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First Amendment expert says universities must still protect free speech

“Hate speech” and other conduct should be further policed by Michigan State University, according to the campus Black Student Alliance.

The activist group wants a “No Hate Ordinance” passed on campus, citing “hate speech and harassment, vandalism and administrative failures” at the public university.

Black Student Alliance board member Missy Chola, for example, says she is a victim and “exhausted” after she faced a subpoena for calling a professor “racist.”

Professor Jack Lipton is currently suing the university trustees following what he says is a targeted campaign against him for criticizing former Chair Rema Vassar.

According to Chola it is “racist” to call a raucous group of protesters who are disrupting the flow of a board meeting a “mob.” She repeated the charge from Vassar who made the same accusation against Professor Lipton, as previously reported by The College Fix.

“I’m not here to stir drama or point fingers,” Chola wrote. “I am here because I have been pushed into a corner. Because I am being targeted. And because MSU, the university that should have stood with me, has chosen silence over support,” Chola said, in a statement reposted on the BSA Instagram.

The Black Student Alliance did not respond to multiple messages sent by The Fix about their demands.

The Fix could not locate the entire 23-page document referenced by the student newspaper. However, the black student group’s Instagram account has a variety of letters criticizing school leadership. The group is also collecting stories about hate on campus, with a campaign called “HATEHASAHOMEHERE.”

The goal is “to bring awareness of the constant and unchecked discrimination that marginalized students, specifically Black students, face on this campus.”

“Black students have been consistent victims of acts of racial and gendered violence for decades, and the university has done essentially nothing to combat this issue,” according to the Google Form. “As a result, we are taking the [initiative] and calling them OUT!”

The Fix also reached out to trustees at MSU for comment, but none responded in the past several weeks.

However, a free speech expert said the university must be careful not to infringe on the rights of students in the name of combatting hate.

“The First Amendment exists to protect the rights of students on a public university campus to agitate for the change they want to see on campus,” Graham Piro with the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression told The Fix via email.

“This is an important exercise of their expressive rights,” Piro said, commenting on the students’ protest activities.

“Some of their proposals, if instituted, would raise concerns about free speech on campus,” Piro said. “[V]andalism is not protected speech, nor are hate crimes. But ‘hate speech,’ without more, is not a category of speech that’s punishable under the First Amendment,” he said.

The “No Hate Ordinance” would involve the creation of a DEI task force, according to the State News.

The group has other demands.

“Among their proposals is a requirement for all incoming students, faculty, and staff to undergo more comprehensive diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) and anti-racism training that would be reinforced by biannual courses,” according to the student newspaper.

MORE: ‘Hate speech’ should be censored, NYU professor says

INSIDE IMAGE CAPTION AND CREDIT: A Google Form sign-up sheet from Michigan State University; MSU Black Student Alliance

MAIN IMAGE CAPTION AND CREDIT: Black Student Alliance members raise their fists; Michigan State University Black Student Alliance/Instagram

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