TRI In The News

At PVCC, panel debates role of disruptive speech

From the Daily Progress
Original article available here.

Anti-war protesters try to shout down President George W. Bush at a July 4 naturalization ceremony at Monticello. U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson, R-S.C., shouts "You lie!" at Barack Obama during an address by the president to Congress. Angry constituents shout in the faces of their congressmen at health care town halls.

The First Amendment guarantees the right to free speech. But does it also guarantee the right to disrupt someone else's speech or to impede an audience's ability to listen?

That question was at the crux of a forum Sunday at Piedmont Virginia Community College titled "Free Speech or Disruption: Balancing the Rights to Speak and to Hear."

Robert M. O'Neil, director of the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression, noted that disruptive speech can be protected by the First Amendment, but can be considered an abuse of free speech if it goes so far as to impede someone else's ability to listen.

In cases of disruptive speech, the government is permitted to intervene as long as it does so in a "content neutral" manner, meaning that it treats all disruptive people the same regardless of their message, O'Neil said.

Dahlia Lithwick, senior editor and legal correspondent for Slate and a contributing editor for Newsweek, said she believes that the First Amendment has an implied guaranteed right to "listen." Free speech is intended to let unpopular ideas be voiced, she said, so without the ability to listen, then "we're all just making noise," Lithwick said.

"The right to speech carries with it the right to listen, particularly to those things we might find odious," she said. "It's more than a freedom to listen. I think it's an obligation."

Bob Gibson, executive director of the Sorensen Institute for Political Leadership at the University of Virginia and host of WVTF's "Evening Edition" radio show, said the media is partly to blame for the rising levels of disruptive speech. The media, he said, tends to reward disruptions by emphasizing the most outrageous behavior in news coverage.

"The loudest voice often goes at the top of the story," Gibson said. He later added, "The average [TV] sound bite is eight seconds, seven seconds. You have time for a quick yell. 'You lie!'"

John W. Whitehead, president of Albemarle County-based civil liberties and human rights group the Rutherford Institute, pointed out that cable TV news talk shows have shown pundits shouting down opponents on every political issue for the past two decades. "We've been teaching the American population, the young people, that you don't have to be civil," he said. "You can cut other people off."

Several of the panelists lamented the lack of civics education in schools, which they suggested has led to a misunderstanding of the responsibilities that come with the freedoms guaranteed by the First Amendment, as well as an overall decline in civil discourse.

"We need to teach the First Amendment and we need to teach civility," Gibson said. "Neither is taught enough in our schools or in public life."

"One of the things I think we should teach in school is how to listen to opposing viewpoints," Lithwick added.

Civility is not a precondition of free speech, Whitehead said, but such speech should not be so disruptive that it infringes on others' rights to hear.

Elaine Jones, who retired as president and director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and was the first black woman to graduate from UVa's School of Law, said it can be easy to dismiss or want to disrupt those with whom we disagree. But we have a responsibility, she said, to respect others' right to speech and to listen to what others have to say.

"We must teach ourselves to listen," she said. "We must teach ourselves to not be shrill."

Roughly 75 people attended Sunday's forum, which was presented by the Thomas Jefferson Center, PVCC and the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities.

PVCC President Frank Friedman was inspired to convene the panel discussion after attending Bush's speech at the 2008 naturalization ceremony at Monticello.