Nine different student groups at Lewis & Clark Law School wrote a letter calling for an end to free speech “when it has a negative and violent impact on other individuals,” especially when that speech is “fascism … under the guise of ‘open debate’ and ‘free discourse.’”
The letter, which was signed by the school’s Young Democratic Socialists of America, the Women’s Law Caucus, and the Immigration Student Group, called on readers to “refuse fascism in all its forms.”
The letter cites specific cases on the Lewis & Clark campus, such as when “the Federalist Society found it necessary to unilaterally invite a known fascist to our campus to encourage what we believe to be an act of aggression and violence toward members of our society who experience racial and gendered oppression.”
The letter also called on the Federalist Society to rescind their invitation to have author and philosopher Christina Hoff Sommers speak on campus.
“We live in an age where we have come to an understanding of how power works: those calling for ‘debate’ of marginalized people’s humanity fail to recognize how unevenly political power is able to be wielded. We now understand how language works, and how it can be used to reproduce the systems of oppression we know we must resist at all costs,” the letter states.
“Instead of recognizing this and moving forward, some in our community choose to remain in denial of this truth and stifle progress in an attempt to preserve the status quo,” the letter continues. “Free speech is certainly an important tenet to a free, healthy society, but that freedom stops when it has a negative and violent impact on other individuals. There is no debate here.”
The Federalist Society refused to rescind their invitation and Sommers spoke on Monday until protesters inside the venue cut the event short.
The nine groups authoring the anti-speech letter concluded with a pointed message: Students should protest speech deemed as “male-supremacy” and “not invite it to our school” or “offer it a platform.”
Lewis and Clark Law School did not respond to a request for comment in time for publication.
Peter Van Voorhis (@RepublicanPeter) is a conservative activist, commentator, and journalist who focuses on political issues affecting millennials.
