Contemplating Media & the First Amendment
The First Amendment protects freedom of speech and freedom of the press, among other rights. These rights have been points of debate in the current administration. The Trump administration has unclear and contradicting stances on protecting First Amendment rights. Last week Education Secretary Betsy DeVos gave a speech at Philadelphia’s National Constitution Center, for Constitution... Continue Reading →
The question of drawing the line between protecting American citizens’ rights to free speech as granted to them by the First Amendment, and protecting them from being unwillingly exposed to pornographic or otherwise obscene content, has historically proved difficult for judges and politicians. Chapter 8 of Anthony Lewis’ Freedom for the Thought That We Hate... Continue Reading →
Journalists have to go through a lot to protect their sources. It was fascinating to read about just a few of the things they do in chapter 7 of Journalism After Snowden. For one thing. The author said that it took him a while to learn about encrypted messages, and he would have to go... Continue Reading →
I found this reading on the topic of hate speech to be incredibly interesting. At the beginning of this course, we were asked to write our thoughts on what we know about the First Amendment, as well as what we think should and should not be protected. I stated that the First Amendment should protect... Continue Reading →
Danny Masterson, known as Rooster, has just been written out of Netflix’s hit comedy The Ranch. Netflix fired him after four women came out about the assaults that happened in the early 2000’s. Masterson, spoke out and said "I have never been charged with a crime, let alone convicted of one. In this country, you... Continue Reading →
This week was a dark one if you consider the U.S. president and his openly racist attitude toward people of the Islam faith. On Wednesday, Trump retweeted three videos which appeared to involve Muslim migrants abusing white people. These videos were endorsed by the British Ultranationalist group, Britain First. The titles of the videos retweeted... Continue Reading →
We have entered a period of reporting where news channels are covering stories about sexual assault every week. This could be a major turning point for how sexual harassment cases are handled in our culture that has repeatedly disregarded sexual assault victims. So it is strange when, at this amazing movement to validate the experiences... Continue Reading →
Chapter 10 of Lewis Freedom for the Thought That We Hate, discusses hate speech and I found it alarming that The United States differs from all other Western societies in its legal treatment of hate speech. In eleven countries it is crime to deny the Holocaust, yet in America we have free expression and the... Continue Reading →
Just the other day, the College Republicans at the University of Connecticut invited the White House Correspondent for the right-wing Gateway Pundit website, Lucian Wintrich to speak. His speech was titled, “It’s OK to be white”. 100 people attended, many of whom shouted “Go, home, Nazi” over him as he tried to speak. I definitely... Continue Reading →
News response: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/27/us/politics/trump-cnn-first-amendment.html?rref=collection%2Ftimestopic%2FFirst%20Amendment%20(US%20Constitution)&action=click&contentCollection=timestopics®ion=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=1&pgtype=collection Freedom of speech and freedom of press typically go hand in hand, but for Trump they often clash. Case in point, Trump recently called CNN out via Twitter (not for the first time, of course). On November 25 he Tweeted: “@FoxNews is MUCH more important in the United States than CNN,... Continue Reading →
Free Press Free Speech 