Terrain Biennial 2025 starts tomorrow, and Trumpy Poopins is all hung up - so come on down!
TB25 - Bolingbrook, IL — Terrain Exhibitions
White House fires many members of the National Council on the Humanities | Reuters
'At a moment when the government is using every tool at its disposal to push ideological conformity, here are five reminders about your First Amendment rights:
The First Amendment protects the rights to free speech, belief, and association. The government may not retaliate against people or groups because they are criticizing someone’s political views — especially when the government is trying to silence views it doesn’t like.
Censorship doesn’t change minds, but open conversation and debate do. To protect public debate, the First Amendment prohibits the government from punishing speech even when it is controversial or offensive. The Supreme Court put it best in Texas v. Johnson (1989): “If there is a bedrock principle underlying the First Amendment, it is that the government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable.” Without that level of protection, any “debate” would be stale and stilted, taking away the opportunity for people to discuss ideas, persuade others, or make up their own minds.
American law does not recognize “hate speech” as a legal category. While the First Amendment does not protect incitement — speech that is intended and likely to cause imminent violence, as established in Brandenburg v. Ohio, litigated by the ACLU — or true threats, an expression of a serious intent to commit a violent act against another person, speech considered to be hateful is not enough to qualify. Indeed, whether speech is hateful is typically a matter of opinion. As Supreme Court Justice John Marshall Harlan II said in Cohen v. California (1971), “one man’s vulgarity is another man’s lyric.” Posting an offensive joke or condemning someone else’s views in harsh terms is generally protected by the First Amendment, regardless of how much someone else doesn’t want to hear it.
The government cannot and should not respond to violence by infringing on First Amendment rights. Politically motivated killings not only take a loved one from their family and community, but also endanger the free and democratic exchange of ideas. Government actors should not further entrench that danger by using their power to suggest that certain ideas or criticism cannot be uttered in our society.
Government officials calling for people who expressed their political views to lose their jobs or face other punishment is unconstitutional. As the Supreme Court ruled just last year in NRA v. Vullo — a case where a Democratic government official was pressuring businesses to not work with the NRA — government officials can't use their power to pressure third parties into silencing or punishing speech they dislike. Full stop. Employers, media companies, and even state and local officials facing such pressure should remember that the First Amendment protects them from having to give in.'
Protecting Free Speech in the Face of Government Retaliation | American Civil Liberties Union
Committee for the First Amendment
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