The war in Israel and Gaza has unleashed a wave of censorship and suppression in the United States—including by government agencies and officials, university administrators, private companies, and cultural institutions. In season 2 of “Views on First: War & Speech,” host Jameel Jaffer talks to scholars, writers, advocates, and others about whether our system of free speech is failing us, and, if it is, why that’s so. How repressive is the climate we’re living in, really? Are there historical precedents for it? And how might the events unfolding now shift free speech culture and the boundaries of the First Amendment?
Read more about this season here.
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Episode One: How Repressive Is this Moment, Really?
Jameel Jaffer talks with Genevieve Lakier, professor of law at the University of Chicago Law School and one of the country’s leading theorists of free speech, about the climate for speech in the United States relating to the war in Israel and Gaza. How repressive is this moment, really? Is the First Amendment failing us? And what imprint will the events unfolding now leave on free speech law and culture?
Further Reading
An Open Letter to the Deans of U.S. Law Schools
Episode Two: Campus Speech in the Shadow of the War
Jameel Jaffer talks with Eugene Volokh, distinguished professor of law at UCLA and soon-to-be senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, about free speech on campus in the shadow of the war in Israel and Gaza. They discuss whether administrators should ban what some students describe as calls for genocide and consider what can be done to protect the space for dissent.
Further Reading
Symposium addresses complexity of free expression, law
When Are Lies Constitutionally Protected?
Episode Three: A Climate of Repression and Fear
Radhika Sainath, senior staff attorney at Palestine Legal, talks with Jameel Jaffer about the climate for speech supportive of Palestinians, defining discrimination, and the “Palestine Exception” to the First Amendment.
Episode Four: Campus Speech, Double Standards, and Discrimination
Jameel Jaffer returns to the issue of free speech on campus with Will Creeley, legal director at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE). They talk about “cancellations” before and after October 7, the difference between free speech law and free speech culture, and the free speech implications of Title VI, the law that requires universities to take action against discriminatory harassment.
Further Reading
Free Speech, Identity, and Power, by Gara LaMarche
IHRA's Working Definition of Antisemitism
Season Credits
Producer: Candace White
Host: Jameel Jaffer
Production assistant and audio editor: Isabel Adler
Researcher, writer, and fact checker: Hannah Vester
Sound design and audio post-production services: Room 3
Artwork: Astrid Da Silva