Censorship News Articles

Peter Arnett was fired from NBC because of statements he made in an interview on Iraqi television commenting on the strength of Iraqi resistance.

Members of Congress put the brakes on the Total Information Awareness Program proposed by the Defense Department, in response to widespread protest and concern for individual rights.

  Issue 88, Winter 2002/2003 by Joan E. Bertin New Yorkers learned a lot about the First Amendment from former Mayor Giuliani. He was sued for infringing free speech more than any mayor in memory, and maybe in history. Ironically this became a living civics lesson. Even those who disagreed vehemently with the message supported the KKK's right to demonstrate peaceably [...]

Last year, the Supreme Court ruled that non-obscene speech is protected online, as it is in print (ACLU v. Reno). To circumvent the ruling, in October Congress enacted the "Child Online Protection Act."

NCAC mourns the loss of two long-time Board members, Samuel Rabinove and Nanette Roberts.

Teaching Sex, by Jeffrey Moran, recently published, provides a timely historical overview on the politics of sexuality education.

Michigan's "cussing canoeist" was recently vindicated when the state appeals court struck down a 105-year-old law banning vulgar language in front of women and children. Timothy Boomer was convicted in 1998, after cursing when he fell out of his canoe.

Other News from the Courts -- Not So Go

The Supreme Court has declined to hear teacher Cissy Lacks' appeal.

The Child Pornography Prevention Act of 1996 which bans sexual depictions of anyone who "appears to be" younger than 18, was upheld by the First Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston--overturning a lower court's ruling that the law is unconstitutionally vague and could prohibit legal adult pornography.

The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a Virginia law that restricts state employees from accessing sexually related materials online.

Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson was drowned out by protestors at the recent international AIDS conference in Barcelona. This is ironic, given the Administration's track record of suppressing speech about sexuality and sexual health.

Schools and libraries receiving federal discounts for Internet service will be required to install censoring software on their computers if the Children's Internet Protection Act, S. 97, is passed.

Last week, the Middle East Forum launched "Campus Watch" to condemn what it calls academic bias on the Middle East; a professor identified on the site was barraged with threatening e-mails.

College campuses erupted recently over a controversial ad that appeared in some student newspapers. The ad, written and paid for by conservative activist David Horowitz, opposes reparations for descendants of slaves.

A decision from a federal appeals court in September sharply limits the First Amendment rights of university journalists in the Sixth Circuit. The decision has stunned advocates for student media and free expression.

Aristophanes' plays were banned in the 5th century B.C. because of obscenity and anti-war themes; Confucius's writings were incinerated around 250 B.C. after a change of dynasty made them politically incorrect.

12 librarians at the Minneapolis Public Library filed a sexual harassment complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission protesting unfiltered computers where patrons can access pornography.

Judy Blume Draws Crowds, Crowds, and Then Some!Popular author Judy Blume drew record crowds to NCAC’s booth at New York Is Book Country, an outdoor fair held each September in New York City to commemorate Banned Books Week.

The State of the First Amendment annual survey, conducted by the First Amendment Center, shows further erosion in support of First Amendment rights.

NCAC Censorship News Issue #65: Spring 1997 As a tribute to her passionate commitment to the First Amendment and to her remarkable leadership, NCAC has established The Leanne Katz Fund for Free Expression (The LK Fund). With Judy Blume as its sponsor, the LK Fund will provide special support to carry forward NCAC's work into the millennium and build the [...]

NCAC celebrated 25 years of activism for free speech, artistic freedom, and the First Amendment with a gala party at the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts in New York City on November 29th.

NCAC welcomes five prominent advocates for free expression to its Board of Directors.

NCAC Censorship News Issue #65: OF MICE AND MEN "Inappropriate" in Illinois Spring 1997 Another attempt to keep students from reading books selected by their teacher has happened in Peru, Illinois where eighth-grade teacher, Dan Brooks, has been told to stop teaching Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men. After 13 years of using the book, Brooks was told it was "inappropriate" [...]

For those who care about free expression, it's been a pretty good century. I was recently reminded of this by NCAC Board member, Chris Finan, president of American Booksellers for Free Expression.

NCAC has lost two dear friends who cared deeply for the First Amendment.

NCAC Censorship News Issue #65: Oklahoma University Bans Sex on the 'Net Spring 1997 The fight to protect free speech on the Internet was set back in January when a federal district court judge ruled that Oklahoma University's newsgroup is not a public forum. The case was brought by journalism professor Bill Loving when the University blocked access to almost [...]

Great news from Congress: In a tremendous victory for free speech, the proposed constitutional amendment to ban flag desecration was defeated, ending the perennial cliffhanger when Senators Robert Byrd, West Virgina, and Richard Bryan, Nevada, switched and voted against it.

NCAC Censorship News Issue #65: We Will Miss Tom Stoddard, Humanist Spring 1997 Thomas B. Stoddard, a member of NCAC's Advisory Council and former head of Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund, died in February. A trailblazer for human rights for lesbians and gays and for people with AIDS, his commitment and leadership was unsurpassed. Tom leaves a hole in [...]

Best-selling author Judy Blume has joined the Board of Directors. Other members recently elected to the Board are Victor A. Bolden, former Assistant Counsel to the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc.; Chris Finan, President of the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression; attorney Jerry Goldfeder; author and attorney Marjorie Heins; and ZD Net senior editor Josh Taylor.

The defense of free speech involves increasingly complex and subtle debates which conflate ideas and action, pit free speech against other societal goals, and seek easy answers to intractable problems

For applying chaotic thinking to terrorist chaos, Jerry Falwell takes the cake.

In Montgomery County, Texas, the award-winning children's sex-education book, It's Perfectly Normal, and It's So Amazing by Robie Harris, are still off the library shelves.

NCAC Censorship News Issue #66: Summer 1997 In an effort to thwart two Supreme Court rulings that flag burning is symbolic speech protected by the First Amendment, the House of Representatives passed a bill to amend the Constitution, giving Congress "the power to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States." The 3-to-1 vote mirrored the 1995 [...]

The Museum of Modern Art in New York will show Tell It Like It Is!, NCAC's new video on censorship of children's books, produced by Lora Hays and Chris Pelzer.

NCAC Censorship News Issue #66: NCAC Announces a New Executive Director and President of the Board Summer 1997 The Board of Directors of the National Coalition Against Censorship has selected Joan E. Bertin as its new Executive Director. She succeeds Leanne Katz, who died in March. The Board also elected Wendy Kaminer as its President. Joan E. Bertin, a lawyer, [...]

In honor of her 90th birthday, friends and colleagues of Lora Hays have contributed to a student internship at NCAC to help with our work to protect freedom of expression and to teach students all about First Amendment principles.

NCAC Censorship News Issue #81:
by Marjorie Heins

In January, the Supreme Court declined to review a sweeping decision from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit that essentially denied state-employed professors any First Amendment right to academic freedom. The case of Urofsky v. Gilmore was a challenge to a Virginia law that barred state employees (with the exception of state police) from using state-owned or state-leased computers to access any "sexually explicit" Internet content without prior written approval from their "agency head."

Freedoms that Americans treasure could be gravely endangered by an Orwellian program Vice Admiral John Poindexter has devised for the Defense Department in the fight against terrorism.

NCAC Censorship News Issue #60: Art Censorship : Female Nudity, Not in Our Community December 1995 After the Raleigh (North Carolina) City Council decided to "preview" some art works that had been booked for exhibit in a city-owned building, the gallery yielded to pressure and booted the artist and her erotic works from the show. The gallery committee had wrestled [...]

NCAC Censorship News Issue #68: Winter 1997 The most significant First Amendment decision in recent history was the Supreme Court ruling in Reno v. ACLU---which held that communications over the Internet deserve the highest level of constitutional protection. In overturning the Communications Decency Act, the Court ruled that attempts to regulate the Internet to prevent children's access to "indecent" or [...]

School vouchers. Many free speech advocates follow school voucher controversies, not just because of their church-state implications, but because of concern that government-funded education in religious settings may inhibit both secular and religious speech.

The outpouring of emotion since September 11th is taking a toll on free expression, in what many describe as the "new McCarthyism."