Tag: free expression

Middle schooler kicked out of school for wearing t-shirt saying ‘There are only two genders’ has his day in court: Lawyer blasts school that ‘teaches there are unlimited genders’ for ‘censoring’ youngster

A Massachusetts student who was allegedly kicked out of his school for wearing a t-shirt with words stating that there are only two genders has appeared in court over the ordeal.

Liam Morrison, who is now in the eighth grade, claimed his father had to pick him up from John T. Nichols Jr. Middle School, in March when he refused to change.

His parents filed a federal free speech lawsuit against the town of Middleborough, the previous acting school principal Heather Tucker, the Middleborough School Committee and Middleborough Public Schools superintendent Carolyn J. Lyons.

Morrison appeared at the US Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit in Boston on Thursday wearing the same controversial ‘there are only two genders’ t-shirt.

He claims that by forcing him to change out of the shirt, the school district was stifling his First Amendment right to free speech and said officials ‘took away my ability to have a different opinion’.

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Oklahoma proposal would make watching porn a felony, ban sexting outside marriage

An Oklahoma state senator has proposed a law that would make watching pornography a felony and ban sexting among people who are not married.

The bill, set to be introduced next month by state Sen. Dusty Deevers (R-Elgin), would prohibit consuming or producing sexual content that “lacks serious literary, artistic, educational, political, or scientific purposes or value” in any medium.

The measure defines “obscene material” as the depiction or description of any “acts of sexual intercourse,” including those that are “normal or perverted, actual or simulated.”

Content depicting sodomy and masturbation would also be off the table, in addition to videos, movies, video games and text messages that involve “sadomasochistic abuse” and “acts of excretion in a sexual context.”

Under the measure, pictures of human genitals or women’s breasts would also be banned as well as “lewd exhibition” of the “buttocks.”

It would carry prison sentences of up to a year and $2,000 fines.

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The RESTRICT act aims to tackle TikTok. But it’s overly-broad and has major privacy and free speech implications.

Senator Mark Warner’s Restricting the Emergence of Security Threats that Risk Information and Communications Technology (“RESTRICT”) Act is currently in Senate procedure, as is widely thought to be targeting China‘s TikTok in particular.

However, those who bothered to read the text of the proposed act – which will next be considered by the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, are warning that it is not merely about TikTok, but aims to grant wide powers over all forms of domestic and foreign communications to the government – such as enforcing “any” mitigating measure to deal with risks to national security.

We obtained a copy of the bill for you here.

And, observers critical of these legislative activities note, there would be no due process in taking these measures, and not much in terms of safeguards.

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Grants Reveal Feds’ Horrific Plans To Censor Americans’ Speech

Our government is preparing to monitor every word Americans say on the internet—the speech of journalists, politicians, religious organizations, advocacy groups, and even private citizens. Should those conversations conflict with the government’s viewpoint about what is in the best interests of our country and her citizens, that speech will be silenced.

While the “Twitter Files” offer a glimpse into the government’s efforts to censor disfavored viewpoints, what we have seen is nothing compared to what is planned, as the details of hundreds of federal awards lay bare. Research by The Federalist reveals our tax dollars are funding the development of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine-learning (ML) technology that will allow the government to easily discover “problematic” speech and track Americans reading or partaking in such conversations.

Then, in partnership with Big Tech, Big Business, and media outlets, the government will ensure the speech is censored, under the guise of combatting “misinformation” and “disinformation.”

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A Taxonomy of Fear

We live in a time of personal timorousness and collective mercilessness.

There might seem to be a contradiction between being fearful and fearless, between weighing every word you say and attacking others with abandon. But as more and more topics become too risky to discuss outside of the prevailing orthodoxies, it makes sense to constantly self-censor, feeling unbound only when part of a denunciatory pack.

Institutions that are supposed to be guardians of free expression—academia and journalism in particular—are becoming enforcers of conformity. Campuses have bureaucracies that routinely undermine free speech and due process. Now, these practices are breaching the ivy wall. They are coming to a high school or corporate HR office near you.

The cultural rules around hot button issues are ever-expanding. It’s as if a daily script went out describing what’s acceptable, and those who flub a line—or don’t even know a script exists—are rarely given the benefit of the doubt, no matter how benign their intent. Naturally, people are deciding the best course is to shut up. It makes sense to be part of the silenced majority when the price you pay for an errant tweet or remark can be the end of your livelihood.

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