Free Speech Zone or Free Speech Campus?

    In class, we have been talking a lot about free speech and when, if ever, it should be limited. I was recently reading an article about how free speech is limited on college campuses and some of the information that I read really surprised me. There are still some colleges that contain areas known as free speech zones. One specific example is at the University of Cincinnati; their free speech zone took up just .1% of the school property. Students were told that if they were protesting or showing other forms of free speech outside of the zone, they would be charged for trespassing. Thankfully, the court proved the zone to be unconstitutional, but still, the idea that colleges still have free speech zones is jaw dropping to me. For my perilous times project, my group is studying the Vietnam War. During this time there were many protests happening on college campuses, which ultimately contributed to the hastening of our withdrawal from Vietnam. In my opinion, especially on college campuses, the whole school should be a free speech zone, not just one small area, unless the well-being of the student body or the institution are at risk.
     Other actions, besides creation of free speech zones, are also done to limit a student's first amendment rights. For example, there was a resolution passed in California that bans students from making anti-Semitic speeches.  At Christopher Newport University, students were not allowed to protest a visit from Paul Ryan.  At Ohio University, a girl was banned from putting a sign expressing her political views on her door and at Yale, a student was not allowed to wear a shirt with provocative language on it. As Greg Lukianoff wrote in the New York Times, "In a study of 392 campus speech codes last year, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, where I work, found that 65 percent of the colleges had policies that in our view violated the Constitution’s guarantee of the right to free speech." This to me is ridiculous and I do not think that authorities should be able to hold people's own rights against them.
     As we have seen in class, many of the acts formed during wartime seem very general, and the same goes for many rules that are made limiting a student's free speech on college campuses. For example, as Greg Lukianoff states, "Harvard freshmen were pressured by campus officials to sign an oath promising to act with “civility” and “inclusiveness.”" What exactly is meant here by civilty and inclusiveness is impossible to tell, but to me it just seems like the most vague way to tell students that they better stick with the status quo, or else they will be punished. Especially during a time when students are in college and, as many call it, "finding themselves", they should without a doubt have a right to voice their own  opinion, no matter what it may be. What do you think of all these limitations on college campuses? Are they fair or immoral?

Big Issue, Few Words

    A topic that is rarely spoken of by either President Obama or Governor Romney is gun control. Around 30,000 people are killed from being shot each year, and according to Gail Collins, a writer for the New York times, "there have been 43 American mass shootings in the last year." These numbers are clearly very high, and while, yes, there are other issues that are important for the candidates to talk about, gun control should be somewhere near the top of the list. Whether or not the candidates want to talk about the issue or not, it is necessary that it be discussed.

AK47 

    Nina Gonzalez, an undecided voter, asked President Obama at the second presidential debate, "During the Democratic National Convention in 2008, you stated you wanted to keep AK47s out of the hands of criminals, what has your administration done or plan to do to limit the availability of assault weapons?" Obama went about answering this question by giving quite a general answer; he said that he does think that the ban on assault weapons should be reintroduced and changed topic soon after. Romney also avoided discussion of gun control, speaking a scarce 42 words on the topic before switching subjects. Romney's reason for trying to stay away from the subject could likely be that as the governor of Massachusetts, he was in favor of new gun laws, but in an effort to be elected, his role on this issue has been reversed. As Gail Collins states, "When it comes to gun control, both presidential candidates are strongly in favor of quality education." In other words, nobody really knows where either candidate truly stands on the issue or what they will do to help control it because when asked about it, they just simply avert into an off-topic matter.
    The second amendment states that citizens have a right to bear arms, but with all the harm that this has caused in our country, where should the line be drawn? What limits should be made, if any, so that the people in America feel safe from assault weapons, but also have their second amendment rights protected?

To read Gail Collins' full article click here: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/20/opinion/collins-the-least-popular-campaign-subject-gun-control.html

American "Hero"

    Lance Armstrong was an American Hero; he won seven straight Tour De France titles and was a Cancer Survivor. Some may have even said he was the best cyclist in history. Recently, though, it seems that Lance Armstrong is really no hero at all. As Juliet Macur states in the New York Times, "...accounts were revealed Wednesday in hundreds of pages of eyewitness testimony from teammates, e-mail correspondents, financial records, and laboratory analyses released by the United States Anti-Doping Agency" that provide proof that Lance Armstrong was doping, using performance enhancing drugs.  Not only was Armstrong using the drugs, he also forced some of his fellow teammates to do the same and threatened them by saying that they would be off the team if they didn't do it. Just like Parris in The Crucible uses intimidation to make people stay with the church, Armstrong did the same to pressure his teammates into using drugs. To top it off, there were team managers and doctors present to help the cyclists inject the drugs that would raise their oxygen carrying capacity and improve their stamina, ultimately to make sure that the team would win. In order to make it less likely for the cyclyists to test positive during a drug test, they were careful to inject the drug into their veins, instead of their skin, so that it would shortly leave the blood stream.
    Armstrong has been been stripped of all of his Tour De France titles and banned from cycling, but is this punishment too harsh? I don't think so, but Michael Specter of The New Yorker said that "a cyclist once told me that if you don’t use drugs during a race like the Tour de France it’s as if you are observing a sixty-five mile-per-hour speed limit on a highway—while everyone else is driving eighty." In other words, many of the top cyclists use performance enhancing drugs, so then maybe Lance Armstrong really was the best. Doping has become so common in this sport, so should it just be legalized? If so, under what conditions?  If so many are already using it, then wouldn't the competition be more fair if everyone was on it, instead of just a few people? Personally, I do not think that the drug should be legalized. Many performance enhancing drugs can be very dangerous, and it sets a very poor example for kids to see that the only way their hero succeeds is by using drugs. People should not have to rely on a drug to help them win, but the sad truth is that many people are so set on winning, that they will do whatever it takes.

To read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/11/sports/cycling/agency-details-doping-case-against-lance-armstrong.html?pagewanted=1&_r=0&ref=opinion

More Moderation

    In class a few days ago, we were talking about presidential debate moderators. This year, Jim Lehrer, 78, moderated for a 12th time. After saying that 2008 would be his last debate, the new format brought him back once again. As Brian Stelter of the New York times explains, the new format "allowed for six 15-minute conversations, each starting with a question and two-minute answers from each candidate." It appealed to Mr. Lehrer because as a moderator he tries to stay out of the way and let the candidates speak. Unfortunately, Mr. Lehrer may have stood a little too far out of the way at the 2012 debate and has been greatly criticized for his performance. It seemed as though he just did not have enough control. Throughout the debate when Lehrer would speak, President Obama and Mitt Romney would often times either ignore him, or talk back to him and continue on. For an example, watch the following video:

     Personally, I think that the moderator plays a very important role and it is necessary that they stay in control in order for the debate to run fairly and smoothly. In this case, it seemed that Mitt Romney was more in control of the debate than Lehrer was, which could be argued to have given Romney an edge up. President Obama, as seen above, interjected Lehrer as well, but not nearly as often as his opponent. If the moderator does not stand their ground, as witnessed on Wednesday, then the candidates will pretty much disregard them. Also, although Lehrer had said that as a moderator he tries to stay out of the way of the candidates, I think it would have been a much more fair and informative debate if he had asked the candidates more specific questions, instead of letting them get away with some very general answers. What do you think the role of the moderator is? What are your thoughts on Lehrer's performance at the presidential debate?

    

    On a side note, the next debate between President Obama and Mitt Romney on October 16 will be moderated by a woman, Candy Crowley, for the first time in 20 years. I am very interested to see how having a woman moderator will differ the debate from what Americans have watched for the past 20 years.

 To watch more of Lehrer from the first 2012 debate click here:

http://on.aol.com/video/mashup--jim-lehrer-gets-bullied-517496754