Fearless Speech

September 15, 2024
An indictment of the First Amendment for protecting toxic speech while stifling speech that "challenges hierarchies of gender, race, religion, and class." A law professor at George Washington University and the author ofThe Cult of the Constitution, Franks claims that the First Amendment contributes to injustice by enabling powerful and privileged individuals and organizations to use speech to harm the most vulnerable. Cushioned by the law, white supremacists marched in Charlottesville in 2017, and Twitter (now X) hosts and circulates bigoted and threatening posts. Such reckless speech strengthens racism and misogyny, she argues, while discussions of diversity, equality, inclusion, race, and gender are restricted in many public schools. Worsening matters is the false portrayal of the private, commodified world of social media as the new public sphere. Franks dreams of a world in which fearless speech that speaks truth to power is encouraged and defended. She thus shifts the debate from free versus censored speech to reckless versus fearless speech. Her heroes are people like Sophie Scholl, an outspoken student activist executed by the Nazis, and Christine Blasey Ford, who, at Brett Kavanaugh's 2018 Supreme Court nomination hearings, testified about his alleged teenage sexual assault on her. Although Franks discusses legal issues, she is more concerned that speech be evaluated in the context of "objective, historical, material conditions of subordination." The issue is whether speech enhances or degrades justice and democracy, and her argument leads away from judicial reform to broad educational initiatives. Franks' zealous tone and uncompromising approach, which may put off some readers, are nonetheless appropriate, given her view that the First Amendment has long been used to validate speech that causes harm and glorifies violence beyond what a just and decent society should tolerate. Franks leaves it for others to make the counterargument. A compelling case that any just assessment of free speech means thinking outside the frame of the First Amendment.

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November 22, 2024

Franks (intellectual property, technology, and civil rights, George Washington Univ. Sch. of Law; The Cult of the Constitution) delivers a blistering takedown of the view that the First Amendment allows all speech. She points out that the law applies to government restrictions, not private ones, and the government can restrict speech to protect society. Her book begins with the film Birth of a Nation, which she asserts utilized the First Amendment in a way that promoted a white-supremacist agenda. Franks addresses book bans and blames the ACLU for many things, including that it supports the right to free speech for everyone--racists and misogynists included. The book criticizes Elon Musk's X and other social media platforms for using Section 230, which prevents users and providers from being held liable for information provided by another person, to avoid making them safe. Franks concludes with a call for fearless speech and profiles of people who have spoken out against oppression. She also proposes more FTC regulation, a Fearless Speech Curriculum in schools, and social media redesigns. VERDICT For concerned readers and scholars seeking an evidence-based argument that free speech has gone awry.--Harry Charles

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