“The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich, as well as the poor, to sleep under the bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread." Anatole France Even for true believers of the First Amendment, the decision in the latest campaign finance case, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, raises difficult issues. (For a press report on [...]
It is, literally, an old story. In the legend of the boy and the snake, a venomous snake asks a boy for help, and promises not to bite him. When the snake bites the boy despite his help, and the boy asks why, the snake says, “because I am a snake.” The boy in the story learns an important lesson: [...]
When, a few years ago, Google agreed to China’s restrictions on the circulation of information and started google.cn, it claimed that “increased access to information for people in China and a more open Internet outweighed [Google’s] discomfort in agreeing to censor some results.” Now, suddenly, Google is threatening to reverse its policy and close google.cn. This change of mind came [...]
Avatar has incited controversy over Sigourney Weaver's character's smoking in the film, even though the character is decidedly not, as director James Cameron describes, "an aspirational role model" for teenagers. Anti-smoking advocates fear that children will mimic the vices they see onscreen -- another theory in a long line of efforts to attribute social ills to media or other cultural [...]
While the display of Janet Jackson’s naked breast and nipple during a 2005 CBS broadcast of the Superbowl may have been fleeting, the legal ramifications stemming from the incident are anything but. Last time we covered this case (here and here) the Supreme Court had vacated the Third Circuit Court of Appeals’ 2007 decision in the matter of FCC v. [...]
Earlier this week the Supreme Court denied petition to review a high school student’s challenge to his school’s dress code. In denying review, the Supreme Court has chosen to leave the lower court’s holding intact — a holding that serves as a dangerous curtailment of students’ rights of freedom of expression. Paul “Pete” Palmer was found to be in violation [...]
T-shirts printed by the Freshman Class Council for football games against Harvard have traditionally featured taunts and put downs of the rival institution, and vice-versa, but this year the featured text - “I think of all Harvard men as sissies,” - proved too provocative for the increasingly sensitive Yale palate. After the LGBT co-op criticized the text (as it happens, [...]
Schools that dish out draconian punishments to students who are mean to each other online (aka cyberbullying) risk running afoul of the First Amendment. Beverly Vista School, a K-8 school in the Beverly Hills Unified School District, learned this lesson via a November 2009 court ruling, where the federal district court for the Central District of California found that administrators [...]
The First Amendment provides American-based websites with the freedom to report on newsworthy events, including those that happen in other countries to citizens of other countries. Yet, the global nature of the Internet opens it up to legal challenges from countries with more restrictive speech regimes. Last fall, for instance, lawyers for the convicted murderers of German actor Walter Sedlmayr [...]
This year marks the 40th anniversary of the famous Supreme Court case Tinker v. Des Moines when the court ruled in favor of students who had been suspended for protesting the Vietnam War. The Tinker case stated that students "do not shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate." But 40 years later, students [...]
Happy New Year, everyone! It seems 2009 was a tough year for sexting, Amazon, and West Bend, WI – but great for Blogging Censorship and infographics! To reminisce a little on NCAC's first full year of blogging, here is a list of our top 5 most popular posts of 2009: Teens Sending Nude Photos of Themselves Sexting Roundup: The Anxiety [...]
We couldn’t make this up. Not so long ago, Yale University Press, on direction from the university, pre-emptively self-censored images of Mohammed from The Cartoons that Shook the World by Jytte Klausen, a scholarly examination of the controversy that erupted over the publication of cartoon images of Mohammed by the Danish newspaper, Jyllands-Posten. Yale’s action was met by a torrent [...]
This week, in a decision that is likely to limit what theaters decide to produce, Colorado's Supreme Court upheld the state's ban on theatrical smoking. The 2006 Colorado Clean Indoor Air Act prohibits smoking inside public buildings. This is something we welcome! However, contrary to the situation in other states where smoking on stage is exempt, Colorado performers are banned [...]
According to a recent report by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), a number of Senators have failed to abide by Section 512 of the 2007 Honest Leadership and Open Government Act (HLOGA) which prohibits the use of “secret holds” on legislation and nominations but provides no mechanism for enforcement of the law. Under the system of holds, [...]
The National Coalition Against Censorship and the American Association of University Professors, joined by leading groups in the academic, civil liberties, journalism, and free speech fields, issued a Statement of Principle and Call to Action urging governments, institutions and private individuals to support freedom of expression and academic freedom, and to resist caving in to threats of violence, real and [...]
An upcoming exhibition at The John Slade Ely House for Contemporary Art in New Haven, organized by the Orchard Street Shul Cultural Heritage Artists Project, is overshadowed by the organizers’ decision to censor one of the artworks in the show. After numerous requests that Richard Kamler, one of the participating artists, modify parts of his installation, and a month before [...]
On October 19 we celebrated our 35th Anniversary with a Night of Comedy with Judy Blume & Friends at City Winery. And by friends, we mean the following fearless writers, artists, actors, comedians, musicians and filmmakers who have fought back against censorship: Elna Baker, Richard Belzer, Alice Eve Cohen, Junot Díaz, Rachel Dratch, Hannah Friedman, Liz Garbus, Martin Garbus, Judy [...]
Two library employees were fired at the Jessamine County Public Library for violating library policy. Deciding that the graphic novel The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Volume IV: The Black Dossier was inappropriate for young patrons, they conspired to keeping the book on permanent “checked-out” status and removed a “hold” one young patron placed on the book so that she would [...]
A billboard with the words "Don't Believe In God? You are not alone" was removed from a site in downtown Cincinnati because of threats received by the owner of the site. Even though both the freedom of religion (including the freedom to not believe in god) and freedom of expression are among the founding principles of the U.S., there are [...]
Great week for high school theatre! RENT and the Laramie project are two of the most challenged plays in high schools around the country, but both shows will go on thanks to the Green Valley High School administration and Clark County's District Court in Henderson, NV despite parents who objected to the plays' "mature content". In an attempt to stop [...]
After being dis-invited upon pressure from Governor Deval Patrick and then re-invited by a faculty group, Ray Luc Levasseur is now stopped from speaking at The University of Massachusetts - Amherst because his parole board refused to let him leave Maine. The parole board has not given any reasons for this decision, but two facts make us suspect it was [...]
The attempted cancellation of Ray Luc Levasseur’s talk at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, under pressure from Governor Patrick’s office, raises serious concerns not only about the state of academic freedom at the University but also about the Governor’s respect for the First Amendment. UMass, in an effort to educate students about the social unrest that occurred during the [...]
This year we received triple the amount of submissions than usual, and were very impressed! We usually choose 10 semi-finalists, but this time we simply had to make room for 13. We congratulate the semi-finalists and all our applicants for their hard work and excellent ideas! Jordan Allen Nathaniel Dueber Aaron Dunbar Taylor Dunlap and Caroline Dunaway Jovan Landry Lauren [...]
[Dr. Marty Klein – a licensed Marriage & Family Therapist, Certified Sex Therapist, and sociologist with a special interest in public policy and sexuality – is our guest blogger today! We post from his great blog, Sexual Intelligence, from October 25.] This week is WRAP Week: White Ribbons Against Pornography. Sponsored by groups including Concerned Women for America (CWA) and [...]
On Monday, October 19th, the Yes Men, a group of artist/political activists, set up a mock website that looked like the Chamber of Commerce’s, and held a mock press conference where they announced that the Chamber was shifting its opposition to serious efforts to address global warming. Major news sources were fooled into reporting the story. In response, the Chamber [...]
Today is the deadline for our contest Free Speech in Schools: Does it Exist? Students 19 and younger are encouraged to film their response in 4min or less for the chance to win up to $1000 and a scholarship to the New York Film Academy. See more details at Youth Free Expression Network or even apply online now! According to [...]
Today, Monday, October 19th the National Coalition Against Censorship is celebrating its 35th Anniversary! Since 1974, NCAC has fought hundreds of attempts to regulate speech including criticizing the results of Meese Report in 1986, opposing the censorship of films like Martin Scorsese’s The Last Temptation of Christ and The Tin Drum, and taking a firm stand in ongoing controversies over public [...]
The Amazing Grace Baptist Church in Asheville, North Carolina will be spending this Halloween burning books and music its deemed Satan's work - including all non-King James versions of the Bible. Attendees will enjoy barbeque chicken and all the sides while they burn works written by the Pope and Mother Teresa among others. Pastor Marc Grizzard says there is a [...]
Which of these images would also be illegal if a 1999 law, heard on October 6, 2009 by the US Supreme Court, were to be upheld? Remember – we are talking about images, not the acts themselves. video from circus companies showing workers hooking elephants and striking tigers; footage from factory farms where farmers are beating sick turkeys to death [...]
It's our 35th Anniversary! The typical gift for 35 years of marriage is jade or coral - well, we won't hand out earrings or take you deep sea diving, but we DO have an exciting evening planned to benefit NCAC and honor renowned and much-censored author Judy Blume! Join us on Monday, October 19, 2009 for A Night of Comedy [...]
On September 29th, Wyoming City Schools' School Board voted to back Superintendent, Gail Kist-Kline's plan to re-evaluate every non-textbook teachers recommend to students. Staff members will now be asked to rate books based on a new 4-point criteria, which inclues the extent to which a book "could create controversy among students, parents and community groups. However, removing books from reading [...]
Later this month the Kids' Right to Read Project will interview John Coy, author of YA novels Box Out and Crackback, and would like your help designing the interview. Crackback was challenged in September at a school in Helena, Alabama. Coy worked with KRRP and the local Library Media Specialist in support of the right to read and so we [...]
"Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing." - To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee Thanks to everyone who participated on twitter, facebook, and this blog with listing your favorite banned books! You wrote about books you read in high school and those that changed your perspectives. You testified about [...]
Some good and bad news for you today, folks, on the fifth day of Banned Books Week… First the good news: In Pennsylvania, Downingtown West High School followed model procedure in addressing a challenge against Laurie Halse Anderson’s Twisted. We are please to report school officials and parents resolved the issue amicably through discussion. For more information click here. Also [...]
Its Banned Books Week and yet efforts to censor books in the U.S.A continue. In fact, just this past week, Ellen Hopkins, author of the Banned Books Week Manifesto was censored in Norman, Oklahoma. According to Ms. Hopkins, "I was supposed to do a school visit at Whittier Middle School. A parent went in complaining about content in CRANK and [...]
On Monday, we reported on the Kids' Right to Read Project's response to a challenge in North Pocono High School against Laurie Halse Anderson's book Speak. We have since learned North Pocono is not the only place in PA where Ms. Anderson's writing may be censored. Her novel, Twisted, which tackles serious teenage concerns about sex, alcohol, grades and family [...]
On Monday, FCC Chair Julius Genachowski announced the commission’s support of net neutrality, a principle which holds that Internet Service Providers (e.g. Comcast, Verizon, Time-Warner, AT&T) should not be permitted to discriminate against specific online content or applications and privilege other content with higher quality service. In introducing the National Broadband Plan, Genachowski, described some of the threats to an open internet posed [...]
The Kids' Right to Read Project is urging the general public to speak out against book censorship at two high schools, one in Pennsylvania and the other in California where Laurie Halse Anderson’s Speak and Jeannette Wall’s The Glass Castle are being challenged. KRRP is calling on supporters of free speech to advocate for students’ right to read everywhere, especially [...]
Under an onslaught of vocal protests that President Obama’s “stay in school and study hard” speech was a means to “indoctrinate” children into “socialist” values and the President’s political “agenda” schools and whole school districts decided not to show the speech. For a partial list of schools and school districts that have canceled the speech click here. Nobody equipped with [...]
Ellen Hopkins, author of numerous Young Adult titles as well as most recently, the Banned Books Week Manifesto is being censored in Norman, Oklahoma. Hopkins was scheduled to speak at Whittier Middle School on September 22nd about her experiences as an author writing about real life issues facing youth today. However, her talk was reportedly cancelled by the district's superintendent [...]