Hazelwood vs. Kuhlmeier

This case is about a school newspaper in St. Louis, Missouri that tried to publish two articles, one about teen pregnancy, and one about divorce.  It was right before the deadline for publishing, and the administration had to review it, as they always did.  However, they found these two articles, both of which had personal comments from students relating to the sensitive topics.  Their names weren’t used but the teacher felt that there was enough information to figure out who they were, and so he was concerned about their safety.  He also found some of the content inappropriate for the 9^th graders.  Because the deadline was so soon, he thought it would be best to simply eliminate the pages that contained the articles, even though they also had other articles on the same pages.  The students however, having worked on this for quite some time, thought that this kind of censorship of their work was against their first amendment rights. 

The district court found in favor of the school, but the students appealed and got it a level higher, where the court found in favor of the students.  Eventually, it made it all the way up to the Supreme Court, who found in favor of the school.  They felt that because it wasn’t a public forum, the school had the right to censor it for the safety and well-being of the students, and because it was a part of a class’s curriculum, not a separate entity. 

The finding of this case affects me as a student, because our own school newspaper is subject to censorship by our teachers and principal, and so might not always be a direct representation of the newspaper staff.  However, that being said, I do agree with the findings of the court.  If the paper was a sovereign entity then it shouldn’t be censored, but it is a subset of the school thus it should be subject to the rules and regulation of the school.

United Stated vs. Alvarez

During George Bush’s second term as president, a law was passed called the Stolen Valor Act, preventing anyone from claiming that they served in the military or received military honors or awards when they never actually did.  This act was intended to preserve the honor and valor of returning soldiers who had received these honors.  Violating the Stolen Valor Act would be considered a misdemeanor, and punishable for up to 6 months in prison, or if you claimed you received the Medal of Honor, up to a year.  Alvarez claimed when introducing himself at a board meeting that he had been a marine and received the Medal of Honor.  He was arrested, and although he pled guilty to lying about receiving the medal, he believed that it was his first amendment right to lie about it.  The case went all the way to the Supreme Court, where they found that the Stolen Valor Act was unconstitutional in order to maintain a “robust and uninhibited marketplace of ideas.”

Shouting Fire Documentary

Out of the four cases discussed in the documentary Shouting Fire (Ward Churchill, Debbie Almontaser, Chase Harper, and protesters at the 2004 republican convention), the one that was most important to me was the Chase Harper case.  This case pertained to me because it was about a public school student who wore an offensive t-shirt to school, and it helps me to understand my rights as a public school student.  The court found that his first amendment rights weren’t violated although he was expressing himself.  Surprisingly, this is the verdict that I was hoping for.  I felt that because his t-shirt said “Be Ashamed,” it became unprotected speech because he was actually attacking homosexual people, rather than just stating his beliefs.  The courts found this verdict, not necessarily for this reason, but because the school has the power to limit the freedom of speech for the safety and well-being of the students.  This case has helped me to understand how my freedoms are limited when I am at school.

Google and the Anti-Islam Video

Free speech on the internet is being challenged by the recent video, “Innocence of Muslims,” that was produced in the United States, but is circulating the internet.  Google, the owner of YouTube, has been under pressure to remove the video due to the inflammatory and offensive content.  In some countries, including Libya and Egypt, Google did remove it because it violated laws in those countries, however according to Google it still wasn’t considered hate speech under their rules.  The article “On Web, a Fine Line on Free Speech Across the Globe,” written by Somini Sengupta, says that each internet company has the right to censor what they want according to their rules, but they also try to comply with the laws of the individual countries that they operate in.  Since Google found that it wasn’t hate speech, they have kept it up on the internet in most countries, including the United States, because it is protected under the first amendment. 

Free Speech for Computers?

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/20/opinion/free-speech-for-computers.html

This article addresses the right to free speech and if that applies to computers.  Specifically, Google is making a case that the results of a Google search are protected under the first amendment.  The argument is that the computer makes a choice to place the search results in that specific order, thus making it “speech” and protected under the first amendment.  This idea seems more reasonable when placed in context; commercial speech and political expenditures are currently protected as free speech.  Although the first amendment only disallows laws being made about free speech and does not specify it protecting only people, that has been the primary assumption up until this point.  Personally, I do not believe that computers or other inanimate objects should have the right to free speech.  Especially with the case of Google, someone programmed that search engine to make the choices it makes; it can’t make decisions for itself; someone has to tell it what to do.  I think that possibly a person’s programming could be considered speech, but the actual computer doesn’t have those rights. 

Tinker vs. Des Moines

I agree that the “school’s need for order and discipline must be balanced with the student’s right to basic constitutional freedoms,” but only to a certain extent.  A school needs to be safe, so they should guard against students carrying weapons and drugs.  If there is evidence that a student is violating those school rules, then for the safety of the other students they should be searched, possibly violating their rights in the process.

However, there are some rights that should not be violated especially for the sake of discipline.  For example, cruel and unusual punishment should not be accepted in a school setting.  There are also some other rights that should not be violated, such as the right to free speech.  Students should have the same rights regarding free speech as any other person, so long as it is not harming anyone directly.  I think that is where the line is drawn.  Some freedoms must be given up for the safety of the students but not for any other reasons.

The USA PATRIOT Act

The government should have the right to investigate suspicious persons and their activities, but not to the fullest extent, and not outside of the realm of our constitution.  Under the USA PATRIOT Act, the Federal Bureau of Investigation would have the right to pre-emptively investigate suspicious persons by searching and seizing financials, records, and possessions, with no disclosure requirement.  This law was passed to combat terrorism after 9/11, and it certainly helps with that.  Within the act, domestic terrorism is defined as a crime, therefore making it far easier to prosecute and investigate terrorists.  Also, the process of investigation is streamlined through not requiring warrants to search and making it easier to access records, which is critical in time sensitive cases such as these.  Law enforcement also has the right to keep everything they are doing quiet, which is important for security reasons. 

However, as good as much of this seems for fighting terrorism, it is also impeding on our constitutional rights.  It violates our fourth amendment, which is safeguards us from unwarranted searches and seizures.  The lack of a requirement for a warrant or for alerting the suspect of a search clearly violates this right.  Because of this unaccountability, there is also a lot of room for unfair profiling.  For example, there was a lawsuit against the act filed by an assortment of ethnic and anti-discrimination groups who felt that they were being unfairly investigated.  This shows how the act can be abused.  The act is also in violation of our first amendment right: the freedom of speech.  The American people have a right to say what they want, whether it’s on the internet or elsewhere, so they shouldn’t be persecuted for it.  While the USA PATRIOT Act aims to protect us from terrorists, it encroaches on too many of our rights to be a just law. 

Barack Obama's DNC Speech

President Barack Obama’s speech to the Democratic National Convention accepting their nomination was filled with dreams.  Dreams of what America could become, what possibilities lie out there, much similar to his campaign four years ago.  However, this time, he had much to back himself up with – his accomplishments in his first term as president.  These accomplishments may not be as expansive as anticipated, but the way that he spun them made it clear that he had fulfilled many of his promises. 

As usual, his speech began with a slew of glittering generalities and sentimental stories, but quickly phased into reminding people why he was elected in the first place: “You didn’t elect me to tell you what you wanted to hear. You elected me to tell you the truth.”  This, I think, gets to what Obama is about, after which he admits that what he has wanted to and wants to accomplish cannot be reasonably accomplished in just a few years, addressing the concern of many Americans.  He also talked about how he has improved manufacturing, increased jobs, helped renewable energy, reduced carbon pollution, made education more affordable, assisted veterans, and more, all given very effectively with evidence and aesthetics, making for a very convincing rhetorical argument.  However, when he talked about his plans for his next term, his use of evidence dried up.  He spoke in generalized terms about what he wanted to do, while never really discussing how he wanted to do it.  “And together, I promise you, we can out-educate and out-compete any nation on Earth,” he said, never really backing up the statement with any specifics.  Then, toward the end, he made a transition into appeals to the emotions of the audience: “It was about you. My fellow citizens, you were the change,” going on to describe what ‘they’ had done in his four years as president.  This arrangement shows a mastery of rhetoric – getting the audience emotional, throwing in some strong evidence, and then finishing off with some more appeals to leave America feeling patriotic. 

Michelle Obama's DNC Speech

While I was watching Michelle Obama’s speech at the Democratic National Convention, I was trying to analyze her content, rhetoric, and passion.  However as I watched, I found myself being drawn in, forgetting my analysis, simply captivated by her ability to weave stories and connect with the audience.  I believe that this is what makes a great speech – being able to draw in an audience while still getting a point across, and Michelle’s speech did just that.  As she told stories of her and Barak’s childhood, she humanized herself and her husband, cracking jokes and revealing the journey that they have been through, all the way up until the presidency.  At this point, she began to talk more about Obama’s policies, focusing on the ones that were successful and that are relatable to the average American.  This structure played to her strengths, building on her personal connection to the president, and ramping up to a few hard-hitting points while you were still emotional from her stories.

Personally, as drawn in as I was, I saw much relevancy in her tales of hardship.  It made me further realize just how disconnected other presidential candidates oftentimes are from the struggles of everyday people, no matter what they might say during the campaign trail.  On the flipside, it also reminded me that Obama has actually come from a lower class, and has had to experience hard times and has had to grow and move on in life, which in my eyes, makes him a much stronger candidate.