The First Amendment to the United States Constitution may be the most famous and oft-cited modification to our country̢۪s establishing document that exists. Famous debates have abounded over the second, fourth, 14th and 21st (which repealed the 18th), but none can top the ongoing storm of the first.
Students, faculty and staff of California State University, Fresno get a daily dose of the amendment̢۪s effects as we pass through the designated campus Free Speech Area.
And as we know all too well, beneath the marvelous, shiny cry of “free speech for all!â€Â is the reality that this amendment protects the most offensive, unpopular and often annoying forms of speech in existence.
People walking through our Free Speech Area are frequently subjected to the infamous crazy preachers, as well as people who yell about legalized marijuana, people who want us to work at Target, unending public displays of what Greek life is like, petitions for all manner of political action you may or may not have any clue about, tracts for upstart Bible studies, Mormon missionaries, fliers for local bars and clubs, sidewalk chalk, club booths and, last Wednesday, a giant poster of the President of the United States sporting a Hitler mustache.
If, as comedian Dave Chappelle once mused, the Internet were a real place, the “free speech areaâ€Â would be where pop-up advertisements lurk. In just trying to get to a desired location students are subject to an influx of information that is, by and large, a frustrating waste of our time and energy.
The very concept of a designated free speech area has been successfully challenged at schools such as West Virginia University and New Mexico State University on the basis of their oxymoronic nature, e.g. because they stipulate that free speech does not exist in other areas.
Free speech areas do serve a useful purpose in keeping protests from disrupting class instruction and other university functions, but Fresno State̢۪s has become an area for annoyance. So, short of eliminating the free speech area, perhaps it could be referred to under a different name.
The name “Free Speech Areaâ€Â seems to explicitly call for fringe elements to have open season on whoever is passing through. It begs for harassing and hate-filled discourse to be spewed at passers-by.
Historically, the Supreme Court of the United States has been no kinder to compelled (forced) speech as it has to limits on free speech.
It would be too much to say that the Free Speech Area compels people to unpopular speech, but it certainly does have a way of bringing odd forms of expression to the forefront.
What keeps most individuals from spouting unpopular speech at strangers is not law, but the common knowledge that most people just don̢۪t want to hear it.
Regardless of what the area is referred to as, and irrespective of where you are as you read this, allow The Collegian to make this clear: when walking through the center of campus, we just don̢۪t want to hear it.
fyi • Oct 7, 2009 at 10:42 am
seriously you contradicted everything you wrote about…mention of free speech in our consitution..we have a free speech area specifically designed for that! if you don’t want to hear it theres a secret nobody knows…you’re ready…you can actually walk away!!!
fyi • Oct 7, 2009 at 5:42 pm
seriously you contradicted everything you wrote about…mention of free speech in our consitution..we have a free speech area specifically designed for that! if you don’t want to hear it theres a secret nobody knows…you’re ready…you can actually walk away!!!
Jared Harper • Oct 3, 2009 at 4:07 pm
TERRY is correct.
This is the most idiotic piece of writing ever. Whoever wrote it, sadly needs help. this one person who seems to speak for all of the Collegian staff shows the brains of the Collegian.
You are afraid of free speech. The campus administration has put in place so many restrictions that force all people who want to do free speech, have to do it in the free speech area. Get it? Or is it still unclear to you? Whoever wrote this , it was waste of free speech rhetoric.
You are writing on the wrong topic. Next time write a column on how the administration on this campus has restricted free speech so much that it generally has diminished the true meaning of free speech, but then again you wont know about free speech because you would have researched the campus policy book that confines it and realized “Oh dang never mind i dont want to look dumb, I get it now…thats why theres always free speech there, and thats why its so annoying and bothersome”
Duh! its called the free speech area for a reason. Administration doesn’t allow for free speech anywhere else. Go after admin and tell them to open up all areas of campus to free speech, that way your ears wont be crying about how you dont want to hear about it. Rookie.
Jared Harper • Oct 3, 2009 at 11:07 pm
TERRY is correct.
This is the most idiotic piece of writing ever. Whoever wrote it, sadly needs help. this one person who seems to speak for all of the Collegian staff shows the brains of the Collegian.
You are afraid of free speech. The campus administration has put in place so many restrictions that force all people who want to do free speech, have to do it in the free speech area. Get it? Or is it still unclear to you? Whoever wrote this , it was waste of free speech rhetoric.
You are writing on the wrong topic. Next time write a column on how the administration on this campus has restricted free speech so much that it generally has diminished the true meaning of free speech, but then again you wont know about free speech because you would have researched the campus policy book that confines it and realized “Oh dang never mind i dont want to look dumb, I get it now…thats why theres always free speech there, and thats why its so annoying and bothersome”
Duh! its called the free speech area for a reason. Administration doesn’t allow for free speech anywhere else. Go after admin and tell them to open up all areas of campus to free speech, that way your ears wont be crying about how you dont want to hear about it. Rookie.
Terry Francke • Oct 2, 2009 at 10:37 pm
I don’t suppose it’s occurred to anyone there that creating a confined area for “free” speech creates a concentrated Hyde Park impact, and that allowing speech throughout the campus would distribute and reduce its potential to irritate people like you. If you allow your school to make most of the campus a speech-free zone then you shouldn’t whine because you have to run the gauntlet of unwanted advocacy that results from that zoning.
Terry Francke • Oct 3, 2009 at 5:37 am
I don’t suppose it’s occurred to anyone there that creating a confined area for “free” speech creates a concentrated Hyde Park impact, and that allowing speech throughout the campus would distribute and reduce its potential to irritate people like you. If you allow your school to make most of the campus a speech-free zone then you shouldn’t whine because you have to run the gauntlet of unwanted advocacy that results from that zoning.