Now, is it shamelessly crass and inappropriate to compare the Parkland incident and aftermath with, say, CUNY Law Students protesting 4th-tier conservative speak-guru Josh Blackman? Sure, but fuck it, the LSTC is going to do it anyway in the right honorable spirit of law school rhetoric.
Just look at these bold stallions of maximum horsepower justice, these charging mustang worms in the Big Apple:
Blackman, an associate professor at the South Texas College of Law in Houston, supported Donald Trump's decision to rescind Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA)...But Blackman supports the DREAM Act, which would grant residency status to many of these same people.How dare the law school administration at a public institution permit peaceable assembly and a frank exchange of views on the legality of executive action. How reckless!
That distinction mattered little to the student activists who crashed Blackman's event last month, calling him a racist and white supremacist. Blackman was merely "gaslighting" them, they said. They accused CUNY of giving a platform to an oppressor. They tweeted, "My existence > your opinion." They heckled Blackman, making it impossible for him to deliver his prepared remarks. A productive conversation was possible only after the activists left the room, furious that the administration had threatened to discipline them.
Sometimes on my darkest days, when the first options in the liquor cabinet have been depleted and mom has taken the car elsewhere, I think these little rat-bastards deserve whatever cruel fate befalls them in the labor market - which, let's be honest, the worst seat on the Million Dollar Express still has bottle service and free cashews. But then I read stories like this - mature, reflective takes on the First Amendment - and I think it's all going to be a-okay!
Just as the Parkland/Stoneman Douglas kids have showed us that yes, we can talk about gun control in the immediate "thoughts and prayers" period of mourning after a senseless slaughter, CUNY students are showing us the way on the First Amendment and obstreperous protests that accomplish nothing but ego-stroking. As a Kantian maxim: If I think your position is reprehensible, you have no right to speak. It's so simple; how didn't Thomas Jefferson think of that? In any event, it's crucial that we lawyers incorporate this approach to free speech under the First Amendment in our daily practices. No, judge, my existence is greater than your opinion!
Clearly, conservative-ish viewpoints are just going to clog the way of conducive learning at America's law schools. After years of trolling law schools, The Federalist Society has finally - FINALLY - been caught red-handed for what they are. Thanks, CUNY, for your tireless efforts. Let's purge and jail the malcontents.
The First Amendment isn't a tricky legal concept...until you start demanding it while refusing its protection to others. Then it becomes the sort of nuanced dance in which lawyers excel.
That's all for today. It's Friday, April 13, so drink until you see ghosts, enroll a dead person for the tuition check, and scam on.
Hey CUNY law students, which of the following constitutes a greater threat to your actual physical "existence," i.e. long-term survival?
ReplyDeleteA. Somebody expresses opinions that you strongly disagree with-- even opinions that you consider bigoted. Of course, you didn't actually have to go to the event where the person expressed these offensive opinions, but morality compelled you to protest in the person's presence, with whatever risk to your existence that entailed.
B. You are deceived into spending hundreds of thousands of borrowed nondischargeable dollars and expending three years of your life on an educational scam that teaches you little of practical use, but that traps you in a profession that is flooded, stressful, insecure, disrespected, unforgiving, under-compensated, credential-obsessed, precedent-bound, and notable for sky-high levels of depression, isolation, and substance abuse. The people who have gotten rich by scamming you sometimes piously remind you that you have a special obligations to use your privilege in service to humanity. See e.g. Katie Redford, Attention, Law Students: Our Country and Our Planet Need You to Lead, 69 Stan. L. Rev. 1831 (2017).