So in todays news paper there was an article about a CSU student adding a four word column to the school's newspaper. All the column said was, "Taser this:fuck bush". If you missed the news earlier this week a student was tasered at a john kerry speach in florida for involking his right to free speech. Now the school newspaper is asking the columnist to resign his position over the uproar the four word column caused. This is simply disgusting. Where the fuck has free speach gone? I don't understand how words became so threatening that we are no longer free to say what we want. The student proved his point. Free speech no longer exists in the united states. Colleges and universities that use to be the place to express yourself and experience freedom are now on the same lockdown as every other organization. All the student was trying to say is that we can (should) say whatever we feel like. This is becomming a real disgrace. If I want to stand in front of the white house and scream fuck bush I should be able to and certainly I should be able to say it in a newspaper. What is happening? And why are more people not angry about it? We can do something. This is a democracy! We live in the United States for Christ's sake where others flee to be free from government opression in their countries. What are we going to do about it?! We need to do something!
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They have rules and regulations. That has nothing to do with the government and individual schools and businesses are allowed to make rules that contributors and employees have to follow. That does not infringe on free speech, unless the government demanded the consequences.
Actions have consequences. They aren't calling for the guy to be arrested or shot.
As the newspaper is funded by the college, and the college's reputation is affected by the school newspaper... they do have the right to ask him to leave. They have a right to adminsitratively tell him that he's done or the paper's done.
You do indeed have the right to speak, but other's also have the right to dislike what you say and not fund it.
Just because you think you have a right to rip on a sitting President doesn't mean that anyone is required to fund your speech.
Also, your right to free speech isn't as wide as you think it is, nor was it intended to be by the founding fathers. Try threatening a judge with words.
I find it interesting that the anti-Bush crowd cheers things like this, and yells at people who would ask him to quit.... but then rails on Imus for his Rutgers speech where he called the girls what he did. Why is this writer's speech protected, but Imus' speech to be silenced?
When you have the RIGHT to something, you also need to take the RESPONSIBILITY for it as well. Words mean things and actions have consequences.
Perfectly put.
I just find it odd that people post about the loss of freedom of speech..... on a free blog on the internet that people the world over can read.
but we don't have free speech becuse a college is asking some student to quit the paper over priting that as an 'article' ?
Do people not realize how free we are?
It is like people who rant about how we've become a police state because they got a ticket or saw someone resisting arrest get tased. If this were a police state, you'd need to show ID to leave the town or city you live in, going through multiple checkpoints. And the police wouldn't use tasers, you'd have rifles and pistols pointed at you at every checkpoint.
We are living in a society that is SO free that the only thing left to rail against is responsibility for one's actions.
Its interesting that you think this is taking responsibility for an action. Asking him to write an apology is one thing but making him quit his job? Come on. It is a loss of freedom. We can no longer say what we feel or we may lose our job. Yes blogging is a method of free speech but its limited; there are not millions of people reading my blog or yours every day. This isn't about what he said this is about his right to say it. Freedom of the press. Who cares if they lose funding. For every 1 bush lover that pulls there funding there will be 10 bush haters standing up and clapping. I hate to break it to you, but bush is at a 33% approval rating. You're delusional if you think we can express our right to free speech. You right you do need to take responsibility for your actions and these days even your words and that my friends is not freedom.
In a college. Plus there are contracts in a job and if he breached the contract, he should quit.
If you want to talk approval ratings, the democrat congress is below 15 or 20%. heh.
As to the topic on hand... you've never had the right to say whatever you want at any time without consequences. Ever.
We get away with more now than we used to, even 50 years ago. If anything, we've become MORE free when it comes to what is protected by the "Freedom of Speech" clause.
As the college owns the newspaper, they have EVERY right to ask the kid to leave the paper. They OWN it. It is theirs and they are allowed to say or do as THEY wish.... you don't have the right to control something that belongs to someone else.
And you're sitting here on a blog talking about a loss of freedom of speech, because you don't get the readership of some newspaper article writer? I can guarentee that the school newspaper in question doesn't have much more of a reader base than this blog, progressiveu. (in fact, this blog may have MORE of a reader base than a college newspaper.)
He's a STUDENT writing for a newspaper... there's not even a job involved. I was with the college newspaper when I was in college. You volunteer. MAYBE if you are the head editor, you may get some sort of special grant from the college, due to all the work you do. But the article writers? nada.
Again, his rights have not been infringed. You don't have the right to say anything you want, at any time, on something owned by someone else. THEY have the right to, but you don't.
Do you think that you have a right to say whatever you want and people are required to read it or hear it?
Open your own newspaper and say whatever you wish. You have the right to do that. Just because people won't read it doesn't mean you're being silenced and your rights are being taken away.
Actions have Consequences and with each Right comes a Responsibility.
Actually they do receive student wages for being on the newspaper. I'm sorry that you didn't. Maybe it has something to do with their paper receiving more money, but at CSU the students who are on the paper do receive a wage. The college itself, the people who own the paper are not asking the student to resign from the paper. Maybe I didn't make that clear enough in my initial blog, it is actually the school's college republicans group that wants the student to resign. I'm sure there were things you wrote about in your paper that were controversial but no one ever asked you to give up your job. The Republicans at the school are making a scene because of what was said. I can't help but feel that you're so heated over this because you're a bush lover. That's not what this is about. This is about a student in Florida being tasered at a Kerry speech and this student being upset about it and trying to make a point. He's saying that you shouldn't be tasered for sharing your opinions and now his job is at stake for simply sharing his opinions. Please explain to me how either or those examples prove that freedom of speech still exists in this country, because to me you still have yet to prove your point.
Ahh... it is a group within the college that wants this kid to resign.
Don't they have the freedom of speech?
I'm not a 'bush lover" though I respect President Bush. He is far too liberal for me on many things, including border security and the soft-handedness that he is using in the War on Terror.
Also, the kid at the john kerry event wasn't tased for what he said. He was tased for resisting arrest and fighting against the cops who were removing him per the event organizers' request. (Yet people are only mad at the cops and are giving the event organizers a free pass. Should be the other way around. The cops were doing their job... if anyone restricted the kid's free speech, it was the event organizers. Though, they have a right to do that as it was their event.)
I will admit, it did strike me as odd that the college was asking the kid to leave, given the rampant liberalism in today's colleges. It makes more sense that the College Republicans are asking for him to resign.
However, if he has the 'freedom of speech' right to write that article, they have the same freedom of speech to ask for him to resign... yes?
I'm an intern for my school paper. i get treated like SHIT and don't get paid.
for FUCK'S SAKE it's a UNIVERSITY NEWSPAPER!!!
it's a paper by the students!!! if they want to print FUCK BUSH then FUCKING DO IT!
do you know how much they DO pay interns when they DO get paid???
4-6 bucks an hour......
I WISH my newspaper would let me print ANYTHING that's not boring bullshit. If I had a chance I would do that too; it would give me a hell of a lot more to put on a resume if my paper title got in the national news.
i hope these guys(and gals) get famous and put FUCK BUSH AND FUCK YOU TOO! all over your darling television screens!!!
when did it become a problem for students to make up their own newspaper articles that AREN'T censored??? I can't write HAPPY HALLOWEEN because it has PAGAN roots!! AND I'M A FUCKING PAGAN!
No one censored it. It was in the paper.
censorship really isn't even the issue here.
Even if the college had said "you can't print that" . . . it is their newspaper, so it is their rules. You don't have a right to control something that belongs to someone else.
You are perfectly free to start your own newspaper and print what you want in it. We live in a free country.
I know things in the u.s are gettingreally bad. Our constitution is being disregarded with this president in office. Our rights are being violated, the most common free speech and now, the suspension of habeaus corpus. (the police dont HAVE to tell a person the reason for their arrest.)
which rights of yours have been removed since President Bush took office?
Please write them down in detail. (Keep in mind that you're on a blog in which you're able to say anything you want... so that kind of keeps one from claiming a lack of free speech right.)
Please detail each right that you've lost since President Bush took office. Also, go into detail.... don't just rifle off a few vague generalities... give specifics as to what rights you had in 2000, but lost started in 2001.
What are the rules for writing in college newspapers? I'd like to know so same thing won't happen to me. It's kind of sad but understanding as well. I don't think using a curse word on a well written newspapers is right though. I'm not sure how much freedom of speech we have, but we certainly get into trouble when someone says hate speech. Then if you support freedom of speech so much, you'd support hate speech to right?
I can't speak for everyone, but those I've found that rant about 'freedom of speech' tend to only extend that to their speech, and will quickly rip on you for disagreeing with them and try to shout you down, limiting your speech.
Truth is, the Constitutional Right to freedom of speech has been radically expanded since it was originally written.
How it used to be, if you spoke against the King, you could be put in prison for it (or killed). They didn't want this country to be based on the same tyranny, so they allowed the ability for free speech, understanding that a critique of the government should not be grounds for imprisonment or death if the Government truly is "For, of and by" the people.
Today, this has been stretched to mean almost anything anyone ever says shouldn't have any consequences and even actions are speech, so people can burn flags and stuff.
Never intended to be the meaning of the RIght.
Hello lancekates, I just randomly picked this blog and started ready, when I saw a particular thing you wrote it sparked something that I find very ironic. You wrote:
"How it used to be, if you spoke against the King, you could be put in prison for it (or killed). They didn't want this country to be based on the same tyranny, so they allowed the ability for free speech, understanding that a critique of the government should not be grounds for imprisonment or death if the Government truly is "For, of and by" the people."
My response-- do you know why kings and rulers stopped being allowed to throw anyone they want in jail??? ummmmm....... habeas corpus, anyone?? I find that somewhat ironic to the conversation at hand.
And… you may want to check out some of my blogs, lol, You’ll have plenty to debate about, especially since we are about exact opposites!!!
Ceila --
http://www.progressiveu.org/blog/ceila30
you can't print anything that makes anyone unhappy. you can't print "happy halloween", or "this team was terrible" (could hurt feelings), or "angry bible men outside of university are a nuisance", or anything that could offend ANYONE.
it's boring to work for the university newspaper, and that's why i'm so pissed that guy was fired for doing what we all want to do if we finally get the editor job...say what we want!
being the only editor of a university newspaper in this forum so far....i believe i have HANDS ON experience, thank you