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Feminists for Free Expression
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| YFEN Film Contest |
[Sep. 30th, 2009|11:29 am] |
YFEN Film Contest
Deadline Extended - October 23!
Each year NCAC challenges young people all across the nation to think about their First Amendment rights and the issue of Free Speech. This year marks the 40th anniversary of the famous Supreme Court case Tinker v. Des Moines when the court ruled in favor of students who had been suspended for protesting the Vietnam War. The Tinker case stated that students "do not shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate." But 40 years later, students are still facing challenges to their free speech and expression in school. <http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?et=1102732185256&s=1079&e=0019viz-bdiekhcg_ylboqjazqqys464vas3gy6m-3rhziaer7jju0py3umklxvmebmypyxw2xm7ihl94i1wlswzeih0wsw-ogralvhjagmvtitd3duf9gngjkpt-_ragbtddna9i_svwtb_vahwf6s8gvsuiabxdal>Make your voice heard! This is your chance to answer the question: Free Speech in School (Does it Exist?) |
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| Calif. Users File Civil Suit Against Facebook Over Privacy Issues |
[Aug. 20th, 2009|02:42 pm] |
<http://editorial.incisivemedia.com/c/1bjtsngqcahrzkv1t>
Calif. Users File Civil Suit Against Facebook Over Privacy Issues
The Associated Press
Five Facebook users filed a civil lawsuit Monday alleging that the social networking site is violating California's privacy laws and misleading members about how their personal information is used. Privacy concerns have been a thorny issue for Facebook, which has more than 200 million users. The company announced earlier this year it was tweaking its privacy controls and giving users a hand in determining various policies after tens of thousands of members criticized the control of information they share on the site.
Joan E. Bertin, Esq., Executive Director
National Coalition Against Censorship
275 7th Avenue, Suite 1504, New York, NY 10001
Tel: 212-807-6222; Fax: 212-807-6245
E-mail: bertin@ncac.org
The National Coalition Against Censorship is an alliance of more than 50 national non-profit organizations, including religious, educational, professional, artistic, labor, civil liberties and and civil rights groups, committed to defending freedom of thought, inquiry and expression. For more information, visit www.ncac.org. |
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| One library's alternative to book banning |
[Aug. 20th, 2009|02:39 pm] |
One library's alternative to book banning
By Marjorie Kehe | 08.19.09
Christian Science Monitor: <http://features.csmonitor.com/books/2009/08/19/one-librarys-alternative-to-book-banning/> The Tintin books are a - mostly - beloved series about the adventures of young reporter Tintin and his dog Snowy. Tintin and Snowy are only likely to become more popular in America as they become the stars of a Steven Spielberg film set for release in 2011. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/herg%c3%a9>
But the 79-year-old "Tintin au Congo" depicts Africans in a fashion that many readers find offensive and a Brooklyn library patron registered a formal complaint. So in an effort to keep the book off the shelves without making it entirely inaccessible, the library has moved it to a back room where it is held under lock and key and can be seen only by appointment.
It's an unusual move - and it marks the first time the library has taken such action, despite the numerous controversial titles among its collection. (The Times notes that Hitler's "Mein Kampf" can be found on its shelves, no appointment needed.)
To become too responsive to public discomfort can put a library in very tight straits. (The Times mentions one library that banned children's classic "Eloise in Paris" after a parent became upset because the children in the story visit a museum with a nude statue.) <http://www.eloisewebsite.com/books/book_eloise_paris.htm>
And yet the public library is just that - an institution that serves the public. "You do walk a fine line, making sure your materials are accessible, while being respectful of community standards,'' Alice Knapp, a former president of the Connecticut Library Association, told the Times.
Jamie Chosak
Program Director
American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression
275 Seventh Avenue
Suite 1504
New York, NY 10001
Phone: 212-587-4025 ext. 13
Fax: 212-587-2436
Email: jamie@abffe.com <mailto:jamie@abffe.com> |
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| ACLU seeks records on suspicionless laptop searches |
[Jun. 11th, 2009|11:04 am] |
By http://rawstory.com/08/news/author/murielkane/Muriel Kane
Published: June 10, 2009
Updated 5 hours ago
http://rawstory.com/08/news/2009/06/10/aclu-seeks-records-on-suspicionless-laptop-searches/
The American Civil Liberties Union is attempting to discover the degree to which Constitutional protections are being violated by a US government policy allowing border officials to search the laptops and other electronic devices of travelers even in the absence of any reason for suspicion.
Last July, Customs and Border Protection — which is part of the Department of Homeland Security — issued a http://www.cbp.gov/linkhandler/cgov/travel/admissibility/search_authority.ctt/search_authority.pdf policy (pdf) allowing it to conduct suspicionless border searches of “documents, books, pamphlets, and other printed material, as well as computers, disks, hard drives, and other electronic or digital storage devices.”
The announced purpose of the searches was to counter such crimes as terrorism, drug smuggling, child pornography and copyright violations.
The ACLU has now filed a Freedom of Information Act http://www.aclu.org/pdfs/freespeech/laptopfoia.pdf request (pdf) to discover what impact that policy has had on travelers. According to ACLU staff attorney Larry Schwartztol, “Based on current CBP policy, we have reason to believe innumerable international travelers — including U.S. citizens — have their most personal information searched by government officials and retained by the government indefinitely.”
The ACLU is seeking information about the extent to which documents and electronic devices have been retained and possibly disseminated to other government agencies or outside entities, as well as on any complaints about the policy filed by affected individuals.
It is also particularly interested in discovering the criteria by which travelers are chosen for these searches because of its concern that “granting CBP agents unbridled discretion to conduct suspicionless searches also raises a serious risk of discriminatory enforcement against racial and religious minorities.”
When the policy was first announced in 2008, Senator Russ Feingold http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/content/article/2008/08/01/laptops.html?hpid=topnews described it as “truly alarming.” The Canadian Bar Association even http://www.cba.org/cba/practicelink/TAYP/laptopborder.aspx warned that the “new U.S. border security policy poses a potential threat to solicitor-client privilege,” and went so far as to recommend that lawyers cross the border with a “forensically clean” laptop and download necessary data at their destination through a secure private network.
According to ACLU attorney Catherine Crump, the CBP policy potentially violates both Fourth Amendment guarantees against unreasonable search and seizure and First Amendment rights of freedom of speech and association.
“These highly intrusive government searches into a traveler’s most private information, without any reasonable suspicion, are a threat to the most basic privacy rights guaranteed in the Constitution,” states Crump. “Searching or retaining a traveler’s personal information — especially the vast stores of information contained in a laptop or other electronic storage device — could also have a chilling effect on the free exchange of ideas and beliefs.”
The ACLU press release can be read http://news.prnewswire.com/DisplayReleaseContent.aspx?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/06-10-2009/0005041795&EDATE= here.
David Horowitz
Media Coalition, Inc.
275 Seventh Avenue, Suite 1504
New York, NY 10001
1-212-587-4025 x11
1-212-587-2436 (fax) |
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| Leading Rights Groups Call On Obama To Release Prisoner Abuse Photos |
[Jun. 1st, 2009|01:43 pm] |
ACLU Calls On Court To Adhere To Mandate Requiring Release Of Abuse Photos
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 1, 2009
CONTACT: Rachel Myers (212) 549-2689 or 2666; mailto:media@aclu.org
NEW YORK – Several of the nation's leading human rights and civil liberties organizations sent a letter to President Obama today urging him to release photos depicting the abuse of detainees by U.S. personnel overseas.
The letter, signed by the American Civil Liberties Union, Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and dozens of other groups, calls on the president to reconsider his decision to block the release of the photos. It states, "The hallmark of an open society is that we do not conceal information that reflects poorly on us – we expose it to the light of day, so that wrongdoers can be held accountable and future abuses prevented."
"The disclosure of these photographs serves as a further reminder that abuse of prisoners in U.S.-administered detention centers was systemic," said Jameel Jaffer, Director of the ACLU National Security Project. "Some of the abuse occurred because senior civilian and military officials created a culture of impunity in which abuse was tolerated, and some of the abuse was expressly authorized. It's imperative that senior officials who condoned or authorized abuse now be held accountable for their actions."
Also today, the ACLU asked a federal appeals court to uphold its earlier ruling that the government must release the photos. On May 28, the government filed a motion asking the court to recall its mandate ordering their release, and today the ACLU filed its opposition to that motion.
"The public has an undeniable right to see these photos. As disturbing as they may be, it is critical that the American people know the full truth about the abuse that occurred in their name. The government's decision to suppress the photos is fundamentally inconsistent with President Obama's own promise of transparency and accountability," said Amrit Singh, staff attorney with the ACLU. "The government has failed to show any good cause for the court to recall its mandate that the photos be released, and we are confident the court will uphold its original order."
In September 2008, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ordered the government to turn over the photos in response to an ACLU Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit. The Obama administration originally indicated that it would not appeal that decision and would release the photos, but abruptly reversed its commitment to do so shortly before the agreed-upon deadline.
In addition to Jaffer and Singh, attorneys on the case are Judy Rabinovitz of the national ACLU; Arthur Eisenberg and Beth Haroules of the New York Civil Liberties Union; Lawrence S. Lustberg and Jenny Brooke Condon of the New Jersey-based law firm Gibbons P.C.; and Shayana Kadidal and Michael Ratner of the Center for Constitutional Rights.
More information about the ACLU's FOIA lawsuit, including today's filing, is online at: http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia
The full text of the letter to President Obama is below and available online at: http://www.aclu.org/safefree/torture/39709res20090601.html
June 1, 2009
President Barack Obama
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW
Washington, DC 20500
Dear President Obama:
We write to express our profound disappointment with your decision on May 13 to block the release of photographs depicting abuse of detainees by U.S. personnel overseas. We urge you to reconsider that misguided decision and to renew your commitment to our nation's most fundamental principles.
On your first full day in office, you eloquently proclaimed your administration's commitment to the principle of open government. You said: "A democracy requires accountability, and accountability requires transparency." That is exactly right. The hallmark of an open society is that we do not conceal information that reflects poorly on us – we expose it to the light of day, so that wrongdoers can be held accountable and future abuses prevented.
These photographs will no doubt be disturbing, as they should be. And we understand your concern about reaction to them overseas. But suppressing information to prevent public anger is inconsistent with democratic principles. The Pentagon should release the photos while reaffirming to the world that the U.S. repudiates such barbaric behavior and is committed to dismantling the culture that allowed it to occur. In the end, full disclosure of the crimes committed by our government will make us all safer.
The last eight years have demonstrated all too painfully that excessive secrecy creates a fertile environment for grave abuses. Those abuses have tarnished our nation's reputation and damaged its security. We will restore our standing as a leader on human rights not by hiding images of our failures, but by demonstrating that those failures will not go unpunished.
As you yourself have stated, "the Government should not keep information confidential merely because public officials might be embarrassed by disclosure, because errors and failures might be revealed, or because of speculative or abstract fears." Suppressing photographs of abuse places your administration on the wrong side of the law, and the wrong side of history. We hope you will reconsider your decision.
Sincerely,
Alliance for Justice
American Civil Liberties Union
Amnesty International
Bill of Rights Defense Committee
Center for Constitutional Rights
Center for Human Rights and Global Justice, NYU School of Law
Center for the Study of Human Rights in the Americas
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW)
CREDO Mobile
Electronic Frontier Foundation
Feminists for Free Expression
Government Accountability Project
Human Rights Watch
International Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ)
Jewish Alliance for Law and Social Action (JALSA)
Leitner Center for International Law and Justice at Fordham Law School
National Security Archive
OMB Watch
OpenTheGovernment.org
PEN American Center
Physicians for Human Rights
Progressive Librarians Guild (PLG)
Reporters Without Borders
The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press
United Methodist Church, General Board of Church and Society
Veterans for Common Sense
Veterans For Peace |
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| Media groups seek access to terrorism evidence |
[May. 30th, 2009|09:13 pm] |
Media groups seek access to terrorism evidence
El Paso Times
"News organizations asked a federal judge on Thursday to grant the
media access to copies of audio and video court records key to the
upcoming trial against a terrorism suspect. The motion seeks access to
about 12 hours of an audiotaped FBI interview with Syed Haris Ahmed,
who is set to go on trial Monday on charges that he aided a terrorist
group." (05/28/09)
http://www.elpasotimes.com/nationworld/ci_12472263 |
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| ACLU Sues To Stop Tennessee Schools From Censoring Gay Educational Web Sites |
[May. 30th, 2009|09:08 pm] |
Filtering Software Allows Anti-Gay Sites
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 19, 2009
CONTACT: (212) 549-2666; <mailto:media@aclu.org>media@aclu.org
NASHVILLE, TN – The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Tennessee sued two Tennessee school districts in federal court today, charging the schools are unconstitutionally blocking students from accessing online information about lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues. Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools, Knox County Schools and as many as 105 other school districts in Tennessee use Internet filtering software to block Web sites containing pro-LGBT speech, but not Web sites touting so-called "reparative therapy" and "ex-gay" ministries. The "LGBT" filter is not used to block sites containing pornography, which are filtered under a different category, but it does block the sites of many well-known LGBT organizations including Parents, Families, And Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG), the Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network (GLSEN) and Human Rights Campaign (HRC).
"Allowing access to Web sites that present one side of an issue while blocking sites that present the other side is illegal viewpoint discrimination," said Catherine Crump, a staff attorney with the ACLU First Amendment Working Group and lead attorney on the case. "This discriminatory censorship does nothing to make students safe from material that may actually be harmful, but only hurts them by making it impossible to access important educational material."
The school districts block the Internet filtering category designated "LGBT," which includes sites that "provide information regarding, support, promote, or cater to one's sexual orientation or gender identity." They do not, however, block sites that condemn homosexuality or promote "reparative therapy," a practice purporting to "cure" LGBT people that is denounced as dangerous and harmful to young people by such groups as the American Psychological Association and the American Medical Association.
The ACLU filed the case in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee against Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools and Knox County Schools on behalf of two high school students in Nashville, one student in Knoxville and a high school librarian in Knoxville who is also the advisor of the school's Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA).
"Students need to be able to access information about their legal rights or what to do if they're being harassed at school," said Keila Franks, a 17-year-old student at Hume-Fogg High School in Nashville and a plaintiff on the case. "It's completely unfair for schools to keep students in the dark about such important issues and treat Web sites that just offer information like they're something dirty."
The lawsuit charges that blocking LGBT sites violates students' First Amendment rights by only allowing access to sites that present an anti-gay point of view on the rights of LGBT persons on issues such as anti-gay harassment, marriage, employment discrimination and the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy while blocking access to sites that support LGBT rights. Further, the filtering hinders the ability of GSAs and their members to facilitate club activities and keeps students from accessing important information about scholarships for LGBT students or doing research for school-related assignments.
The ACLU first learned about the discriminatory filtering from Andrew Emitt, a Knoxville high school student who discovered the problem while trying to search for LGBT scholarships. Internet filtering software is mandated in public schools by Tennessee law, which requires schools to implement software to restrict information that is obscene or harmful to minors. However, the "LGBT" filter category does not include material which is sexually gratuitous and already included in the "pornography" filtering category.
"While schools may have an interest in using filters to block material that could be harmful to minors, blocking access to information about LGBT issues while allowing anti-gay information is unlawful and potentially dangerous," said Tricia Herzfeld, a staff attorney with the ACLU of Tennessee. "There is no place for this kind of unconstitutional censorship in our public schools."
In addition to Crump and Herzfeld, attorneys on the case are Chris Hansen of the ACLU First Amendment Working Group and Christine Sun of the ACLU LGBT Project.
The plaintiffs are Nashville students Keila Franks and Emily Logan, Knoxville student Bryanna Shelton, and Karyn Storts-Brinks, a Knoxville high school librarian and faculty sponsor for her school's GSA.
More information about the case, including the ACLU's complaint and a video featuring one of the student plaintiffs, is available online at: http://www.aclu.org/lgbt/youth/39346res20090413.html |
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| Judith Krug, Who Fought Ban on Books, Dies at 69 |
[Apr. 15th, 2009|01:50 pm] |
April 15, 2009
Judith Krug, Who Fought Ban on Books, Dies at 69
By http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/m/douglas_martin/index.html?inline=nyt-per>DOUGLAS MARTIN
Judith F. Krug, who led the campaign by libraries against efforts to ban books, including helping found Banned Books Week, then fought laws and regulations to limit children’s access to the Internet, died Saturday in Evanston, Ill. She was 69.
The cause was stomach cancer, her son, Steven, said.
As the http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/a/american_library_assn/index.html?inline=nyt-org American Library Association’s official proponent of the First Amendment’s guarantee of free speech since the 1960s, Ms. Krug (pronounced kroog) fought the banning of books, including “Huckleberry Finn,” “Mein Kampf,” “Little Black Sambo,” “Catcher in the Rye” and sex manuals. In 1982, she helped found Banned Books Week, an annual event that includes authors reading from prohibited books.
She also fought for the inclusion of literature on library shelves that she herself found offensive, like “The Blue Book” of the ultraconservative John Birch Society. The book is a transcript of a two-day monologue by Robert Welch at the founding meeting of the society in 1958.
“My personal proclivities have nothing to do with how I react as a librarian,” Ms. Krug said in an interview with The New York Times in 1972. “Library service in this country should be based on the concept of intellectual freedom, of providing all pertinent information so a reader can make decisions for himself.”
In 1967, Ms. Krug became director of the library association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, which promotes intellectual freedom in libraries. In 1969, she was appointed executive director of its Freedom to Read Foundation, which raises money to further First Amendment issues in court cases.
The issues have changed over time. In December 1980, Ms. Krug’s observation that complaints about the content of books in public libraries had increased fivefold in the month since http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/r/ronald_wilson_reagan/index.html?inline=nyt-per Ronald Reagan was elected president was widely reported. In an interview with The Times, she said that many of the complainants identified themselves as members of Moral Majority, a strongly conservative group, but the Rev. George A. Zarris, chairman of Moral Majority in Illinois, denied there was any organized effort.
But the situation illustrated a frequent conflict in issues over library censorship. Ms. Krug pushed what she often described as a pure view of the First Amendment against what her opponents often said was the democratic will.
“What the library associations are trying to do is make the voice of the people null and void,” said Nancy Czerwiec, a former primary school teacher who led the fight to ban a sex education book from the Oak Lawn Library in Illinois.
That controversy was settled when the library agreed to lend the book only to adults.
Ms. Krug later became a leader in fighting censorship on the Internet, an issue taken up by libraries because many people with no computers at home use library computers. The question involved not just a limited number of books for a particular library’s shelves, but efforts to keep theoretically unlimited amounts of indecent material from children by means of technological filters.
In 1997, an alliance of civil liberties groups, with Ms. Krug a principal organizer, persuaded the http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/s/supreme_court/index.html?inline=nyt-org Supreme Court to strike down the indecency provisions of the Communications Decency Act of 1996.
Jerry Berman, founder and chairman of the Center for Democracy & Technology, which promotes free speech on the Internet, said in a statement, “Her legacy rests in the constitutional challenge that secured the free speech rights for the Internet that we exercise today.”
More recently, Ms. Krug fiercely fought a provision in the http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/u/usa_patriot_act/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier USA Patriot Act that allows federal investigators to peruse library records of who has read what. Former Attorney General http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/a/john_ashcroft/index.html?inline=nyt-per John Ashcroft dismissed protests about the law as “baseless hysteria.”
Judith Rose Fingeret was born in Pittsburgh on March 15, 1940, graduated from the http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/u/university_of_pittsburgh/index.html?inline=nyt-org University of Pittsburgh and earned a master’s degree in library science from the http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/u/university_of_chicago/index.html?inline=nyt-org University of Chicago. She worked as a librarian at the University of Chicago and elsewhere before joining the library association as a research analyst.
In addition to her son, Ms. Krug is survived by her husband, Herbert; her daughter, Michelle Litchman; five grandchildren; her two brothers; and her sister.
Ms. Krug credited her parents as inspiring her passion for free expression. In 2002, she told The Chicago Tribune about reading a sex-education book under the covers with a flashlight when she was 12.
“It was a hot book; I was just panting,” she said, when her mother suddenly threw back the bed covers and asked what she was doing. Judith timidly held up the book.
“She said, ‘For God’s sake, turn on your bedroom light so you don’t hurt your eyes.’ And that was that,” Ms. Krug said. |
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| Boston College Bars Bill Ayers from Speaking on Campus |
[Apr. 1st, 2009|01:32 pm] |
Boston College Bars Bill Ayers from Speaking on Campus
In education news, Boston College has barred University of Illinois professor Bill Ayers from speaking on campus. The former member of the Weather Underground was scheduled to give a speech last night, but it was canceled by school administrators citing safety concerns. The school also prevented Ayers from giving his talk by satellite. Ayers was scheduled to speak about urban schools and educational inequities. Boston College student Melissa Roberts said, “It’s an unconscionable violation of academic freedom on a college campus, which should be a place where all ideas are welcome, not just popular ones."
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/3/31/headlines#11 |
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| "Obama Generation" Filmmakers Gather to Share Views on Art, Activism and Free Speech |
[Mar. 16th, 2009|03:25 pm] |
"Youth Voices Uncensored" to Feature Films By and For Teens on Sexuality, Immigration and Politics
New York, NEW YORK - High school students, educators, and free speech advocates from around the city will gather at the New York Film Academy on Saturday, March 28 for Youth Voices Uncensored, an afternoon of film screenings and discussions about how youth media can address important social and political issues.
"Youth today are transforming our political landscape, and they are doing so largely through the world of film and new media," said Brian Pickett, Youth Program Coordinator for the National Coalition Against Censorship and event organizer. "As technology becomes easier to use and more widely accessible, we are seeing youth video production emerge as a significant way for young people to put a mark on their world."
Young people are finding that posting videos on Youtube, MySpace, and Facebook is an empowering and effective way to advocate for social change, Pickett noted. Further, youth media organizations are playing an important role in expanding the audience for youth-made media and increasing the likelihood that the voices of tomorrow's leaders will be heard today.
The 10 short films to be featured at Youth Voices Uncensored address a wide array of topics: from abstinence-only education and sexuality to racism and immigration. Following the screenings, the filmmakers and audience will take part in an interactive panel discussion. A schedule of the films is available at www.ncac.org/youth-free-expression-network
At the event, NCAC will announce the launch of the 2009 Youth Free Expression Film contest, an annual competition that awards youth filmmakers with cash prizes and a scholarship to the New York Film Academy.
There will also be a special youth theatre performance by CALLE (Creating Artistic Links to Liberation and Expression).
WHO: Youth Voices Uncensored is hosted by the National Coalition Against Censorship's Youth Free Expression Network, in partnership with Global Action Project, Reel Works, and the New York Film Academy.
WHAT: An afternoon of film screenings and discussions about how youth media can transform the way we think about and address important social and political issues. The event is free and open to the public. High school students and media educators are especially encouraged to attend.
WHEN: Saturday, March 28, 2009, 1 - 4 p.m.
WHERE: New York Film Academy, 100 East 17th Street (near Union Square)
Participating organizations:
The National Coalition Against Censorship is a coalition of 50 non-profit organizations dedicated to protecting rights and principles guaranteed by the First Amendment. NCAC's Youth Free Expression Network is a coalition of teens and adults committed to defending free expression rights of youth.
http://www.ncac.org
Since 1991, Global Action Project (G.A.P.) has worked with young people, specifically those most affected by injustice, to build the knowledge, tools, and relationships needed to produce thought-provoking media on issues that affect them and their communities, and use their media for dialogue and to build community power.
http://www.global-action.org/main.html
Reel Works Teen Filmmaking is centered of the conviction that every young person has a story to tell and an important contribution to make our world. We believe that filmmaking holds within it essential disciplines of literacy, communication, creative and critical thinking, storytelling and teamwork that young people need to effectively express their unique visions. We say to teens: You have a voice. Use it!
http://www.reelworks.org/
The New York Film Academy was founded on the philosophy that "learning by doing" combined with best industry practices is more valuable than years of theoretical study for filmmakers and actors. This educational model allows students to achieve more in less time then at any other university, school or institute in the world.
http://www.nyfa.com/
CALLE (Creating Artistic Links to Liberation and Expression) is a bilingual (Spanish/English) street theater project at Art for Change where high school aged youth voice their visions and opinions through theater in an increasingly privatized and segregated city.
http://callenyc.blogspot.com/ |
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| Book Groups, NCAC Protest Topeka Library Restrictions |
[Mar. 4th, 2009|04:53 pm] |
For Immediate Release
Book Groups, NCAC Protest Topeka Library Restrictions
NEW YORK, NY, March 4, 2009 – Groups representing booksellers, publishers, writers and librarians today joined the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) in urging members of the Topeka, Kansas, library board to restore The Joy of Sex and three other sex education books to the open shelves of the library. On Feb. 19, five members of the library board ignored the pleas of the library staff, three other board members, and 14 of the 16 people who spoke during a public hearing and voted to remove The Joy of Sex, The Joy of Gay Sex, The Lesbian Kama Sutra, and Sex for Busy People from the library’s health section because they are allegedly “harmful to minors” under Kansas law. The books are to be made available only at the specific request of adult patrons. “The board’s action violates the central purpose of a library–to provide the material that its patrons want, no matter how controversial,” Chris Finan, president of the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (ABFFE), said.
The letter from ABFFE, NCAC, the Association of American Publishers, PEN American Center and the Freedom to Read Foundation charges that restricting access to the books will discourage adults from requesting them. It also challenges the view that the books are “harmful to minors” simply because some people in the community may consider them so.
The letter is available online at http://www.abffe.com/topekalibrary-letter.htm |
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| Anxiety over causing religious offence limits freedom of speech in the West |
[Feb. 18th, 2009|11:38 am] |
http://www.economist.com/world/international/displaystory.cfm?story_id=13130069
Self-censorship in the West
Speech impediments
Feb 14th 2009
From Economist.com
Anxiety over causing religious offence limits freedom of speech in the West
TWO decades ago, on 14th February 1989, Salman Rushdie received one of history’s most notorious Valentine greetings. Ayatollah Khomeini, then Iran’s Supreme Leader, issued a fatwa (a religious edict) calling for the death of the Indian-born British author in response to his novel, “The Satanic Verses”. Khomeini called on all “intrepid” and “zealous” Muslims to execute the author and publishers, reassuring them that if they were killed in the process, they would be regarded as martyrs.
Rarely had a book stirred up such intense feelings. Hitoshi Igarashi, its Japanese translator, was stabbed to death. Ettore Capriolo, the Italian translator and William Nygaard, the book’s Norwegian publisher, were stabbed and shot respectively, although both survived. Bookshops were bombed and the tome was burned in public across the world. Mr Rushdie, fearing for his life, was forced into hiding.
Horrific though these consequences were, many argued that freedom of speech itself was at stake. To cave in, by withdrawing publication or sale of the work, would represent the crumbling of a defining principle of liberal societies. Britain broke off diplomatic relations with Iran over the threat to kill a British citizen. At no point did Penguin, the original publisher, withdraw the book. It remained possible to argue that Mr Rushdie’s intolerant detractors, despite their violence, had lost their battle.
Yet critics today, such as Kenan Malik, a writer and broadcaster, argue that the detractors have gradually won their war. Mr Malik and others suggest that free speech in the West is in retreat. Other publishers, faced with books that were likely to cause widespread offence, have been less resolute. In 2008 Random House was set to publish “The Jewel of Medina”, a misty-eyed account of romance between Muhammad and his wife Aisha. The firm reversed its decision after a series of security experts and academics cautioned them against publication (one American academic described the work as historically inaccurate “soft core pornography”) warning it would be dangerously offensive. Gibson Square, another publisher, took up the novel and saw its offices firebombed in September 2008, 20 years to the day after the publication of “The Satanic Verses”. “The Jewel of Medina” has since been released in America, but it remains under wraps in Britain.
Other examples of political sensitivity abound. In 2006 the New York Theatre Workshop cancelled a planned production of “My Name is Rachel Corrie”, a play about an American student killed by an Israeli Defence Forces bulldozer. The theatre was concerned that the play would be too controversial in the wake of Ariel Sharon’s collapse into a coma and Hamas’s election victory in the Palestinian territories. In June 2007, the Royal Court Theatre in London cancelled a reading of an adaptation of Artistophanes’s Lysistrata which was set in a Muslim heaven, for fear of causing offence. In 2005, the Barbican in London was accused of excising sections of its production of Tamburlaine to remove scenes attacking Muhammad. And in 2004, the Birmingham Repertory, another British theatre, cancelled a production of Bezhti, a play depicting a rape in a Sikh temple, after protests by members of the local Sikh community.
The most notorious example of the trouble that can be stirred up is the cartoons of Muhammad first published by Jyllands-Posten, a Danish newspaper in 2006. The pictures, one showing Muhammad in bomb-shaped headgear, one with him wielding a cutlass, another saying that paradise was running short of virgins for suicide-bombers, provoked a tumultuous response around the world. Many Western newspapers decided it would be irresponsible to republish the cartoons (The Economist decided not to publish them, but defended the rights of newspapers to do so). Some governments, including those in Britain and America, denounced their publication. To free-speech campaigners, all this was seen as further evidence of self-censorship amid increasing fears of upsetting sensibilities of some Muslims.
This week Geert Wilders, a strident anti-Muslim Dutch politician, was denied entry into Britain where he intended to screen his film, Fitna, a nasty rant against Islam. Mr Wilders was deported on the grounds that his opinions “threaten community harmony and therefore public safety”. The film was anyway shown in Westminster despite dire predictions that as many as 10,000 Muslims would turn out in protest. The fears were wide of the mark: not one person turned up to complain.
Two decades after the fatwa was imposed on Mr Rushdie, it appears that many Western artists, publishers and governments are more willing today to sacrifice some of their freedom of speech than was the case in 1989. To many critics that will be seen as self-censorship that has gone too far. But a difficult balance must be struck: no country permits completely free speech. Typically, it is limited by prohibitions against libel, defamation, obscenity, judicial or parliamentary privilege and the like. Protecting free expression will often require hurting the feelings of individuals or groups; equally the use of free speech should be tempered by a sense of responsibility. But that sense should not serve as a disguise for allowing extremists of any stripe to define what views can or cannot be aired. |
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| Landmark Obscenity Ruling Inspires Free Speech Benefit Fragrance |
[Feb. 18th, 2009|11:27 am] |
February 12, 2009
For Immediate Release
Contact: Charles Brownstein
212.679.7151
mailto:Director@cbldf.org
Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab Creates "Miller v. California"
To Benefit Comic Book Legal Defense Fund
Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab (BPAL), a California based manufacturer of specialty fragrances, has announced the release of 413 U.S. 15/Miller Vs. California, a limited edition perfume to benefit the First Amendment legal work of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund!
Based on the landmark 1974 court ruling, Miller v. California is a playful scent designed to evoke both prurient and cultured senses. The perfume oil contains aromas of leather, cognac, fig, ripe berry, and cream, and is stuffed into a plain brown paper bag.
BPAL head Beth Barrial says, "For Valentine's Day last year, we debuted a series of Shunga scents, based on classic Japanese erotica, and I was working on a second series for this year. As I researched the art, I got to thinking about porn and obscenity and freedom of speech, and that led me to want to create a scent to celebrate it. And who best to share in the proceeds than the CBLDF, because we love those guys and everything they stand for."
Miller Vs. California continues BPAL's work for the CBLDF, which began as a series of fragrances based upon the works of bestselling author Neil Gaiman. Since establishing their line of Neil Gaiman fragrances in 2006 BPAL has contributed over $58,000 to the CBLDF.
413 U.S. 15/Miller Vs. California, will be available until March 13 and can be ordered from http://blackphoenixalchemylab.com/limited.html
"We're always grateful to Beth and her team at BPAL for their extraordinary support," says CBLDF Executive Director Charles Brownstein. "Miller v. California is the most recent manifestation of their tremendous creativity, and will make an impact on our work to aid the defense of manga collector http://www.cbldf.org/pr/archives/000372.shtml Christopher Handley, who faces criminal charges for mere possession of comics."
About Comic Book Legal Defense Fund: The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund was founded in 1986 as a 501 (c) 3 non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation of First Amendment rights for members of the comics community. They have defended dozens of Free Expression cases in courts across the United States, and led important education initiatives promoting comics literacy and free expression. For additional information, donations, and other inquiries call 800-99-CBLDF or visit them online at http://www.cbldf.org/
About BPAL: Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab specializes in formulating intriguing, compelling body and household blends with a dark, romantic, and sexual tone. Their scents run the aesthetic gamut of romance era, Renaissance, Medieval and Victorian formulas, pagan and mythological blends, and horror / Gothic-themed scents. They have over two decades of experience in the field, and their joy is their work. All of their products are hand-blended in their laboratory. |
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| Michigan State Drops ‘Spamming’ Complaint Against Student Critic of Administration |
[Feb. 4th, 2009|12:26 pm] |
Michigan State Drops ‘Spamming’ Complaint Against Student Critic of Administration
EAST LANSING, Mich., January 28, 2009—In a significant victory for freedom of expression on campus, Michigan State University has withdrawn “spamming” charges against a student government leader who criticized administration plans in an e-mail to professors. MSU junior Kara Spencer had carefully selected and e-mailed eight percent of MSU’s 5,000 faculty members, encouraging them to express their views about proposed changes to the academic calendar. Spencer’s cause has been supported by the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) and a dozen other civil liberties organizations.
“Michigan State did the right thing by withdrawing its bogus ‘spam’ charges against a student leader who was simply exercising her rights,” FIRE President Greg Lukianoff said. “Now MSU needs to suspend its unconstitutional spam policy so that students like Kara cannot be punished for responsibly engaging the MSU community. Of course, FIRE would be happy to advise MSU about pitfalls to avoid while crafting an effective spam policy, but the existing policy must go as soon as possible.”
Spencer’s ordeal began last semester when MSU’s administration revealed plans to shorten the school’s academic calendar and freshman orientation schedule. The http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/9988.html controversial plans led members of the University Committee on Student Affairs (UCSA), a committee comprised of students, faculty and administrators, to meet and exchange http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/9989.html e-mails in mid-September to construct a formal response. Spencer, a member of the committee, is Association Director of the student government.
On September 14, Spencer told UCSA that she would send individual faculty her own version of its letter. Spencer carefully selected 391 faculty members—roughly eight percent of MSU’s faculty—and e-mailed them http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/9992.html her version of UCSA’s letter, arguing that the proposed changes “will greatly affect both faculty and students alike” and calling for “an inclusive dialogue among members of the University community.”
Two days later, MSU Network Administrator Randall J. Hall http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/9993.html summoned Spencer to a mandatory “investigation” meeting. The next day, Hall http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/9991.html alleged that Spencer had violated as many as five MSU policies by sending what he called unauthorized “spam.” After Spencer requested a hearing before the Student-Faculty Judiciary, FIRE http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/9987.html wrote to MSU President Lou Anna K. Simon, calling on her to end the unconstitutional investigation. MSU chose to proceed with the hearing, however, and Simon erroneously http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/10010.html claimed that the policy was acceptable because it was “content neutral.” In fact, MSU’s vague spam http://lct.msu.edu/guidelines-policies/bulkemail.html policy prohibits sending unsolicited e-mail to more than about 20–30 recipients over two days without prior permission and bans all such e-mails when they are “personal” or “political.”
Despite the fact that her e-mail was timely, carefully targeted, and concerned a campus issue, Spencer was http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/10019.html found guilty of violating MSU’s “spam” policy. A formal “Warning” was placed in Spencer’s file, hurting her chances of obtaining employment or attending graduate school.
In response to the unjustifiable prosecution of Spencer, thirteen civil liberties organizations, led by FIRE and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), wrote http://www.thefire.org/pdfs/563763864da70ad7c8048a790c4fd153.pdf an open letter to President Simon on December 17 challenging both the policy and its application against Spencer. FIRE also highlighted MSU’s absurd prosecution of Spencer in its Inauguration Day http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/10141.html letter to President Barack Obama asking him to help fight campus speech codes.
Spencer http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/10150.html appealed her punishment in January 2009. In the wake of Spencer’s submission of her appeal and the open letter from FIRE, EFF, and other civil liberties organizations, Spencer learned Thursday that the charges had been “ http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/10162.html withdrawn by the Complainant(s).” An attorney for Michigan State told FIRE that Spencer’s warning will be removed from her file and that students in Spencer’s position will not be referred for disciplinary action while the university is reviewing the policy. However, Michigan State has so far refused to suspend or revoke the unconstitutional policy, leaving students under the impression that it is still enforced.
“Withdrawing the complaint comports with the First Amendment, fairness, and common sense,” Will Creeley, FIRE’s Director of Legal and Public Advocacy, said. “However, every day this policy and other unconstitutional policies remain on the books is a day when MSU is abridging the rights of over 45,000 students. FIRE and the Electronic Frontier Foundation will be keeping the pressure on Michigan State to ensure that this unconstitutional policy is reformed.”
Until the unconstitutional policy is suspended or revoked, Michigan State will remain on FIRE’s Red Alert list of the worst offenders against campus liberty, together with four other schools that FIRE believes prospective students should avoid in order to protect their rights: http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/9641.html/print>Brandeis University, http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/9639.html/print Colorado College, http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/9649.html/print Johns Hopkins University, and http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/9648.html/print Tufts University.
FIRE is a nonprofit educational foundation that unites civil rights and civil liberties leaders, scholars, journalists, and public intellectuals across the political and ideological spectrum on behalf of individual rights, due process rights, freedom of expression, and rights of conscience on our nation’s campuses. FIRE’s efforts to preserve liberty at Michigan State University and elsewhere can be seen by visiting http://www.thefire.org>www.thefire.org.
CONTACT:
Will Creeley, Director of Legal and Public Advocacy, FIRE: 215-717-3473; <mailto:will@thefire.org
Lou Anna K. Simon, President, Michigan State University: 517-355-6560; <mailto:presmail@msu.edu |
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| A small town's plea to the US Supreme Court raises a number of big-theory constitutional questions. |
[Feb. 4th, 2009|12:18 pm] |
A small town's plea to the US Supreme Court raises a number of big-theory constitutional questions.
Its being reported that lawmakers in Sugar City, Iowa, wrote to the Justices urging them to reconsider the constitutional protection given some forms of adult entertainment. Judicial decisions that prohibit municipalities from banning adult entertainment outright, they said, "severely handicapped the community's efforts to retain a morally and aesthetically satisfying environment."
Like municipalities across the country, the city council had recently amended its zoning laws to prohibit new venues from popping up next to schools, churches, parks and the like. Though the Supreme Court has endorsed such measures, the city council considers zoning restrictions a less desirable, albeit constitutional, fall back to the more preferable strategy of prohibiting such establishments in the first place.
http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/firstamendment/2009/02/obscenity-free.html |
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| Court backs school's punishment of student for off-site writing |
[Jan. 21st, 2009|12:05 pm] |
Court backs school's punishment of student for off-site writing
Associated Press
"Burlington school officials acted within their rights to discipline a
student for an Internet posting she wrote off school grounds, a
federal judge has ruled. US District Court Judge Mark Kravitz rejected
Avery Doninger's claim that administrators at Lewis B. Mills High
School violated her rights of free speech and equal protection. She
also alleged they inflicted emotional distress when they barred her
from serving as class secretary because of the 2007 posting, which
criticized the administrators for canceling a popular school
activity." (01/19/09)
http://tinyurl.com/8nx342 |
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| Supreme Court won't revive online content law |
[Jan. 21st, 2009|11:58 am] |
WASHINGTON (AP) — The government has lost its final attempt to revive a federal law intended to protect children from sexual material and other objectionable content on the Internet.
The Supreme Court, in an order Wednesday, said it won't consider reviving the Child Online Protection Act, which lower federal courts struck down as unconstitutional. The law has been embroiled in court challenges since it passed in 1998 and never took effect.
Full story at: <http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iQBB5KuH04ldwSqw_2t8YhHpZKIQD95RJMK80 |
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| Booksellers Concerned by Oregon Decision |
[Jan. 14th, 2009|10:23 am] |
For Immediate Release
Booksellers Concerned by Oregon Decision
NEW YORK, NY, January 7, 2009 – The American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (ABFFE), the bookseller’s voice in the fight against censorship, today expressed concern about a federal judge’s recent decision upholding an Oregon law that could restrict the sale of books, magazines and other material to minors. In April, ABFFE joined six Oregon booksellers and others in challenging the law because it lacks the procedural safeguards that have been written into the laws of every other state in compliance with U.S. Supreme Court decisions. However, U.S. District Court Judge Michael W. Mosman declared in an opinion issued on Dec. 12 that the Oregon law contains provisions that offer comparable protections. “We disagree with Judge Mosman,” ABFFE President Chris Finan said. “We believe that the Oregon law does not provide the explicit guidelines that booksellers and others need in determining whether they may be committing an illegal act.”
The law makes it a misdemeanor punishable by up to one year in jail to allow a minor under 13 to view or purchase a “sexually explicit” work. It also makes it a crime to furnish anyone under 18 with a visual representation or verbal description of sexual conduct for the purpose of arousing or satisfying the sexual desire of the person or the minor.
In his opinion, Mosman acknowledged that the law does not meet the precise terms of the test established by the Supreme Court: it does not require that the work be patently offensive or appeal to prurient interest or that it be considered as a whole. There is also no protection for material that has serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value.
However, Mosman noted that the law contains an exception for “material the sexually explicit portions of which form merely an incidental part of an otherwise non-offending whole and serve some purpose other than titillation.” Read together with other portions of Oregon law, the judge held that this exception provides protections that are functionally equivalent to the Supreme Court test. The law would only apply to those who intentionally sought to sexually arouse a minor, he said.
Booksellers continue to believe that the law does not provide clear guidelines for determining what material is prohibited. For example, would it be a crime to allow a 12-year-old to view a book with a single sexual image even if it is a work of sex education intended for minors? Could a clerk be arrested for selling a romance novel to a 17-year-old? Without clear answers to these questions, booksellers would be forced to stop selling such material, depriving both adults and minors of works they have a First Amendment right to receive.
Attorneys for the plaintiffs will meet soon to decide whether to appeal the decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
The Oregon booksellers participating in the challenge are Powell’s Books, Annie Bloom’s Books, St. John’s Booksellers and 23rd Avenue Books, all located in Portland; Paulina Springs Books, which has stores in Sisters and Redmond, and Colette’s Good Food + Hungry Minds in North Bend.
The other plaintiffs are the Association of American Publishers, the Freedom to Read Foundation, the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, Planned Parenthood of the Columbia/Willamette, Inc., Cascade AIDS Project, the American Civil Liberties Union of Oregon and Candace Morgan.
For further information, contact: Chris Finan, American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression, (917) 509-0340 |
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