Morgan State Journalism Dean: Free Speech Doesn’t Protect Offensive Images of Mohammad
This is a journalism dean. He has a weird interpretation of the first amendment.
Alexandra Zimmern of the College Fix reported.
Journalism dean: Free speech doesn’t protect offensive images of Mohammad
Free speech attorney says scholar is way off the mark
DeWayne Wickham, dean and distinguished professor of journalism at Morgan State University, published an editorial this week in USA Today that essentially argues free speech rights should not and do not give people the right to make fun of Mohammad.
He argues that Charlie Hebdo, in its latest cartoon image of Mohammed, has “gone too far.” The “offensive depiction of Mohammed” should not constitute free speech, the journalism professor suggested.
The College Fix reached out to Wickham via email to confirm whether he was suggesting that the First Amendment does not protect insulting Mohammad. He replied that interpretation was incorrect but did not elaborate, nor respond to follow-up emails.
The image he referenced in his op-ed appeared on the cover of Charlie Hebdo only days after the attack on its office in Paris earlier this month, when radical Islamists killed 12 people. The image shows the prophet crying under a headline: “All is Forgiven.”
Wickham suggested in his op-ed that the Charlie Hebdo cartoon is to blame for several violent riots that have occurred in the Arab world following its release. He then proceeded to call for broad limits on free speech, basing his argument in his understandings of U.S. Supreme Court rulings, writing that:
… given the possible ripple effects of Charlie Hebdo‘s mistreatment of Islam’s most sacred religious figure, at least people in this country should understand the limits America’s highest court has placed on free speech.
In 1919, the Supreme Court ruled speech that presents a “clear and present danger” is not protected by the First Amendment. Crying “fire” in a quiet, uninhabited place is one thing, the court said. But “the most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man in falsely shouting fire in a theater and causing a panic.”
Journalism dean: Free speech doesn’t protect offensive images of Mohammad (The College Fix)
Comments
Free speech is free speech. There are no qualifiers.
This idiot journalist shows just why we have problems in the US. If you put restrictions on what people can say about other people, then you have no free speech. Crying fire in a crowded theater is not the same thing. When a reporter or professor of journalism bends the interpretation of free speech, they give up their rights as journalists. You cannot trust people who give their own opinions about basic rights. This fool must be fired and never let near a publication or school.
You might want to think that position over a bit. Professor Wickham wants limits placed on your free speech, and you want him fired for exercising his. In point of fact, you’re saying the same thing he is; is that really what you wanted to convey to us?
That is exactly what it DOES protect–speech that somebody doesn’t like is the soul of the matter.