I am more concerned than ever about the motivations of local ACLU head counsel David Blair-Loy. He seems deeply concerned with his own career, as evidenced by the effort he must have put in to get busy lawyers to participate in the Daily Transcript's yearly opportunity for lawyers to promote themselves.
The Daily Transcript does not evaluate the lawyers it chooses as "Top Lawyers" of the year; there is no panel of experts making the choice. Nor do all the lawyers in town participate in the vote.
Instead, the voters select themselves. To win, a lawyer has to get his pals to send in ballots. (There is even a section for insurance lawyers.) The Daily Transcript seems to be promoting itself by exploiting lawyers who feel the need to promote themselves. The most highly regarded lawyers do not seem to participate in this contest.
David Blair-Loy, legal counsel for the San Diego ACLU, gets along too well with school attorneys. He even got an award from the bar association for "high civility" in dealing with them, and with other attorneys.
But the situation at Southwestern has gone on long enough. It's time to stop writing letters to Jonathan Pearl and Raj Chopra, and to take some action.
...Ralph Opacic, the charter school's president and executive director, issued a statement defending administrators, arguing that charter schools were exempted from the law defining student rights.
Even if this teacher lost her job because of unrelated issues, this is still an important story. I would really like to know why the students wrote about the religion of the food service providers. Was religion a factor in hiring the caterer? Is that what the school wanted to cover up?
An Orange County high school newspaper and yearbook adviser who stood up to the school's administration when it threatened to censor the paper has been dismissed, prompting accusations of retaliation.
Konnie Krislock, adviser at Orange County High School of the Arts, got a letter June 20 saying she had been dismissed – less than a year after Krislock had a very public dust-up with Principal Sue Vaughn last fall, according to the Student Press Law Center...
The story began last September, when Vaughn tried to stop publication of the student newspaper, Evolution, because a story about the school's new food services vendor described the company, Alegre Foods as a "Christian-based company" whose purpose is to serve God, according to a report in the Orange County Register.
Krislock said the school – a public charter school – was illegally censoring the student press. Ultimately, the school administration allowed the paper to publish without pre-approval.
But the controversy didn't end there. A few days after the school backed down, Ralph Opacic, the charter school's president and executive director, issued a statement defending administrators, arguing that charter schools were exempted from the law defining student rights.
That in turn prompted state Sen. Leland Yee, D-San Francisco, to sponsor SB 438. The law would make provisions regarding free speech for public school students specifically applicable to charter schools. It has been unanimously approved by the state Senate, cleared the Assembly Appropriations Committee and will go before the full Assembly soon, the Student Press Law Center reports...
One of America’s leading defenders of free speech has named Southwestern College one of the nation’s 10 worst violators of the First Amendment for 2010.
SWC Superintendent Dr. Raj K. Chopra and Vice President of Business and Financial Affairs Nicholas Alioto were singled out for criticism by the Virginia-based Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression “for promulgating and enforcing a policy limiting even peaceful and non-disruptive protests to a designated ‘free speech’ patio.” The Jefferson Center awarded its notorious “Jefferson Muzzle” to the college for events that arose from an October 22, 2009 student rally and a February 2010 effort by students to collect signatures for a petition to recall three SWC Governing Board members.
Judge: Lesbian student's rights violated By Chris Joyner, USA TODAY March 23, 2010 ABERDEEN, Miss. — A federal judge ruled Tuesday that the Itawamba County, Miss., school board violated the rights of a lesbian student by canceling the prom when the student challenged a ban on same-sex dates, but the judge stopped short of ordering the district to reinstate the April 2 prom.
U.S. District Court Judge Glen Davidson said he denied the injunction request because a private prom parents are planning will serve the same purpose as the school prom and because "requiring defendants to step back into a sponsorship role at this late date would only confuse and confound the community on the issue."
NIXED PROM: Lesbian gets day in court
Constance McMillen, 18, and the American Civil Liberties Union sued the Itawamba County school district when she was denied her request to bring her girlfriend, a sophomore, to the dance and to wear a tuxedo.
McMillen said she was saddened that the judge did not reinstate the school-sponsored prom, but she understood his reasoning since the private prom is scheduled for the same day in Tupelo.
"It would be hard for him to move it," she said. "A lot of people would be inconvenienced."
Davidson ruled the school board violated McMillen's rights. "The Court finds this expression and communication of her viewpoint is the type of speech that falls squarely within the purview of the First Amendment," Davidson wrote in his opinion...
Judge Hayes says that I don't understand Constitutional law (click on image above to read her decision). She's right that I don't understand that the Constitution allows Judge Hayes to impose broad prior restraints on a citizen journalist in order to protect law firms that appear before her. Well, not ALL the law firms who appear before her, but one of them, a group that was founded by two members of what some school-watchers think of as the Poway Pow-wow, lawyers who live in the suburb beloved by Judge Hayes.
What is this constitutional subtlety that Judge Hayes accuses me of not understanding? It seems to be the Hayes Doctrine, devised to fill a gaping hole in the legal system of the United States--a hole that allows citizens to become informed about actions of public entities that their lawyers don't want the public to know about.
In my benighted state, I believe that the law that Hayes is supposed to follow is Balboa Island Village Inn v. Lemen, 156 P.3d 339 (Cal. 2007), a decision striking down an overly broad injunction on speech. (Judge Hayes' injunction says I must remove every mention of Stutz law firm from my websites, and never mention their name again. Balboa Island says that court may only apply prior restraints to specific statements found to be defamatory.
Although the University continues to be under censure by the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) for academic freedom violations and continues to ban certain speakers from campus, CUA has made a general statement of policy that the academic freedom of its faculty and students will be respected.[18] It considers academic freedom a "fundamental condition for research and dissemination of information."[18] The policy sets forth its respect for the right and responsibility of its faculty and students to (i) conduct research, (ii) publish their findings, and (iii) discuss ideas according to the principles, sources and methods of their academic disciplines.[18] The University further "sanctions" the investigation of "unexplored phenomena, advancement of knowledge, and critical examination of ideas, old and new" and "accepts the responsibility of protecting both teacher and student from being forced to deny truth that has been discovered or to assert claims that have not been established in the discipline."[18]
However, the University specifically provides that "theologians" in the University are "expected to give assent to the teachings of the magisterium in keeping with the various degrees of assent that are called for by authoritative teaching."[18]
It's like old times at UCSD. When I was there in the late 60s I remember the kids did a lock-out of the administration offices: they put putty in the locks.
I can't believe that forty years later so little progress has been made on achieving equality for African Americans.
Anger boiled over on the University of California San Diego campus Friday, where students took over the chancellor’s office for several hours to protest the hanging of a noose in a campus library.
Students wearing red handkerchiefs over their faces blocked the doors to Chancellor Marye Anne Fox’s offices for hours, while more students inside chanted “Real pain, real change.”
They left the office peacefully at sundown, about the same time that leaders of the university’s Black Student Union ended talks with administrators in a nearby conference room over demands that include more boosting the African-American curriculum and campus activities. A university spokesman, Jeff Gattas, said there were no arrests and no property was damaged during the takeover.
The noose found dangling from a light fixture on the seventh floor of Geisel Library on Thursday night was the latest in a string of racially charged incidents in the university community, authorities said Friday. Less than two weeks ago, an off-campus party mocking Black History Month ignited racial tensions...
...First, there was the KoalaTV program that discussed the fallout from the party, in which its editor, Kris Gregorian, 25, dropped the N-bomb. KoalaTV, a student-run, closed-circuit station, has a reputation for inciting controversy across campus, all in the name of “free speech and the First Amendment.” Gregorian, as seen in a column by the Union-Tribune’s Michael Stetz, has proven himself to be at best an insensitive, agitating windbag, and at worst an antagonistic bigot...
Thousands of students and administrators attended a “teach-in” at UC San Diego Wednesday to address a recent ghetto-themed party intended to mock Black History Month and the racial unrest it sparked on campus, but the event was disrupted when the bulk of students in attendance walked out.
About an hour into the event at the university’s student center, two female students with the Black Student Union stood up and blasted the teach-in, with one saying, “The university and our community will not be fixed by a two-hour teach-in.”
Saying the university was doing little to address racism on campus, the pair urged their fellow students in the packed auditorium and overflow room to march out of the event, and the vast majority complied. The students filed out of the auditorium, loudly chanting “Whose university? Our university!”
The students then gathered en masse outside the auditorium, continuing to chant. Members of the Black Student Union work black T-shirts with the slogan “Real Pain Real Action.”
About 3,000 people gathered at the teach-in and resulting demonstration — with whites making up about half of the crowd. About 2 percent of UCSD’s students are black...
It’s no surprise that college kids like to throw parties. You might be surprised by the kind of parties that some like to throw, though.
We got something of an idea last week when a number of UCSD students helped arrange a party called the “Compton Cookout,” which ridiculed African-Americans on the occasion of Black History Month.
That’s actually a more common party theme than you might think. They also go by the names “Pimps and Hos,” and “Gangsta” or “Ghetto” parties.
At these gangsta parties, students wear gold chains. They drink malt liquor. They flash gang signs.
Fraternities also have thrown parties making fun of Latinos. At Santa Clara University, students came dressed as gardeners and janitors. Some of the women put balloons under their shirts to look pregnant.
Poor white people are targets, too. A fraternity at the University of Idaho throws a big one at the end of the year. Partyers wear overalls and John Deere caps to the “White Trash Trailer Bash.”
Here’s another party concept: “Mekong Delta.” At the University of Florida, male students dressed up as U.S. soldiers and the women as Vietnamese prostitutes.
Whatever happened to togas?
So why is this happening? Daniel Widener, who teaches African-American history at UCSD, believes that the lack of black students on college campuses is partly to blame.
“The Cosby Show” probably boasted more blacks than UCSD. So the other students rarely get a chance to interact with average, everyday blacks, Widener said.
They get their cues from TV, which often portrays young blacks as gangsters and thugs, Widener said. And they aren’t told when they’re crossing the line because there’s no one to tell them so.
Society, in general, has tired of hearing about the plight of minorities, Widener said. That’s particularly true now, given how the economy is hurting all people, whites included. So fewer college students feel empathy.
They may even feel threatened by the rise of minorities, such as President Barack Obama.
Some students said that those involved in the party are not racists. They’re just normal guys who weren’t thinking, said Debbie Sert, a member of the sorority TriDelta.
“They were trying to be funny,” Sert said. “But it was ridiculous. I’d never take part in it.”
On campus last week, she was selling calendars that pictured members of different campus fraternities. The money is going to a local hospital.
“We’re shocked because it’s not what the Greek community is about,” Sert said.
Members of Pi Kappa Alpha — also known as Pike — the fraternity in question, are pictured in the calendar. They represent the month of August and are pictured in Speedos and holding foam noodles, which help keep you afloat.
In the back of the calendar is another picture of the students. There, they have the noodles sticking out from their crotches.
They’ve since cleared out their Web site, which had pictures of them partying. And partying.
They wouldn’t return phone calls or e-mails.
UCSD got hit with more controversy when a student-run television show was aired Thursday defending the students who threw the party and criticizing blacks for being offended.
Regardless of how anyone feels about what the students did — and some feel it was no big deal, that it was just a joke — some argue the students do indeed have the right to have their party.
Gene Policinski of the First Amendment Center in Nashville, Tenn., noted how the First Amendment “allows people to say hurtful and insulting things.”
It would be wrong to suppress it, Policinski said. Indeed, it sometimes works out better if such speech is aired. That way, people can rally to fight against it.
“It promotes more speech,” he said.
That’s already happening at UCSD. For one thing, the party invitation, which described “ghetto chicks” as having “short nappy hair” and “cheap weave,” turned viral because people were outraged over it.
And the incident is sparking a loud call for the university to do a better job in recruiting blacks and fostering a more welcoming campus.
One of the colleges there is named after Thurgood Marshall. Let’s see if they can start living up to it.
Would someone please invite Mike Radazzo to a party? He's never been to one that wasn't about making fun of someone.
What's fun or funny about denigrating a group of people? Of course, it is possible to tell a funny ethnic joke, but that involves some subtlety, some thought. Humor requires the juxtaposition of the unexpected, and it's best when it involves some insight, perhaps poking fun at someone with pretensions. I'm Irish, and I always liked the one about the Irish priest who refused to say a mass for a dead horse until he heard the sum of money that the horse's owner was offering. "Why didn't you tell me your horse was Catholic?" the priest then asks. Good ethnic humor is merely a clever insight about human beings wrapped in the trappings of a given culture.
It doesn't sound like the Compton cookout involved any actual humor, just put downs intended to make the party goers feel superior. Mr. Radazzo doesn't understand that the target of fun has to buy into the idea or it's not fun, it's harmful.
Here Mr. Radazzo justifies his efforts to have another Compton cookout:
"If your intent is to make fun and not to harm anyone, and you really aren't trying to hurt anyone's feelings, then it's different from trying to cut someone down on purpose," Randazzo said.
He claims he has never been to a party that was not a mockery of something.
“On Cinco de Mayo, we have parties making fun of Mexicans; on Veterans Day, we make fun of veterans (yes, the same veterans who uphold our rights to free speech); on St. Patrick's Day we make fun of the Irish. Everyone gets made fun of out of jest now, not hate,” the invitation read. --from Channel 6 Sam Diego
The racial tension at UCSD is boiling over for many and it may get worse.
Another invitation has surfaced on Facebook to an off campus "Compton Party Part Deux" party encouraging partygoers to “come to this party in honor of your favorite cultural stereotype.”
"We pretty much want people to just choose a culture and harmlessly poke fun at it," Mike Randazzo told NBC San Diego...
Should public funds be given to "journalists" to shower contempt on minority students, making them want to leave UCSD?
Should fraternities support this type of journalism?
The free speech issue is very important, making this a tough situation. Our society benefits from free speech, but is harmed as it becomes less inclusive.
It's important for all of us that African American citizens become educated and allowed to fully participate in public higher education. In a way the situation is analogous to the Sally Smith situation. The Koala "journalists" don't want irritating "loud" black girls around; the teachers at Serra don't want "irritating" Sally Smith around. The urge to silence voices that make us uncomfortable is rampant in America. Situations with competing moral values, such as freedom of speech v. equal treatment of and participation by all people in our society, are far more tricky than simple questions of right and wrong. It seems to me that UCSD needs to teach students to think more carefully about these issues.
KRIS GREGORIAN
Kris Gregorian and his friends would have us think that he has contempt for black girls because one cute black girl yelled at him at a softball game. I think the reverse is true: Kris Gregorian and friends are racists, and they use an outburst, similar to outbursts I've heard time and again by white girls with extroverted personalities and a sense of fun, to justify their contempt. Apparently the Koala folks consider white women to be more acceptable because they are perceived as passive aggressive like Gregorian and friends, rather than direct and to the point.
Pi Kappa Alpha Fraternity denies responsibility the "Compton Party", but we'll see if it aids and abets the planners and participants by keeping some of them as members.
...According to the BSU, the broadcast called critics of the party ungrateful and used the n-word. Students searching for a tape of the broadcast found a scrap of cardboard in the TV station with the words “Compton lynching” written on it, further fueling tensions...
...In the latest incident, members of an irreverent student organization aired a live segment on closed-circuit television Thursday night supporting the party...
About 200 students, mostly black, met yesterday with administrators to discuss four pages of demands, mostly aimed at improving the campus’ racial climate.
Brewing tensions were made worse yesterday morning, when students searching for a copy of the videotape found a piece of cardboard in the student-run television studio with the words “Compton lynching” written on it — an apparent reference to the party, which was billed as the “Compton Cookout.”
...The show that sparked fresh outrage is called Koala TV and featured the editor of the Koala publication [Kris Gregorian] supporting the ghetto-themed party organized by fraternity members.
An invitation to the party urged participants to dress and act like “ghetto chicks” by speaking loudly, starting fights and wearing cheap clothes. The party drew condemnations from lawmakers in Sacramento and angered many students and faculty...
“I don’t feel accepted, and I don’t feel welcomed here at all,” Robinson said. “The whole lynching situation pretty much upset me. It is a possible threat. It was found in the Koala studio, where they called us niggers, and called us ungrateful, and ghetto and dumb. This is an unsafe environment.”
PI KAPPA ALPHA INTERNATIONAL FRATERNITY DNIES RESPONSIBILITY FOR PARTY
...The Fraternity regrets the display of ignorance and error-of-judgment made by any individual members who may have attended or were associated via social-media with the racially-offensive party. These actions are in direct violation of PIKE's code of conduct and appropriate disciplinary actions have been taken against members affiliated with the event.
While the Kappa Phi Chapter accepts no direct involvement in the planning of this party, the Fraternity encourages all in attendance to reach out to the African American community, as well as the UCSD community at large, with a sincere and effective reconciliation program... Garron Engstrom President The Kappa Phi Chapter The Pi Kappa Alpha International Fraternity
The UCSD’s Student Run Television (SRTV) shut down Friday after a student used the N-word to describe students who complained about the recent “Compton Cookout” controversy, according to a source at the university.
Last week, a group of UCSD students held a party dubbed the Compton Cookout, which featured a motif full of racial stereotypes. African Americans have staged protests in the days since. On Thursday night, students on SRTV, the campus TV station, allegedly called the protesters "ungrateful n-----s."
August 25, 2009 by donal brown First Amendment Coalition
A management firm who lost a case against a griper defending himself refuses to let the matter die, appealing the case to the Ninth Circuit. -DB
August 24, 2009 By Michael Masnick from the bad-idea dept
Remember that discussion a few months ago about how most lawyers apparently understood the Streisand Effect, and knew better than to file bogus lawsuits against individuals putting up “gripes” sites about their business? We’ve already seen that’s not quite true, but it takes a special level of thoughtlessness to lose such a bogus lawsuit (badly) and then file an appeal. We recently wrote about lawsuit filed by Sedgwick Claims Management against a guy who was upset with the company. Part of his griping, involved taking photos of Sedgwick execs and putting them on a fake “WANTED” poster.
The judge, correctly, threw out most of the lawsuit as being a SLAPP and tossed out the ridiculous “copyright infringement” claim on the use of the photos, noting that it was certainly a case of fair use. Most impressive? The guy fighting Sedgwick and its big law firm won the case defending himself (pro se). Perhaps because of the pro se nature of defense, Sedgwick has decided to appeal, but Eric Goldman can’t figure out what they’re thinking as all it does is call more attention to the complaints against the company: Put this one in the “Are you kidding me?” file. Last month I blogged about Sedgwick Claims Management v. Delsman involving a small-time griper who had the temerity to cut-and-paste some company executive headshots to create his griping material. Sedgwick went after Delsman in a big way, hiring a big national firm (Lord Locke) to take Delsman down, apparently unaware of or unconcerned about the Streisand effect.
Delsman defended pro se. Despite the long odds, Delsman nevertheless got a rousing dismissal of the claims. The court held the use of the headshots was a fair use (a clearly correct ruling, IMO), and the court casually tossed all of the other claims using California’s anti-SLAPP law.
That should have been the end of it. Instead, surprisingly, Sedgwick has decided to appeal the ruling to the Ninth Circuit. This sets up a potentially important Ninth Circuit showdown over how copyright fair use and anti-SLAPP doctrines apply to Internet gripers. It also gives Sedgwick extra time to bask in the glow of the Streisand effect.
Some people apparently never learn.
Editor’s note: The Streisand Effect surfaces when attempts to censor or remove information from public view brings the information greater exposure.
Southwestern College Free Speech Zone: ...Mario Savio... is no doubt rolling in his grave over the state of free speech on many college campuses -- including post-stamp-sized "free speech zones," like the one at Southwestern College in Chula Vista. Southwestern College's president, Dr. Raj Chopra, has designated a tiny patio area as "Free Speech Plaza," while declaring the rest of the 156-acre campus out of free speech bounds. The ACLU sent a demand letter, calling on the college to revise its policies to allow free speech and assembly throughout the campus. In 2010, we resolve to resolve this matter through negotiation or litigation.
Kevin Keenan is the executive director of the ACLU of San Diego & Imperial Counties.
...Superintendent Dale Mitchell confirms his district struck a deal with the ACLU to settle a school newspaper censorship case dating back to 2008.
The district will now pay Fallbrook High School's newspaper advisor $7,500 in the settlement. The ACLU gets $20,000.
At the time, Fallbrook High School's principal attempted to block the publication of a student-written article about the resignation of the district's former superintendent. The principal also tried to block a student editorial critical of the district's abstinence-only sex education program.
Mitchell says the campus has adopted new guidelines and procedures so this doesn’t happen again...
The district will also send letters to the students involved, exonerating them from any wrong doing.
The ACLU's David Blair-Loy says the settlement is a victory for student press rights. “There is no better place to begin standing up for and teaching basic principles of freedom of speech and freedom of the press than in our schools,” Blair-Loy said. “It does take enormous courage for students to stand up to school authorities when (officials) are violating freedom of speech.”
The campus newspaper advisor was removed from his position for insisting to run the information. Five of his journalism students alerted the Student Press Law Center in Virginia. That's when the ACLU got involved.
