Are Universities and Free Speech Compatible???

[EagleSmack]

With Democrats being the majority in the USA, how do you explain that just about all radio political shows are right wing?

.

Because Left Wing radio talk shows fail miserably. Just look at Air America. On the radio talk show hosts have to take calls to have an interesting show. Lefties do not like being questioned and fail miserably when they actually have to debate someone live.

Thursday buck o beer night is when the true opinions come out.

And that's about it.

Cheers!

 

[CDNBear]

I back up my claims with proof such as the links to your Tea Baggers disrupting town halls.

You don't back up your claims with facts. I'd ask you defend the nonsense of "your tea baggers", but you won't defend that idiocy with facts, because there is none.

You'll do what you always do, babble, deflect and whine.

Notice how nobody even tried to refute that truth.

Because nobody cares, we were talking about Canadian universities.

The whole world doesn't revolve around gopher, his infatuations and delusionalisms.

Where is your proof that I want a single party system (this should be interesting).

Maybe if you reread your posts you'll understand.

You should try that as well especially in regard to your comments for anyone who dares to disagree with you regarding Israel.

Interesting deflection.

I was talking about standards.

Please try and stop being so dishonest. It just makes you look silly.

 

[Niflmir]

I was saying that universities do. If a forum or podium is given to a speaker he/she should have the right to be heard.

It is not an arrestable offense what they did, but he certainly was denied his right to be heard. And if the shoe was on the other foot and Pro-Choice folks were surrounded by Pro-Life folks screaming "C***!" there would be all hell to pay.

What right to be heard? If you are having a conversation with your friend in a bar and I am talking so loudly that you cannot hear your friend, have I infringed your friend's right to freedom of speech?

Honestly, these clowns gave a huge boost to Woodworth's message by interrupting him in such a rude fashion. If anything they amplified his speech.

 

[CDNBear]

What right to be heard? If you are having a conversation with your friend in a bar and I am talking so loudly that you cannot hear your friend, have I infringed your friend's right to freedom of speech?

Wow Nif, that's a bit of a stretch for a comparison.

 

[DaSleeper]

What right to be heard? If you are having a conversation with your friend in a bar and I am talking so loudly that you cannot hear your friend, have I infringed your friend's right to freedom of speech?

.

Wow Nif, that's a bit of a stretch for a comparison.

Actually, a better analogy would be a heckler or hecklers interrupting a performance in a bar, so loud that the patrons cannot hear the performance.....the bar has not only the authority, but the duty to kick his/her ass out.

 

[CDNBear]

Actually, a better analogy would be a heckler or hecklers interrupting a performance in a bar, so loud that the patrons cannot hear the performance.....the bar has not only the authority, but the duty to kick his/her ass out.

I wouldn't necessarily call that a better analogy.

Neither is a place of higher learning.

 

[DaSleeper]

I wouldn't necessarily call that a better analogy.

Neither is a place of higher learning.

Agreed.........what some students learn these day at university................................

 

[gopher]

As always, nobody bothered to prove that anything I wrote was incorrect. Nobody proved that I want a one party system. Everybody ignored the fact that right wingers disrupt free speech all the time whereas the one instance in the OP was an isolated event.

Typical right wing tin hat lunacy and crybaby idiocy, but no surprise.

The one valid point was made by Eagle when he talked about the mismanagement of Air America. It was pathetic. But other shows like Schultz and Hannemann have been taken off the air by some channels despite their good ratings. and that's censorship that exists on a daily basis. Something that never happens to the far right.

Ah, but we all know why of course,


BLAME GOPHER!

 

[Walter]

But other shows like Schultz and Hannemann have been taken off the air by some channels despite their good ratings.

Did the left-leaning MSNBC take away Schultz's prime-time show because of good ratings, too?

 

[DaSleeper]

As always, nobody bothered to prove that anything I wrote was incorrect. Nobody proved that I want a one party system. Everybody ignored the fact that right wingers disrupt free speech all the time whereas the one instance in the OP was an isolated event.

Not so Isolated...a quick search produced.....
Freedom of Expression, Universities and Anti-Choice Protests |

U of C may expel anti-abortion protesters - Calgary - CBC News

University of Toronto Students for Life – Pro-life Student Protesters Arrested at Carleton [updated]
and then there was ...
Ann Coulter's speech in Ottawa cancelled - The Globe and Mail

But for you that wouldn't count....she's a Republican:roll:

Typical right wing tin hat lunacy and crybaby idiocy, but no surprise.

The one valid point was made by Eagle when he talked about the mismanagement of Air America. It was pathetic. But other shows like Schultz and Hannemann have been taken off the air by some channels despite their good ratings. and that's censorship that exists on a daily basis. Something that never happens to the far right.

There you go....... Still trying to deflect ...with a straw man.......Your usual M.O.................

Ah, but we all know why of course,


BLAME GOPHER!

McCloud - YouTube

Did the left-leaning MSNBC take away Schultz's prime-time show because of good ratings, too?

Quit giving him material to derail with........

 

[Niflmir]

I wouldn't necessarily call that a better analogy.

Neither is a place of higher learning.

Mine was not meant as an analogy. Freedom of speech is in no way invoked simply because it is a place of higher learning. If you only have freedom of speech in a university, then you do not have freedom of speech at all. A person has as much right to speak in a bar as in a classroom where they were invited. Being interrupted in your speech is not the same as being prevented from speaking. But if you don't like this example, let us use a better one.

Is this a violation of the prefessor's freedom of speech: Banana/Gorilla Interrupt Lecture @ UTD - YouTube

No, it is a person being an idiot. It is the same with the situation at hand. Woodworth was invited by some people to speak at the university. He showed up and spoke. Some rude people interrupted. He finished talking to the interested parties afterwards. As I have pointed out, if anything, Woodworth has been given a larger platform to have his message heard because of the incident. He has very plainly expressed his message to a much larger audience than what was intended, otherwise we would not even be talking about this.

Freedom of speech means very little to people who see this as a violation of it.

 

[EagleSmack]

What right to be heard? If you are having a conversation with your friend in a bar and I am talking so loudly that you cannot hear your friend, have I infringed your friend's right to freedom of speech?
.

Really... you don't see the difference between a university scheduling a person to speak to students and is subsequently surrounded by idiots screaming "C***!" to a couple guys having trouble hearing each other in a bar?

Seriously?

Ah, but we all know why of course,


BLAME GOPHER!

Oh please... you're not that thought of.

. But other shows like Schultz and Hannemann have been taken off the air by some channels despite their good ratings. and that's censorship that exists on a daily basis. Something that never happens to the far right.

By the government?

 

[Niflmir]

Really... you don't see the difference between a university scheduling a person to speak to students and is subsequently surrounded by idiots screaming "C***!" to a couple guys having trouble hearing each other in a bar?

Seriously?

Oh, I see the difference. What I am saying is that the difference is without distinction in this topic.

The one situation does not create more right to freedom of speech than the other. You really cannot comprehend the nuance I am underlining? You really think we live in a world where the only people that deserve freedom of speech are the ones giving lectures in classrooms?

Flip it around. Let us say you are right, and the people in the bar do not have as much right to speak. Fine, now anyone who talks about pro-life matters in a bar will be kicked out. It is not like a bar is a classroom, so what does it matter?

Well, maybe I am misunderstanding you. Maybe for you the distinction is the content of the conversation. Then it is ten times worse what you are suggesting: content based determinations for when someone has freedom of speech. So certain predetermined subject matters are deserving protection and some are not?

No, anyway you slice it, it is absurd. Interrupting someone is rude and that is all. It is not an abridgement of their freedom of speech.

 

[DaSleeper]

Semantics....................Bah!

depends what the meaning of the word is....is!

 

[gopher]

Did the left-leaning MSNBC take away Schultz's prime-time show because of good ratings, too?

His ratings are quite high - he wanted the change and got it.

Quit giving him material to derail with........

Get your facts straight - he left weeknights, went to weekends, and had second highest ratings on that network.




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Now, as for censorship, here is MSNBC showing that it is not the leftie network some think it is:



Phil Donahue on His 2003 Firing from MSNBC, When Liberal Network Couldn


Phil Donahue on His 2003 Firing from MSNBC, When Liberal Network Couldn’t Tolerate Antiwar Voices





In 2003, the legendary television host Phil Donahue was fired from his prime-time MSNBC talk show during the run-up to the U.S. invasion of Iraq. The problem was not Donahue’s ratings, but rather his views: An internal MSNBC memo warned Donahue was a "difficult public face for NBC in a time of war," providing "a home for the liberal antiwar agenda at the same time that our competitors are waving the flag at every opportunity." Donahue joins us to look back on his firing 10 years later. "They were terrified of the antiwar voice," Donahue says.






Now, that is real censorship.




But wait,






BLAME GOPHER!!!

 

[Niflmir]

I realize that.

But universities sell themselves as places of higher learning, where one can speak freely, .share ideas, and discuss. Non?

Indeed, which is one of the reasons why these protesters are such idiots: they have basically spit on the idea of open dialogue. But as for a freedom of speech violation, I put this on the same level as the conspiracy theorist who continuously intterrupted to ask the inflammatory questions about black holes in a physics seminar.

In an open discussion, the sort that universities strive to facilitate, there are the opportunities for such astoundingly rude behavior. Compare that with the sort of official talks that occur where the questions to politicians are vetted before the person is allowed to approach a microphone. Such a person will not even be allowed inside the facility because of their strange attire.

As opposed to showing that freedom of speech is incompatible with universities, I just think this incident shows that universities are the sorts of places that support such open dialogue that such jerkish behavior is possible.

 

[CDNBear]

As opposed to showing that freedom of speech is incompatible with universities, I just think this incident shows that universities are the sorts of places that support such open dialogue that such jerkish behavior is possible.

Good point.

 

[Colpy]

The deplorable hollowness of our campus

The wonderful Rex Murphy.

Those of us who belong to the realist school of ****** impersonation, who believe private parts should be at all costs mute (and we are legion), were seriously nonplussed. A voluble ****** — and this one was chatty to the point of incontinence — was seen as a fanciful add-on, an app if you will, that seriously distorted the fidelity that should exist between art and its object.

LOL!!

 

[petros]

Nothing but a bunch of played out hippy wannabes.

Nothing is unique anymore.

All this re-hash is getting extremely boring and mundane.

 

[mentalfloss]

The problem is that the term "free speech" like "political correctness" is a loaded term that's difficult to have a universal dialogue about. There is context to what kind of speech is appropriate and under what circumstances and even that is changing all the time.

Also, I really dislike this idea that we have to generalize an entire group just to make a point.

Couldn't this thread have just been about that one situation instead of turning it into some grand political statement about Universities infiltrating the minds of our youth with leftist propaganda?

I'm not so sure Tom Flanagan is the type to show up to class as a schemey leftist prof. and I'm sure he doesn't appreciate this delusion some people have that every academic body is conspiring to convert our kids to some political ideology.