Court Rules Free Speech Must Yield to ‘Woke’ Speech

[rangerrebew]

Court Rules Free Speech Must Yield to ‘Woke’ Speech
 

    By George Leef March 23, 2020

Shawnee State University in southern Ohio (cross the bridge and you’re in Kentucky) is an open-admissions school that opened in 1986. It’s very little known, but the school’s administrators are as politically attuned to progressive sensibilities as any across the nation. A case that has arisen at Shawnee threatens to set a terrible precedent for the suppression of speech that any “woke” student claims to find harassing.

Nicholas Meriwether has been on the Shawnee faculty since 1996, teaching political science. He has risen to the rank of full professor with the equivalent of tenure. In a course on political philosophy he was teaching in 2018, he called upon an obviously male student and after the student (registered in class under the name Alena Breuning, but referred to as “Doe” in the court documents) replied, Meriwether said, “Yes, sir.” That’s all it took to set off a federal case.

https://www.mindingthecampus.org/2020/03/23/court-rules-free-speech-must-yield-to-woke-speech/

[sneakypete]

Court Rules Free Speech Must Yield to ‘Woke’ Speech
 

    By George Leef March 23, 2020

Shawnee State University in southern Ohio (cross the bridge and you’re in Kentucky) is an open-admissions school that opened in 1986. It’s very little known, but the school’s administrators are as politically attuned to progressive sensibilities as any across the nation. A case that has arisen at Shawnee threatens to set a terrible precedent for the suppression of speech that any “woke” student claims to find harassing.

Nicholas Meriwether has been on the Shawnee faculty since 1996, teaching political science. He has risen to the rank of full professor with the equivalent of tenure. In a course on political philosophy he was teaching in 2018, he called upon an obviously male student and after the student (registered in class under the name Alena Breuning, but referred to as “Doe” in the court documents) replied, Meriwether said, “Yes, sir.” That’s all it took to set off a federal case.

https://www.mindingthecampus.org/2020/03/23/court-rules-free-speech-must-yield-to-woke-speech/

@rangerrebew brew   

 I believe the obvious observation here is the classic "Hung by his own petard"

Or is that "retard"?

This is all so confusing!

[PeteS in CA]

An update on the case:

6th Circuit upholds First Amendment rights of Shawnee State professor

https://adfmedia.org/case/meriwether-v-trustees-shawnee-state-university

CINCINNATI – The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit ruled Friday in favor of Dr. Nicholas Meriwether, a philosophy professor at Shawnee State University, reversing a district court’s dismissal of his lawsuit against university officials. The university punished Meriwether because he declined a male student’s demand to be referred to as a woman, with feminine titles and pronouns. The court ruled that, based on the allegations in the complaint, the university violated Meriwether’s First Amendment rights.

“This case forced us to defend what used to be a common belief—that nobody should be forced to contradict their core beliefs just to keep their job,” said ADF Senior Counsel and Vice President of Appellate Advocacy John Bursch. “We are very pleased that the 6th Circuit affirmed the constitutional right of public university professors to speak and lead discussions, even on hotly contested issues. The freedoms of speech and religion must be vigorously protected if universities are to remain places where ideas can be debated and learning can take place.”

“Traditionally, American universities have been beacons of intellectual diversity and academic freedom,” the 6th Circuit wrote in its opinion in Meriwether v. The Trustees of Shawnee State University. “They have prided themselves on being forums where controversial ideas are discussed and debated. And they have tried not to stifle debate by picking sides. But Shawnee State chose a different route: It punished a professor for his speech on a hotly contested issue. And it did so despite the constitutional protections afforded by the First Amendment. The district court dismissed the professor’s free-speech and free-exercise claims. We see things differently and reverse.”