruption of classes, lectures, events, ceremonies, ...).

I'm more leery of applying the rule to the sort of un-organized free speech that occurs out in the roads and the quads. While rules/laws about violence, harassment, incitement, and so forth should certainly apply, I doubt that this 'disruption' rule could be fairly enforced in the hurly-burly of the quad...

[certainot]

18. uw broadcasts sports on 5 limbaugh talk stations and a few other rw republican stations

students can protest their own uni on any major issue to get it to look for apolitical alternatives.

all the republican regents owe their elections to those stations. when advertisers see protests like that they will start dropping talk radio stations and all republicans will freak out. the stations will be exposed and without advertisers some will have to go to music and sports talk

wisconsin will go blue.

[rzemanfl]

20. Years ago, when I attended, they used cops, tear gas and the National Guard. n/t

[murielm99]

21. They used canisters then,

and people threw them back at the cops.

[rzemanfl]

23. I was marching up the back side of Bascom Hill with maybe a thousand plus others. Three trucks

full of National Guardsmen pulled up and formed ranks with fixed bayonets. Tear gas canisters were fired. Just then a squall came through and blew the gas back where it came from very close to the ground. The guardsmen got back in their trucks and split as the students kept on coming.

[Greybnk48]

25. Don't forget the dogs. A close friend of ours still

has bite scars on his arms. He was 19.

[rzemanfl]

26. In Wisconsin? n/t

[kimbutgar]

24. I would drop out of that college and transfer to another

Wisconsin has become such a disgusting Reich wing state. This is a gross violation of students
first amendment rights.

[murielm99]

34. This has been happening.

People are choosing to go to school in other states.

My daughter got her undergrad degree at Lawrence. She got one master's degree at UW, and played in Madison Symphony for a while. Her roommate left for another state as soon as she got her PhD. My daughter left soon after. They are losing their best academics.

I have quite a bit of family still there. They are all Democrats.

[barbtries]

28. hopefully this will be challenged

and overturn. these attempts to thwart the 1st amendment are chilling.

[Doreen]

37. My question is, will this only be Democrats and Liberals who will be punished?

Do Repukes get away with heckling?

[LiberalFighter]

38. Will they apply the same standard to both sides?