Category: reason

Some Universities, Even Public Ones, Actually Support Free Speech


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The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) has released its annual college free speech rankings. This is the largest survey of campus free speech, reaching 37,000 students from the nation’s top 159 colleges and universities; it assesses each school’s speech climate across seven aspects: perceived comfort in speaking one’s mind publicly, soundness of the speech code, reported levels of self-censorship, tolerance for liberal speakers, tolerance for conservative speakers, levels of acceptance for disrupting campus speech, and ability to discuss challenging topics on campus.

Topping 2021’s list is Claremont McKenna College, which has been celebrated for gracefully handling a controversial speech by the conservative journalist Heather Mac Donald and for launching an Open Academy Initiative intended to foster viewpoint diversity. In the poll, 54 percent of students report that their administration makes it “extremely” or “very” clear that they champion free speech.

“At higher ranking schools, the students felt the administration made their stance on free speech issues clear,” says Sean Stevens, FIRE’s senior research fellow of polling and analytics. “It’s a testament to the power of strong leadership on the part of administrators.” Finishing out the top five were the University of Chicago, the University of New Hampshire, Emory University, and Florida State University.

On the other side of the spectrum is Marquette University, which drew ire for attempting to revoke Prof. John McAdams’ tenure and to terminate him. (McAdams ultimately was reinstated after prevailing in court.) At Marquette, fewer than one in five students feel their school clearly upholds free speech. Also in the bottom five are Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Boston College, Louisiana State University, and DePauw University.

FIRE Executive Director Robert Shibley says prospective students can use the rankings to find out which schools value free expression and open debate. Meanwhile, the polling provides an up-to-date snapshot of the state of free expression on campuses nationwide.

One major trend is rising hostility towards controversial speakers on campus. Two thirds of students say shouting down speakers is at least sometimes acceptable, up 4 percent from last year; 23 percent believe using violence to stop certain speech is acceptable, up from 18 percent in 2020. The two schools at which violence is considered most tolerable are Wellesley College and Barnard College, both elite women’s institutions, who polled at 45 percent and 43 percent, respectively. According to the survey, conservative speakers face greater potential blowback.

Students also express trepidation in controversial conversation, with only 48 percent reporting that they feel comfortable expressing views on contentious issues during in-class discussions. In 2021, students were most apprehensive to discuss racial inequality, abortion, gun control, the George Floyd protests, and transgender issues.

“The value of higher education comes from developing a fuller understanding of the world by asking questions that challenge the status quo,” says Adam Goldstein, FIRE’s senior research counsel. “A college that won’t clearly protect your right to ask those questions is a bad idea, even if it boasts small class sizes or a fancy stadium.”

Merely one in three students nationwide say their administration makes it very or extremely clear that their speech is protected on campus. More than 80 percent of college students admitted to self-censoring, with 21 percent saying they do so often.

Such levels of illiberalism are intolerable in a higher education. The university campus is supposed to serve as a colosseum in the battle of ideas, not a place where students are conditioned to bite their tongues.

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Teachers Union Boss Accidentally Endorses School Choice While Rushing To Support Masking in Schools


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The performative politics of mask mandates have produced some weird moments during the pandemic. Now, they’ve even managed to get a prominent teachers union boss to argue in favor of school choice.

Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, on Monday night tweeted out a story from the Detroit News about how parents are navigating the complexities of some school districts in Michigan mandating that children wear masks in the classroom while others don’t. At the center of the story is a mother, Janine Fogg, who recently pulled her kids out of public schools in Brighton, Michigan, where masks are not mandated. Now, Fogg’s two children attend private schools where masks are mandated for all students and staff.

Weingarten’s take? “This parent chooses to drive her students to a school district that has a mask mandate. Masks save lives and limit the spread of COVID-19,” she wrote.

Weingarten’s overstating the efficacy of masking in the classroom, but she’s shockingly 100 percent right about the merits of letting parents choose the school that they believe is right for their kids. She also may not have read the whole story, since Fogg isn’t driving her kids to a “school district” that mandates masks but, rather, leaving public schools behind entirely.

That’s a choice that lots of parents have been exercising during the pandemic. In the wake of COVID-related school closures, parents have been fleeing to private schools and state lawmakers have introduced dozens of bills to expand school choice options like charter schools and private school voucher programs. Polls show that clear majorities of both Democrats and Republicans support school choice.

Normally, Weingarten isn’t a fan of giving parents more control over their children’s education. She’s attacked politicians who favor expanding charter schools and unfairly compared school choice advocates to segregationists.

Her union fought tooth-and-nail to keep schools closed during the first year of the pandemic, and unions have continued to be a major obstacle to full reopening even now that effective vaccines are readily available. Among other things, she’s argued that schools should have to close for a single positive test and maintain social distancing of 6 feet, even after the overly cautious Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said 3 feet of distance is just fine.

It’s possible that the fight over mask mandates in schools has caused Weingarten to see the light and understand that parents know what is best for their kids. But that’s unlikely. Instead, it seems like the politicization of mask mandates has caused Weingarten to temporarily forget that she believes one-size-fits-all schooling is the only way to go.

It’s just another example of how the pandemic has exposed the hypocrisy of our national leaders and those who have undue influence over them. By Weingarten’s logic, exercising school choice to send your kids to a private school where they will be masked all day is praiseworthy, but wanting to have greater school choice so your kids can get a better education (or any education while public schools are closed) is racist.

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Teachers Union Boss Accidentally Endorses School Choice While Rushing To Support Masking in Schools


polspphotos806129

The performative politics of mask mandates have produced some weird moments during the pandemic. Now, they’ve even managed to get a prominent teachers union boss to argue in favor of school choice.

Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, on Monday night tweeted out a story from the Detroit News about how parents are navigating the complexities of some school districts in Michigan mandating that children wear masks in the classroom while others don’t. At the center of the story is a mother, Janine Fogg, who recently pulled her kids out of public schools in Brighton, Michigan, where masks are not mandated. Now, Fogg’s two children attend private schools where masks are mandated for all students and staff.

Weingarten’s take? “This parent chooses to drive her students to a school district that has a mask mandate. Masks save lives and limit the spread of COVID-19,” she wrote.

Weingarten’s overstating the efficacy of masking in the classroom, but she’s shockingly 100 percent right about the merits of letting parents choose the school that they believe is right for their kids. She also may not have read the whole story, since Fogg isn’t driving her kids to a “school district” that mandates masks but, rather, leaving public schools behind entirely.

That’s a choice that lots of parents have been exercising during the pandemic. In the wake of COVID-related school closures, parents have been fleeing to private schools and state lawmakers have introduced dozens of bills to expand school choice options like charter schools and private school voucher programs. Polls show that clear majorities of both Democrats and Republicans support school choice.

Normally, Weingarten isn’t a fan of giving parents more control over their children’s education. She’s attacked politicians who favor expanding charter schools and unfairly compared school choice advocates to segregationists.

Her union fought tooth-and-nail to keep schools closed during the first year of the pandemic, and unions have continued to be a major obstacle to full reopening even now that effective vaccines are readily available. Among other things, she’s argued that schools should have to close for a single positive test and maintain social distancing of 6 feet, even after the overly cautious Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said 3 feet of distance is just fine.

It’s possible that the fight over mask mandates in schools has caused Weingarten to see the light and understand that parents know what is best for their kids. But that’s unlikely. Instead, it seems like the politicization of mask mandates has caused Weingarten to temporarily forget that she believes one-size-fits-all schooling is the only way to go.

It’s just another example of how the pandemic has exposed the hypocrisy of our national leaders and those who have undue influence over them. By Weingarten’s logic, exercising school choice to send your kids to a private school where they will be masked all day is praiseworthy, but wanting to have greater school choice so your kids can get a better education (or any education while public schools are closed) is racist.

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The Trillion Dollar Platinum Coin Can Be Minted “Within Hours”

So far, the Biden Administration has rejected the idea of the trillion dollar platinum coin. But the President could change his mind, quickly. Axios explains that the entire process of minting the coin would take a few hours.

A trillion-dollar platinum coin could be minted “within hours of the Treasury Secretary’s decision to do so,” Philip Diehl, former director of the United States Mint, tells Axios. . . . The U.S. Mint, which Diehl ran from 1994 to 2000, already produces a one-ounce Platinum Eagle and has no shortage of platinum blanks already in stock. Producing a trillion-dollar Eagle would require only the denomination to be changed. “This could be quickly executed on the existing plaster mold of the Platinum Eagle,” says Diehl. Then an automated process would transfer the new design to a plastic resin mold. Even if Janet Yellen,the Treasury secretary, has no intention of minting such a coin, there is no reason for her not to quietly instruct the Mint director to take those steps a day or two in advance. At that point, a coin could be struck in minutes at the West Point mint. Even if it then needed to be physically deposited at the New York Fed, that’s only a short helicopter ride away.

The thought of a chopper couriering a trillion dollar coin is something out of the movies.  I imagine some kind of Ocean’s 11-style caper to pilfer the loot.

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The Trillion Dollar Platinum Coin Can Be Minted “Within Hours”

So far, the Biden Administration has rejected the idea of the trillion dollar platinum coin. But the President could change his mind, quickly. Axios explains that the entire process of minting the coin would take a few hours.

A trillion-dollar platinum coin could be minted “within hours of the Treasury Secretary’s decision to do so,” Philip Diehl, former director of the United States Mint, tells Axios. . . . The U.S. Mint, which Diehl ran from 1994 to 2000, already produces a one-ounce Platinum Eagle and has no shortage of platinum blanks already in stock. Producing a trillion-dollar Eagle would require only the denomination to be changed. “This could be quickly executed on the existing plaster mold of the Platinum Eagle,” says Diehl. Then an automated process would transfer the new design to a plastic resin mold. Even if Janet Yellen,the Treasury secretary, has no intention of minting such a coin, there is no reason for her not to quietly instruct the Mint director to take those steps a day or two in advance. At that point, a coin could be struck in minutes at the West Point mint. Even if it then needed to be physically deposited at the New York Fed, that’s only a short helicopter ride away.

The thought of a chopper couriering a trillion dollar coin is something out of the movies.  I imagine some kind of Ocean’s 11-style caper to pilfer the loot.

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A Disinvitation at MIT

Dorian Abbot is a professor of geophysics at the University of Chicago. He was invited to deliver the annual John Carlson Lecture in the department of earth, atmospheric and planetary sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. After the lecture was announced, however, activists organized to pressure the department to cancel it, and the department has now done so.

This is not the first time that activists have sought to pressure universities to penalize Abbot for his speech. After he criticized some diversity initiatives, there were calls for his home institution to sanction him. The University of Chicago quite properly rejected those demands, stating simply that

the University does not limit the comments of faculty members, mandate apologies, or impose other disciplinary consequences for such comments, unless there has been a violation of University policy or the law. Faculty are free to agree or disagree with any policy or approach of the University, its departments, schools or divisions without being subject to discipline, reprimand or other form of punishment.

Abbot has continued to express his views about how universities should approach diversity issues, and activists have demanded that he be blackballed for his extramural speech. They are free to express their displeasure and disagreement with Abbot, but universities should refuse to surrender to their demands that he be barred from speaking at a university campus on topics relating to his scientific expertise because his political and social views are unpopular with some segments of the campus community.

The Academic Freedom Alliance has issued a statement condemning MIT’s cowardice in this instance. The letter can be found here.

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Are These Wyoming Library Books Obscene?


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Wyoming prosecutors are being asked to consider criminal charges against public library staff because the library carries information about reproduction, sex, and being gay. Local busybodies in Campbell County, Wyoming, are trying to brand children’s or young adult books about getting pregnant, sex education, and being gay as illegal obscenity.

“These books are absolutely appalling,” lead campaigner Susan Sisti, an administrative pastor with Open Door Church, told the Associated Press. (Ironically, Sisti ran for office in 2020 on a platform that she described as “pro-Constitution.”)

Sisti said that library books reported to county law enforcement include How Do You Make a Baby? by Anna Fiske (a book explaining reproduction to kids), Dating and Sex: A Guide for the 21st Century Teen Boy (a book by therapist Andrew P. Smiler that’s listed on the American Psychological Association website), the teen sex-education book Doing It by Hannah Witton, This Book Is Gay by Juno Dawson, and Sex Is a Funny Word by Cory Silverberg. The latter—an award-winning children’s comic book on the American Library Association’s 2016 Reading List—discusses concepts such as sex, gender identity, “privacy, safety, and respect,” “protecting yourself against unwanted sexual touch and abuse,” and “boundaries regarding nudity.”

Library Director Terri Lesley told the Casper Star-Tribune that the controversy “is bigger than our library. This is a political movement, and we just happen to be caught in it here.”

That some people think anything about sex should be hidden is hardly surprising. The more disturbing element here is the aid that these illiberal forces are getting from local law enforcement in Campbell County. “After a complaint filed with the sheriff’s office, prosecutors are reviewing the case,” the A.P. reported on October 1:

They will seek appointment of a special prosecutor to weigh in as well before deciding whether to pursue charges, County Attorney Mitchell Damsky announced Friday. …

Sisti has been working with Hugh and Susan Bennett, who went to the Campbell County Sheriff’s Office on Wednesday with concerns that the five books may have violated state child-sex laws. Sheriff’s officials reviewed the complaint and referred the case, which was first reported by the Gillette News Record, to prosecutors. …

[Hugh Bennett] called the books “hard-core pornography to children.”

While it’s absurd that this matter is even being referred for potential prosecution, Damsky at least admits that there’s some constitutional tension here:

“Personally, as a parent, I find the material to be just inappropriate for children and disgusting. But as a lawyer I’m sworn to uphold the Constitution and that’s why we are dealing with it with a fine-toothed comb,” Damsky said.

Before going to the sheriff, the book-banning brigade appealed to Campbell County commissioners. But “demands to remove LGBTQ-related books from the children’s and young adult sections at the local library were not met,” reported County 17 in August.

“A commissioner’s job is not to monitor or censure books in the library,” Commissioner DG Reardon said at an August 12 meeting. Rather, commissioners choose the library board and what books are stocked is up to them.

Not all commissioners took Reardon’s view, however. “We shouldn’t fund you at all,” Commissioner Del Shelstad told the library board during a September 27 meeting. Shelstad later walked this back slightly, saying “I didn’t mean 100% of their funding.”

The hoopla has spawned a rash of recent complaints about library books. “Library director Terri Lesley on Friday said a month ago there were three formal complaints on reading material,” County 17 reported. By September 3, it was up to 22 books.

“I’ve been the director here for eight years,” she noted. “Receiving 22 challenge forms in a two-week time span is unheard of. I’ve researched this and haven’t been able to find an instance of this happening at a public library.”

As of October 4, library staff was still working through responses to contested books, according to the Casper Star-Tribune:

There have been 35 requests for reconsideration submitted, Lesley said. Sixteen letters have been sent out to the people who filled out the forms, and more will be sent next week.

Some of the challenges don’t ask that the books be removed, but that they be moved to a different section of the library.

All 16 of those letters said the books will remain in the library in their respective areas.

FREE MINDS

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• Want to “reduce recidivism and the labor shortage in one fell swoop”? End occupational licensing requirements that “disqualify individuals with a criminal conviction from eligibility altogether” and requirements that applicants prove “good character,” writes Christopher Bates, a legal fellow at the Orrin G. Hatch Foundation, at The Hill.

• Seattle will decriminalize psychedelic drugs.

• “Over the next 10 to 20 years, as bitcoin’s liquidity increases and the United States becomes less creditworthy, financial institutions and foreign governments alike may replace an increasing portion of their Treasury-bond holdings with bitcoin and other forms of sound money,” suggests Avik Roy, president of the Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity. “With asset values reaching bubble proportions and no end to federal spending in sight, it’s critical for the United States to begin planning for this possibility now.”

• Check out Reason TV’s new video on the Backpage trial:

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A Disinvitation at MIT

Dorian Abbot is a professor of geophysics at the University of Chicago. He was invited to deliver the annual John Carlson Lecture in the department of earth, atmospheric and planetary sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. After the lecture was announced, however, activists organized to pressure the department to cancel it, and the department has now done so.

This is not the first time that activists have sought to pressure universities to penalize Abbot for his speech. After he criticized some diversity initiatives, there were calls for his home institution to sanction him. The University of Chicago quite properly rejected those demands, stating simply that

the University does not limit the comments of faculty members, mandate apologies, or impose other disciplinary consequences for such comments, unless there has been a violation of University policy or the law. Faculty are free to agree or disagree with any policy or approach of the University, its departments, schools or divisions without being subject to discipline, reprimand or other form of punishment.

Abbot has continued to express his views about how universities should approach diversity issues, and activists have demanded that he be blackballed for his extramural speech. They are free to express their displeasure and disagreement with Abbot, but universities should refuse to surrender to their demands that he be barred from speaking at a university campus on topics relating to his scientific expertise because his political and social views are unpopular with some segments of the campus community.

The Academic Freedom Alliance has issued a statement condemning MIT’s cowardice in this instance. The letter can be found here.

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via IFTTT

Are These Wyoming Library Books Obscene?


Untitled

Wyoming prosecutors are being asked to consider criminal charges against public library staff because the library carries information about reproduction, sex, and being gay. Local busybodies in Campbell County, Wyoming, are trying to brand children’s or young adult books about getting pregnant, sex education, and being gay as illegal obscenity.

“These books are absolutely appalling,” lead campaigner Susan Sisti, an administrative pastor with Open Door Church, told the Associated Press. (Ironically, Sisti ran for office in 2020 on a platform that she described as “pro-Constitution.”)

Sisti said that library books reported to county law enforcement include How Do You Make a Baby? by Anna Fiske (a book explaining reproduction to kids), Dating and Sex: A Guide for the 21st Century Teen Boy (a book by therapist Andrew P. Smiler that’s listed on the American Psychological Association website), the teen sex-education book Doing It by Hannah Witton, This Book Is Gay by Juno Dawson, and Sex Is a Funny Word by Cory Silverberg. The latter—an award-winning children’s comic book on the American Library Association’s 2016 Reading List—discusses concepts such as sex, gender identity, “privacy, safety, and respect,” “protecting yourself against unwanted sexual touch and abuse,” and “boundaries regarding nudity.”

Library Director Terri Lesley told the Casper Star-Tribune that the controversy “is bigger than our library. This is a political movement, and we just happen to be caught in it here.”

That some people think anything about sex should be hidden is hardly surprising. The more disturbing element here is the aid that these illiberal forces are getting from local law enforcement in Campbell County. “After a complaint filed with the sheriff’s office, prosecutors are reviewing the case,” the A.P. reported on October 1:

They will seek appointment of a special prosecutor to weigh in as well before deciding whether to pursue charges, County Attorney Mitchell Damsky announced Friday. …

Sisti has been working with Hugh and Susan Bennett, who went to the Campbell County Sheriff’s Office on Wednesday with concerns that the five books may have violated state child-sex laws. Sheriff’s officials reviewed the complaint and referred the case, which was first reported by the Gillette News Record, to prosecutors. …

[Hugh Bennett] called the books “hard-core pornography to children.”

While it’s absurd that this matter is even being referred for potential prosecution, Damsky at least admits that there’s some constitutional tension here:

“Personally, as a parent, I find the material to be just inappropriate for children and disgusting. But as a lawyer I’m sworn to uphold the Constitution and that’s why we are dealing with it with a fine-toothed comb,” Damsky said.

Before going to the sheriff, the book-banning brigade appealed to Campbell County commissioners. But “demands to remove LGBTQ-related books from the children’s and young adult sections at the local library were not met,” reported County 17 in August.

“A commissioner’s job is not to monitor or censure books in the library,” Commissioner DG Reardon said at an August 12 meeting. Rather, commissioners choose the library board and what books are stocked is up to them.

Not all commissioners took Reardon’s view, however. “We shouldn’t fund you at all,” Commissioner Del Shelstad told the library board during a September 27 meeting. Shelstad later walked this back slightly, saying “I didn’t mean 100% of their funding.”

The hoopla has spawned a rash of recent complaints about library books. “Library director Terri Lesley on Friday said a month ago there were three formal complaints on reading material,” County 17 reported. By September 3, it was up to 22 books.

“I’ve been the director here for eight years,” she noted. “Receiving 22 challenge forms in a two-week time span is unheard of. I’ve researched this and haven’t been able to find an instance of this happening at a public library.”

As of October 4, library staff was still working through responses to contested books, according to the Casper Star-Tribune:

There have been 35 requests for reconsideration submitted, Lesley said. Sixteen letters have been sent out to the people who filled out the forms, and more will be sent next week.

Some of the challenges don’t ask that the books be removed, but that they be moved to a different section of the library.

All 16 of those letters said the books will remain in the library in their respective areas.

FREE MINDS

Poll: Americans oppose fetal heartbeat laws like the one in Texas. A new poll from NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist finds that “almost 6 in 10 Americans oppose a ban on abortions after cardiac activity is detected, at about six to eight weeks into a typical pregnancy.” This includes a majority of self-identified Republicans. Some 59 percent of Republicans polled said they oppose these laws. The same was said by 61 percent of Democrats and 53 percent of independents polled.

FREE MARKETS

QUICK HITS

• Congress is holding yet another hearing on Facebook this morning, this time concerning reports that Instagram is bad for teen girls.

• A Trump administration rule banning groups that get federal family planning money from referring patients to abortion services has been revoked.

• Want to “reduce recidivism and the labor shortage in one fell swoop”? End occupational licensing requirements that “disqualify individuals with a criminal conviction from eligibility altogether” and requirements that applicants prove “good character,” writes Christopher Bates, a legal fellow at the Orrin G. Hatch Foundation, at The Hill.

• Seattle will decriminalize psychedelic drugs.

• “Over the next 10 to 20 years, as bitcoin’s liquidity increases and the United States becomes less creditworthy, financial institutions and foreign governments alike may replace an increasing portion of their Treasury-bond holdings with bitcoin and other forms of sound money,” suggests Avik Roy, president of the Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity. “With asset values reaching bubble proportions and no end to federal spending in sight, it’s critical for the United States to begin planning for this possibility now.”

• Check out Reason TV’s new video on the Backpage trial:

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via IFTTT