free speech
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Supreme Court Backs BLM Activist DeRay Mckesson in Fight Against Lawsuit Filed by Cop Injured During Protest
Once upon a time, in 2016, a cop got hit in the face with a rock during a Black Lives Matter protest in Baton Rouge, La., and decided that one of the leaders of said protest, DeRay Mckesson, was responsible. In 2017, a federal judge decided that’s not how any of this works and dismissed…
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The Supreme Court's Latest Ruling Makes It Easier for Cops to Arrest Black Lives Matter Protesters
It was a ruling that failed to register widely in terms of national news, but could have potentially devastating effects for protesters around the country—and anyone tasked with keeping police officers accountable. On May 28, the Supreme Court made it more difficult for people who say they were arrested for exercising their free speech rights…
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An Arizona Prisoner Was Sent a Book Critical of the Criminal Justice System. Now, the State Has Banned It
In one of the most memorable passages of his seminal autobiography, civil rights leader Malcolm X made explicit the impact his in-prison education had on him. Arrested on charges of larceny and sentenced to 10 years in prison, Malcolm read voraciously. “I knew right there in prison that reading had changed forever the course of…
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‘Hang the Whites’: Rapper’s Hate Speech Trial Exposes the Hypocrisy of Race Relations in France
The music video for 34-year-old French rapper Nick Conrad’s “Pendez les Blancs” (“Hang the Whites”) opens with a jarring visual akin to the title itself: the lifeless body of a white man on a noose, while Conrad (a black man of Cameroonian descent) stands beside him lighting a cigar. It’s a role reversal intended to…
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Man Gets $80,000 Settlement For ‘Laughing While Black’
People are out here fighting for our right to talk cash shit, and I salute. According to a news release from Chandra Law, Robert Spencer filed a civil rights lawsuit after he was arrested in July 2017. Officers in the recorded confrontation accused Spencer of threatening them, but all he actually did was clown them…
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Betsy DeVos Tells Students Not to be Mean on Twitter. Student Responds: What About Your Boss?
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, also known as Sarah Palin’s play cousin, continues her “I just want to be loved tour” in which she attends events and tries to prove that she actually became the Education Secretary on merit and not because she’s the wife to a very wealthy man. The cabinet position has always been…
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Virginia Court Awards 'Unite the Right' Organizer $5 Because a Protester Called Him Names
Jason Kessler, the man who organized the deadly “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Va., will be awarded a handsome sum of $5 by a Virginia Court over insulting names an activist hurled at him. Kessler, who once said the United States “would be better off if the South won the war” and tweeted that…
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Spotify Reverses Controversial ‘Hateful Conduct’ Ban After Industry Backlash
Spotify has backpedaled on its “hateful conduct” policy, which penalized artists on the streaming platform if they had a history of “controversies.” The policy, which was part of a broader set of guidelines on hate speech and hateful conduct, drew immediate criticism upon its release in May for being too vague. Record label executives, like…
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Woman Fired for Flipping the Bird at Trump Motorcade Sues Former Employer
A Virginia cyclist whose image went viral after she was photographed giving the finger to Donald Trump’s motorcade and was subsequently fired from her job late last year is finally taking action, filing a lawsuit against her former employer. Juli Briskman, the cyclist in question, said that she doesn’t think people should be afraid to…
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Texas Motorist Whose Vehicle Boasts Profane Anti-Trump Sticker Arrested on Previous, Outstanding Warrant
Nothing to see here. Nothing at all. It’s just that a Texas motorist whose truck caught a lot of attention in the past 24 hours over a bold sticker in its rear window declaring, “FUCK TRUMP AND FUCK YOU FOR VOTING FOR HIM,” has since been arrested. Karen Fonseca was not arrested because of the…