Two Columns Defending Randa Jarrar

Randa Jarrar is the CSU Fresno professor who created a national controversy by tweeting vile things about Barbara Bush. Following an initial affirmation of the First Amendment, the Fresno State president has now announced an "investigation" of Jarrar in which "all options" are on the table. With one exception (which I will address presently), the investigation should lead nowhere because Jarrar's extramural speech is indeed protected both by tenure and the First Amendment (and probably her union contract, too).  As explained by AAUP vice president Henry Reichman,

While it is true that tenure does not permit faculty members to say or do whatever they want, it does clearly protect the specific statements that this faculty member made, however much the administration or anyone else, myself included, may find them offensive.

Two national columnists have defended Jarrar, one from the left and the other from the right.  In the New York Times, Michelle Goldberg writes, 

In comparing left-wing and right-wing transgressions against free speech, there’s a danger of getting into an escalating cycle of whataboutism, in which the silencing of one side becomes an excuse for silencing the other. This is a mistake. Ultimately, if the power of the First Amendment is eroded on college campuses, it’s the people with the least power who have the most to lose.

The uproar around Jarrar shows how easily arguments for speech restrictions can be turned against progressives. Writing to The Fresno Bee, an infuriated alumnus of Fresno State called for her firing: “Hiding behind freedom of speech doesn’t work anymore. Just as professors are fired for making racist or insensitive comments, she should meet the same fate.” To explain why she shouldn’t, people on the left need to rediscover the right to offend.

Writing in the Washington Post, Megan McCardle makes the same point from right-of-center:

This commitment to mutually assured destruction is stupid, dangerous and frankly un-American. Conservatives who are rushing to make Jarrar’s tenure the next battlefield in this partisan warfare with a piercing war cry of “Turnabout is fair play!” need to ask themselves whether the fight will leave them weaker or stronger when it’s over. And then they need to ask themselves the vital question that seems to have slipped everybody’s mind: “Do I want to win the last battle — or the next one?”

 In fact, McCardle goes further, which brings us to the exception I mentioned above.  In addition to insulting the Bush family, Jarrar also invited her critics to call her on the phone -- but the number she provided was actually the suicide hotline at Arizona State University.  That was an act of sheer vandalism, which resulted in tying up the hotline and potentially preventing its use by students in crisis. Suicide hotlines need to remain open for a reason, and shutting it down foreseeably risked the health and well-being of an indeterminable number of individuals. Although posting the hotline number was the equivalent of shouting fire in a theater, McCardle nonetheless argues against sanctioning Jarrar:

 Now, there is one thing that might give us pause: that tweet about the suicide hotline. That wasn’t a political statement about a person of public interest; it was something akin to vandalism — tying up resources at another school as they are forced to deal with whomever calls. So Fresno State, and conservatives who want to support them, can say, “See, this isn’t about academic freedom, it’s about misconduct.” They could then happily move on to separating Jarrar from her tenured position and her $100,000 salary and her sense of overweening entitlement.

They could, but they shouldn’t. Not because that tweet wasn’t wrong, but because the punishment is all out of proportion to the offense. Let’s be honest: If pointing people to another campus’s suicide hotline had been her only violation against decency, how many of the people currently calling for her head would be demanding that Fresno State fire one of its professors for what amounted to a dumb prank?

None, that’s how many. Her would-be executioners are using that tweet as a pretext to litigate other grievances — and in the process, they’re damaging something much more important than the grievance they’re trying to avenge.

If there is any value about which the right and left ought to agree, it is freedom of speech, which makes the Goldberg and McCardle columns so welcome in difficult times. (And Reichman, too.)

 

Comments

[Deep State Special Legal Counsel]

Golly, if your going to call someone names, like President Trump a dotard, you better be the Leader of North Korea, Colbert or me posting at the Knights Inn's public Wi-Fi, using a handle with a dummy email address. Seriously, why not say something nice about Barr? In retrospect, except for Willie Horton and barfing all over the Japanese Prime minister trying to peddle Chevy Cavaliers, he was a credit to our Nation. He passed NAGPRA, ADA and toughened up diesel truck emissions.

[Enrique Guerra-Pujol]

Off point: whatever happened to the academic ideal of civility?

[Deep State Special Legal Counsel]

^^^^^Don't be so POLITICALLY CORRECT, you LIBERAL snow flake.^^^