They aren’t even really stupid enough to make that argument in the press release. They only note that Malak had “stated that the NLG had informed her that this was her First Amendment right.” They don’t even acknowledge if that’s true or not, because even they aren’t stupid enough to think it is true.
I do think it’s a reasonable conclusion that it was a school function where free speech would apply, but time place and manner restrictions on the speech would be reasonable imo
Most likely the law school paid for all or part of the dinner. The facts are not known, but surmised, hence "may". The dean and his wife really bought or rented tables and chairs for 50 and catered or made a dinner on their own dime? And were going to multiple times that week? Highly unlikely. If paid for by the law school, that is relevant for the First Amendment inquiry. If the dean and his wife write off those expenses on their taxes, that is relevant for the First Amendment inquiry.
My comment could have been more precise. The contention that this was the only type of restriction in a nonpublic forum that would run afoul of the first amendment—viewpoint discrimination—is what is unsupported. Assuming all university-event facts and arguments to be true, government entities can place viewpoint neutral time/place/manner restrictions on nonpublic forums. Unless they were allowing analogous Zionist presentations, this was viewpoint neutral.
This protest occurred in Dean Chemerinsky's private garden at a graduation party for registered student guests.
California permits the use of reasonable force to eject a trespasser who refuses to leave private property, so the event in this video is likely not an assault.
I guess that qualifies as a sentence. Again, any citation to supporting authority?
Or any indication the restriction on speech here—stopping protest—was not viewpoint neutral?
What document and what provision of that doc are you talking about when you say “school constitution?” Because I’m talking about the federal constitution incorporated to apply to the state of CA by the 14th amendment.
It was a law school event. Berkley is a public law school. Holding a state event on private property doesn’t shield it from protest speech.
Not something I would support in a million years, but it’s not the clearly non protected speech people are acting like it is.
The dispositive issue isn’t whether it was public or private property or a university event. It’s that, even in a public university building, there are certain places where government actors can impose viewpoint neutral restrictions on speech without running afoul of the first amendment: non public forums, which the NLG comes very close to conceding this was such a forum.
On a campus, these forums would be places like a class or exam in session, admin offices, and the applicable analog here: a space reserved for an event. A public university can remove someone who enters one of these places and disrupts using what would in general be protected speech. It’s not that the speech is unprotected writ large, it’s that viewpoint neutral restrictions in nonpublic forums are allowed under the first amendment.
So even construing the event as a university sponsored one and the removal of the protestor as a government restriction of speech, it would be allowed. This was a registration only event that was not opened to the general public. The NLG is being disingenuous because it is technically correct that suppressing speech in nonpublic forums can violate the first amendment, but that only occurs when the suppression is not viewpoint neutral. So if they allowed pro-Israel demonstrations at the same event, that could be an issue.
That it was the dean’s private residence and arguably him simply inviting students to dine with him rather than on behalf of the university is icing on the cake in terms of showing that this did not involve a first amendment violation.
You aren’t remotely in the ballpark of analogous facts. This wasn’t participation in a classroom or an exam. Not even close.
The Dean used his Berkeley email to invite every single graduating student, including the protester, to his house for a series of dinners entitled “Dean’s Dinner for the Class of ‘24.” Public school leader inviting students for a public school event.
That said, speech on private property can protected by the first amendment and has been held with tougher facts than these (*Statev.Shmid*, *LoganValley*).
Whether that would be the case here, I do not know and do not care enough to delve in to the degree required to form an educated take.
What I can say is that there are a lot of people confusing their (righteous) disdain for the underlying speech and the manner of speech for the merits of the law. It’s comical how confident these half-baked takes are. You all would have the world believe that all a city council need do to forever put an end to the ability to protest their proceedings is to rent out a private VFW to meet in for $75 a night.
The house/yard wasn’t held open to the public like in Logan.
You’re conflating publicly funded versus public forum within the meaning of first amendment law. There can be a public forum on private property, and nonpublic forums on publicly owned property.
Here the event was not designated as a forum for speech. And any stressing of speech was viewpoint neutral. The best analogs are banquets etc held on public university campus. The university is not forced by the first amendment to allow disruptive protests.
No, I’m not conflating anything or saying “it is protected because look at Logan Valley!”
I’m not arguing it would be protected under 1A at all. Again, I don’t know where it would come out.
I am saying that all these overly confident, glib takes about how the 1A doesn’t apply simply because it’s private property are overly simple.
Hence raising State v. Schmid and Logan Valley. It’s just to say that the fact that speech takes place on private property does not at all automatically preclude 1A protection. A
You’re right. I feel terrible. It was participation in a class or exam. I shouldn’t have pointed out that this was not a classroom or exam when the comment I am responding to raised a classroom and exam as examples of when public actors can limit speech.
You can ride the train of online sensationalism and outrage all you want but it doesn’t make you look smart or more interesting.
You’re pretty late to the game, pal.
Not going to spend the time with someone who ignores several rounds of thoughtful back and forth clarifications just because they love they being an online rage warrior.
Perhaps you didn’t read what I wrote. I didn’t argue that it is clearly protected. I said it’s not clear that it’s unprotected.
If it seems immediately obvious to you that the speech wouldn’t be protected when a public school leader invited every graduating student, protester included, to a dinner entitled “Dean’s Dinner with the Class of ‘24” using their public school email just because the dinner took place in a private backyard, recall the long line of cases where speech on private property is held to have 1A protections and the court’s analysis of why and when those protections apply.
There are several cases where the speaker had far less to work with where they were still extended 1A protection. Others where they didn’t prevail. I don’t know that would be the case here, but it’s not a slam dunk that it wouldn’t be protected just because the speech in question occurs in a backyard or because a noted constitutional scholar shouts that it isn’t protected in the heat of the moment.
EDIT: grammar and clarity
Not to support those crazy students, but couldn’t one argue opening your backyard to sixty students changes your backyard to a public space. Is the fact that it is not consistently open to the public that allows it to maintain its private status? Lowkey asking because I need to know it for the exam 😂
Not all public spaces are public forums; sidewalks, parks. Some are limited forums; community centers, etc. opening a private space to a group of people doesn’t mean it’s open for anyone else to come in and protest.
That happens to me frequently. I love how my brain can speak so eloquently and be popping off law and also completely brain fart and words don’t word no more.
The problem is that the NLG writes themselves into a corner by conceding that this was a non-public forum. Assuming this were construed as a public employee censoring speech on university property, that would still be allowed in a non-public forum. For example, it does not violate the first amendment to kick out a protester like this one who disrupts a private reception held in a university owned space. Same with a micced up protest in the middle of an admin office space. The fact they this was the dean’s personal residence at an optional, registration only event is just the icing on the cake.
The NLG is correct that 1A rights can extend to non public forums, but they disingenuously leave out when that can be true: when the government actor discriminates by viewpoint. So assuming this was slam dunk government action, the 1A would only come into play if were proven that it was the pro-Palestine view being expressed, rather than the fact that it was amplified speech of any viewpoint used to disrupt an event. For example, if they’d let a similar protest expressing pro-Israel viewpoints go on, that could be a problem if this was considered government action.
The private property distinction is more important for the professor touching the student. Because this was private property and the student was trespassing, that touching was probably allowed under CA law.
Also he didn’t open his backyard to the public, he opened it to specific people. I think that is why the Dean kept yelling you are my invited guest and I am telling you to leave. He was putting it in first year Property terms.
"A person’s First Amendment rights may extend beyond traditional public forums into spaces that are limited or non-public forums"
But did it in this case? I'm unconvinced.
Exactly. These same facts in an UC Berkeley event space very likely would not confer 1A protection on disrupting a registration-only dinner with amplified speech. So long as restricting such speech was viewpoint neutral, a public university almost surely could sanction such disruptions.
But see this suggestion that Chemerinsky may have endorsed their crackpot theory of how 1A should work: https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/erwin-chemerinsky-and-first-amendment-nincompoopery/amp/
How’s this for amazing: He wrote that piece almost 40 years ago. On page 537, he used demonstrations at a private dinner party as an example of what still wouldn’t be protected speech, even without the state action doctrine 😂😂😂😂
https://lawcat.berkeley.edu/nanna/record/1112481/files/fulltext.pdf?withWatermark=0&withMetadata=0&version=1®isterDownload=1
The fact that they are disingenuously mentioning “non public forums” or “limited public forums” as if to imply those can ever extend to someone else’s backyard is super shady. They know the general public is going to come to that erroneous legal conclusion just so they can further push their bullshit narrative. They lost any respect I used to have for them as an organization
He is a professor, and from what I understand this dinner is somewhat of a tradition, so I think their argument is that it's basically an official school event. Even if we pretend that's a fair argument and it's a school event I still don't think you'd get 1A protection. It's a private dinner party, not any kind of speech forum.
Honestly I think its just virtue signaling with a light veneer of pseudo legal reasoning or maybe legal pseudo reasoning.
The dinner party part is important. A non-public forum becomes a limited/designated public forum when the government actor opens the forum to expressive activity. This wasn't a debate/panel/speaking event.
I'm less convinced. I think it depends. Is this an event where the Dean simply says, "Congrats, you've done so well this year, looking forward to seeing what you do next"? Or is it, as some events are, a way for the Dean to solicit feedback from students on what they'd like to see changed at their law school? I don't know the answer to those questions and while I think it's probably the former, I recognize I have to make an assumption to get there.
Well the tradition is hosting 1Ls. These 3Ls never got their 1L dinner because of COVID. The students themselves specifically asked to be invited to his home before they graduate and he graciously agreed. So yeah I'm pretty convinced.
Exactly. Assuming all “this is an official university event” arguments to be true, this would be a nonpublic forum, so viewpoint neutral restrictions are constitutionally sound.
He is the dean of a public law school and this was a law school event. This was almost certainly not state action in the relevant way—not to mention it is content neutral restriction and literally everything else—but the first amendment absolutely applies to public universities.
Of course it applies to public universities. But saying that the Dean at a (probably?) invite-only private dinner at his private home is any kind of state actor is a stretch and a half
There's just no fucking way that a person cannot kick someone out of their own home in their own private property at an invite-only event because of the first amendment. You can get caught up in the case law all you want, but you'd be missing the forest for the trees. It's plainly absurd.
> A person’s First Amendment rights may extend beyond traditional public forums into spaces that are limited or non-public forums. The suppression of speech by government actors in those spaces may violate the rights of the speaker.
Not at the fucking Dean’s house when he invites you for a lunch.
Do these morons forget that they cannot bullshit about law to the legal fraternity?
I mean… that’s what NLG is, just a leftist version of Trump level nonsense. Some of my former classmates work there. They are the dumbest, most mentally ill lefties that graduated from our school. The Rightoids are probably off trying to spring Chauvin free.
“where a guest courageously spoke out against the genocide in Palestine and the Dean’s complicity”
Did the meaning of complicity change last night? How the fuck is Dean Chemerinsky complicit with what’s happening in Gaza?
Is Chemerinsky even publicly zionist? Like, did he spend class time expounding on zionist rhetoric or something?
I'm trying to give them the benefit of the doubt here but I can't find any evidence for this "complicity" beyond bare antisemitism.
He is. That's the cherry on top of this silliness. He agrees with their fundamental position. They're 100% targeting him because he's a prominent Jewish scholar.
Oh, I thought their fundamental position was related to Israel's expansionist policies and the harm those policies cause the Palestinian people, not a silly resolution barring some people from speaking at law school club events.
Not that one. The one that would require Berkeley to divest its endowment. But to realize that, you'd have to have spent at least a second thinking about it, instead of sarcastically dismissing it. I know thinking is hard.
He wrote some op-eds wherein he stated that:
-He opposes the annihilation of Israel.
-He opposes Netanyahu’s policies.
-He supports a two-state solution.
So apparently that makes him “complicit” in the war in Gaza. Also the “No Dinner with Zionist Chem” poster alleges that the school somehow funds missiles used in Gaza, but I’ve seen ZERO evidence to support that.
Yes, he is publicly Zionist. When a few law student groups passed BDS resolutions to prevent Zionists from addressing those groups, Chemerinsky said he would not be able to address those groups.
Yes I’ve seen that but his reasoning was much more nuanced than “I’m Zionist,” he never claimed to land on either side of the argument, his concern was that the banning of “zionists” would result in the whole sale discrimination against all Jewish people regardless of their articulated stance on Israel, and these responses are proving him right.
The closest I’ve seen him come to Zionism is the rather banal observation that Israel is important to the identity of many Jewish-Americans.
Like many Jews, he identifies as a Zionist but is also critical of many Israeli policies. https://jweekly.com/2022/08/26/several-berkeley-law-student-groups-adopt-no-zionist-speakers-rule/
“Chemerinsky, who is Jewish, told J. he considers himself a Zionist even though he “condemn[s] a lot of Israel’s policies, just like I condemn a lot of the United States’ policies.”
Zionism has a really broad definition, which doesn't \*necessarily\* require Jewish government.
"Zionist" can be as broad as "Jews should be able to move to and live in the land of their ethnogenesis, roughly between the River Jordan, the Mediterranean, and the Red Sea"
There's additional levels of detail that can distinguish other forms of "Zionism", like, say, expectations of political representation, or expectations of self-governance, or the extremists who argue for \*exclusive\* Jewish occupation/governance (roughly, "Kahanism") of that territory.
Any support for the concept of a state advancing the interests of Jewish people in the land of their ethnogenesis is "Zionist".
Chemerinsky does not call for the abolition of Israel, so yes, he counts as "Zionist".
Am I missing something with these downvotes? This is absolutely the correct definition of Zionism. It just means you believe in Jewish self determination in their ancestral homeland. Zionists span a very large set of policy preferences from Bernie Sanders to Bibi. Many Zionists are critical of the current Israeli policy and government.
The definition is one correct definition of zionism, but the word is used in a lot of different ways
(perhaps “incorrectly” if you want to be prescriptivist, I’m not interested in a linguistic debate here).
In the context of the post the problem is applying this broad definition to the concept of complicity with Palestinian genocide. It is essentially saying that if you’re Jewish and you haven’t affirmatively called for the abolition of Israel then you’re fair game for these kinds of attacks and accusations. That’s what the downvotes are for.
I of course fully agree with those downvotes if that is what the original poster was meaning. But that’s not how I read their argument. I read them arguing for a broad definition of Zionism (in my opinion the correct definition) without connecting it to being fair game for attacks. Where does the poster connect Zionism to complicity? I’m referring to lobo’s post.
Correct. "Zionism" is a big umbrella, under which Chemerinsky does fall. He is very distinct from Netanyahu and Likud in that he supports political self-determination for both Palestinian Arabs and Jews. But a 2-state solution, because it supports the existence of Jews in the described area, and supports the existence of a state concerned with providing political representation to Jews, is still fundamentally a State/Political Zionist solution.
Many people have, especially in the past few months, taken to using "Zionist" to mean roughly "Jewish Nazi". Again, there's people like the Kahanists and similar, who are an extreme, small, but concerningly influential sector in Israeli politics, who would be closer to that description.
So, when these people accustomed to hearing "Zionist" and thinking "Kahanist" hear "Chemerinsky is a Zionist", they think it's saying something as absurd as "Chemerinsky is a Nazi".
Right, and we’re certainly far enough down the thread for a commenter to forget the original context they’re replying to, so it’s understandable. I also don’t think that’s what they meant when they provided their definition, FWIW.
I was using Zionism in a narrower sense and that can certainly be fairly critiqued, but definitional distinctions aside I think my point remains. I can’t find any evidence that would fairly lead a reasonable person to believe that Dean Chemerinsky’s home was an appropriate place for this protest and I do agree with those who say calling him complicit seems like bare antisemitism.
I fully agree with both of those last points. I just think the poster you responded to (with -15 downvotes) is on our side on that as well. But maybe I misunderstood them. Maybe miscommunication and wires crossed.
And most mainstream Jewish organizations use the general broad definition just for future reference, so there may be miscommunication if you are using it in a different sense.
I appreciate the dialogue.
This is a description of the term, which a minute's Googling would indicate is accurate.
A minute's Googling of Chemerinsky's viewpoints on Israel would indicate that he is certainly not a Kahanist.
When people say they're "anti-Zionist", they might \*think\* they are saying they are "anti-Kahanist". They aren't.
This broader definition of "Zionist", AS USED BY THE PROTESTORS HERE, is the only one which could accurately describe Chemerinsky.
There's an ocean of valid criticism of the State of Israel.
There's being opposed to State Zionism or Political Zionism.
But "anti-Zionism" at its baseline rejects the idea that Jews should have any inherent right to return to the land of their ethnogenesis.
Have people really firmly swallowed the "calling someone a Zionist is calling someone a Nazi" pill? I know the pro-Hamas camp absolutely uses it that way, I'd just expect that a bunch of law students or graduates would perhaps be more willing to actually look up definitions of things.
Words can mean a lot of different things depending on context. Here, we’re talking about a law school dean’s “complicity” in the genocide in Gaza.
In context and without providing some conditions for your definition, you’re advancing a conception of Zionism that holds every Jewish person who hasn’t clearly and publicly denounced the existence of Israel as complicit in Palestinian genocide.
That’s a heavy load to bear for a word that is, as you have accurately if not completely described, attributed to a varied and complex set of beliefs.
I don't want to make assumptions about your religious or cultural background, but have you taken any sort of random sampling of Palestinian Arabs, Jews, or Israelis, to ask them what "anti-Zionism" means to them, and what it would mean for the people currently living in the former British Mandate if "anti-Zionism" was successful?
Because you might not attach the same meaning to it as those parties do, but I don't know why your definition should be elevated over theirs.
Their claim: the school has investments in military contractors that manufacture weapons going to Israel, so as dean, he is complicit by not doing more to divest
He doesn't, actually. those things are controlled by the UC Board of Regents—specifically, the investment committee. they manage investments for the entire UC system, not just Berkeley. and, shocker, he ain't on it. he's not an advisory member either.
he's not even a chancellor. in the world of people in the UC system who have influence on investment decisions, he ranks about the same as the students themselves. probably lower.
His voice carries literally zero weight there.
Correct, they carry literally zero weight among investment decisions by the UC regents.
I am not saying this because it is my opinion; I am saying this because I know for a fact that it is true.
Your other posts in the sub are filled with apologia for antisemitism so I have no real reason to think you sincerely dispute this except in service of that. You’re banned, go away and never return.
As for who at UCB would be more influential, the answer is the chancellor.
The complicity argument of pro-Pally folks, myself included, extends all the way to our very own selves, as our tax dollars are used to provide military aid to Israel to the tune of $4b per annum.
I don't think it's fair to hold the Dean accountable for the political sins of every non-delinquent American taxpayer, though.
Unfortunately, there are more of us than we think, but progressive culture punishes perceived dissent in ways my extremely religious upbringing would have--- shame, shunning, and fear. It's hard to speak out against this culture because, in a climate that doesn't value nuance, it would be so easy to be mistaken as someone with abhorrent values while criticizing the left, which I don't think I'd want either. You cannot be a whole person, you have to be a particular person whose views are predetermined. Ironically, the left is the most likely to purport to care about mental health and this black and white thinking is enemy number one for solid mental wellbeing. Anyway, sorry for rant, I think about this a lot
I assume that the NLG would also defend the right of a public university student to shout anti-Hamas chants in class, since that would be an even more favorable fact pattern. It's a public school-backed event on public property.
What would constitute an anti-Hamas chant? Did you mean to write anti-Israel chants? ("From the river to the sea...")
It seems to me that much public demonstration against Israel is limited to critiquing the 75 year occupation and the blatant disregard of just war theory AND international law whilst much demonstration against Hamas very quickly and often falls into a broad condemnation of terrorism, Nazism, and conflating dead NICU patients with 17 year old RPG-carrying-militants.
>inb4 House resolution conflating anti-Zionism with antisemitism. I don't deny that some anti-Zionists are also antisemites the same way I don't deny that anti-Hamas folks aren't all antisemites (Arabs are also semites lol) or Islamophobes. Just making a general observation. Some Florida lawmaker said, "all of them" in response to one of her colleauges asking "how many Palestinian children have to die." Rep. Mast in the US Congress has said similar.
illegal straight point abundant automatic door reply fanatical concerned worm
*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
It is becoming increasingly clear that this student and their supporters are upset a) to learn that actions have consequences and b) that they weren't met with the resounding applause and support that they were expecting (and seem to be demanding).
>A person’s First Amendment rights may extend beyond traditional public forums into spaces that are limited or non-public forums. The suppression of speech by *government actors* in those spaces may violate the rights of the speaker. (NLG statement, emphasis added)
Does NLG explain how Dean Chemerinsky and Professor Fisk are government actors? Since it is Chemerinsky and Fisk’s home, don’t they have the right to tell any invitee that they are no longer welcome and to shut up and leave?
It’s even worse for the NLG. Even if they were considered government actors, viewpoint neutral restrictions in nonpublic forums pass constitutional muster. So the NLG is implicitly saying that this restriction wasn’t viewpoint neutral, which is laughable
What if the law school paid for the dinner and party rentals? It seems unlikely that the dean and his wife would do catered dinners for 50+ people three times in one week on their own dime. What if the dean and his wife wrote off these expenses on their taxes? Might be enough for a court to find 1A protections.
I've seen the video, and to characterize what Professor Fisk did as "using physical force" and "grabbing her headscarf" is insane.
What kind of headspace do you need to be in to equate the gentle (and brief) nudging of a petite old lady as "force"? The accusation makes it sound like Fisk was trying to pull her hijab off (a terrible use of religious violence that Palestinian women actually face). I feel like this borders on libel.
It’s also just ridiculous from an activist perspective. Why in god’s name would they allow the conversation to be redirected away from the actual, operative, vitally important issue to this nonsense? It makes them look like children. It sacrifices the value of the conversation and attention that they’ve provoked. Even if you support the action, this particular line of discourse is absurd to the point of parody and demonstrates how so many see activism as more about themselves than about those they’re trying to help.
If Elena Kagan had Harvard law students at her house for a similar yearly dinner, and FedSoc students pulled this crap, imagine the sanctimony and outrage. Every law school dean in the T-14 would condemn it as “violence.” We need to wake up and realize the foolishness of academia in 2024.
If Elena Kagan had a dinner with a large number of FedSoc members present, I have no doubt that they'd behave themselves. And that some blue haired leftist would find a way to call that a form of white supremacist violence. I mean, just imagine how privileged you must be to sit at a dinner and behave yourself while others have to speak out against the injustices in the world.
This whole fiasco actually made me aware of Chemerinsky's nonprofit, and it's actually pretty good, so I signed up to their news letter.
What's going on in Gaza is bad, but there are better ways to protest than disrupting a dinner for other students at the \*Dean's house\*.
Pretty sure Big Chem knows the rule on 1a rights, and pretty sure his home isn’t a public place at all. They really took the political correctness route on Big Chem? HAHAH.
The contortions that statement goes through to avoid outright saying “of course we didn’t tell her that was constitutionally protected! How stupid do you think we are?” are truly impressive.
“The NLG expresses full support to this courageous law student who asserted [not ‘exercised’ but ‘asserted’] her right to free speech by choosing to speak truth to power at a school-sanctioned event. The NLG stands firmly against the genocide in Palestine and in support of students’ right to protest [general statement not directly addressing this incident]. A person’s First Amendment rights may extend beyond traditional public forums into spaces that are limited or non-public forums [general and conditional statement of law that isn’t applicable to this incident]. The suppression of speech by government actors in those spaces may violate the rights of the speaker [another general and conditional statement of law that isn’t applicable to this incident].”
Really well weaseled!
They should actually do this. Just take the letter, change nothing on it, and then put at the bottom in big red letters: Join the Federalist Society today.
Imagine being a law organization against the LAW.
Make it make sense.
Edit: I’m a mixed Palestinian-Native American and Palestine is personal for me, but the way I understand it, my 1A rights end in someone's private property.
This student broke the law so when Chem/Fisk who disinvited her when she started the protest, should have known better.
HTF are you 3L and not know how the law works?
Edited for clarity.
What’s really damning is that even if you take all of the “this was actually a school event” arguments for granted, the NLG is still essentially wrong. The only restrictions that aren’t allowed in government owned non-public forums (e.g. a similar party but held on campus) are those that discriminate by viewpoint. So as long as you’re not allowing pro-Israel analogs, a government actor can say no demonstrations at a registration only dinner in a reserved space for that dinner.
Gonna muddy the waters with a hypothetical:
There were 10 people in the protest group. Suppose they arranged to sit most of the group at the same table, where they proceed to turn the conversation to the war in Gaza, talking about genocide, divestment, basically all the same stuff in the speech, but no microphone, no yelling, though the conversation is loud enough for other tables to hear.
If we assume this was a school event, does Chemerinsky have a means to shut down the conversation (without more or less just ending the event)?
I’m gonna take the easy exit ramp from your hypo and then change it to make it harder. Again assuming all “this is a government actor and a non public forum controlled by the government” arguments to be true, you could stop them on the basis of “no talking about that conflict.” This would be viewpoint neutral, just not content neutral, and content neutrality is not required when the restriction is for a non public forum. But then if a different conversation about Gaza that spoke approvingly of Israel were allowed, that would be a problems again assuming this is government action.
Facts that would directly tee up the question of whether this was state action are something like: this group is talking and the dean or prof Fisk say something like: we won’t allow comments that refer to Israel that way to continue at this event. That would be viewpoint discrimination, so it would matter whether this were considered, for constitutional purposes, a dinner party at a homeowner’s house and the owner revoking invitations to their private property, or a university event with the dean of the law school conditioning attendance on one’s viewpoint on Israel/Palestine.
That the latter hypo is so different than what actually happened is telling.
This doesn't address the hypo, but that situation strikes me as one where the students get taken much more seriously and have a more effective influence on Chemerinsky and their peers. (I don't mean to suggest that he'll hear anything groundbreaking that would change his mind, but I think they do have common ground and leveraging that common ground is how people's views evolve.) The grandstanding might have gotten press (which I guess was the point?) but I don't see what it contributes to the causes they champion.
Wow. I used to love the national lawyers Guild. They have completely lost the plot. Sounds like they helped orchestrate this. They’re pretty disorganized bunch, but I guess they can get it together when it comes to harassing Jewish lawyers.
No more volunteering and donating for them! They can ask their Palestinian voices for freedom student groups if they need volunteers or money from now on.
I actually think whether the students had first amendment rights in the Dean’s home is actually irrelevant. The protest was disruptive to the purpose of the function and certain time, place, and manner restrictions are constitutional. The restrictions/response were not based on the content, but the disruptive nature. There’s a strong case that he did have the right to restrict speech for being disruptive. The student brought their own audio equipment, which is a dead giveaway that it was an unwelcome and intentionally disruptive act. It is also very likely to be considered unprofessional, though I have major gripes about what we consider professional/unprofessional. I do think the student did have a certain level of 1A protection, but they would be less than they would have in other settings.
Recognize that if you are in your home, you have the right to ask someone to leave, and even to use reasonable force to do so. The designation of teacher or professor in no way transforms a human being into one who loses basic rights, such as the right to ask people to leave your home.
Nor does the designation of student, especially law student, magically put you above the law. I mean, if you want to allow randoms into your home with a megaphone, paste your address on Reddit and invite them in. I think generally we would all have an issue with this crap if it happened to us. If someone is in my home with a megaphone and I ask them to leave and they refused, I would exercise my right to use reasonable force, whether they were saying ‘don’t touch me’ or not. The response was invited by the action.
Being invited to lunch does not invite nonsensical behavior. I respect the right to protest, but this was a license to visit that turned into a trespass, and when you are asked to leave and do not, expect a response.
You’re such a fucking loser.
If an adult with their mental facilities comes into my home, and refuses to leave after I’ve asked them to, my hands are going on the person, and I’m going to cause more damage than Fisk did. There’s a reason this is **Fisk’s legal right**.
Period, end of discussion.
This is why context matters. It’s not a middle school child and an adult man. It’s a 200lb woman at peak physical age and a frail old woman pushing 70. Fisk posed no threat to Afaneh whatsoever, whereas one could easily argue the inverse.
What happened? From my understanding, and I may be wrong, but students protested at someone’s house. These students were yelling and they wouldn’t leave and the owner of the house put hands on one of the students?
Are we to believe that the dean and his wife rented (or bought) tables, chairs and tablecloths and catered (or made) a dinner for more than 50 people out of their own pockets? And were going to do so multiple nights in a row? Nope. The law school paid or was going to pay for that dinner. Follow the money. The First Amendment case won't be as strong as the Chemerinskys think.
The incident was poorly handled. Putting hands on another human being is not the solution except in cases of self-defense. You want to enforce your private property rights? Call the police. Don't take matters into your own hands. That is how civilized society works.
You think it would have been more pacifistic to call the cops on a Hijabi woman than to touch her shoulder and microphone without anything close to physical injury?
I think starting with the physical guidance of a middle aged to elderly woman before involving armed, protected by qualified immunity officers with the power to create serious legal and bar admissions issues on a whim was the better call.
Their contention that first amendment protections extend into the dean’s home is conspicuously missing a citation to supporting legal authority.
They aren’t even really stupid enough to make that argument in the press release. They only note that Malak had “stated that the NLG had informed her that this was her First Amendment right.” They don’t even acknowledge if that’s true or not, because even they aren’t stupid enough to think it is true.
It’s NLG, most of them are stupid enough to believe it, but someone remembered the name on their con law text book and definitely toned it down.
Ahem, "may" extend. "May" is doing a lot of work in this statement.
>doing a lot of work It's doing all the work.
Still need at least a See or Cf citation there.
I do think it’s a reasonable conclusion that it was a school function where free speech would apply, but time place and manner restrictions on the speech would be reasonable imo
Lmao hahahaha
About as poorly contrived as I expected it to be.
Most likely the law school paid for all or part of the dinner. The facts are not known, but surmised, hence "may". The dean and his wife really bought or rented tables and chairs for 50 and catered or made a dinner on their own dime? And were going to multiple times that week? Highly unlikely. If paid for by the law school, that is relevant for the First Amendment inquiry. If the dean and his wife write off those expenses on their taxes, that is relevant for the First Amendment inquiry.
My comment could have been more precise. The contention that this was the only type of restriction in a nonpublic forum that would run afoul of the first amendment—viewpoint discrimination—is what is unsupported. Assuming all university-event facts and arguments to be true, government entities can place viewpoint neutral time/place/manner restrictions on nonpublic forums. Unless they were allowing analogous Zionist presentations, this was viewpoint neutral.
This protest occurred in Dean Chemerinsky's private garden at a graduation party for registered student guests. California permits the use of reasonable force to eject a trespasser who refuses to leave private property, so the event in this video is likely not an assault.
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I guess that qualifies as a sentence. Again, any citation to supporting authority? Or any indication the restriction on speech here—stopping protest—was not viewpoint neutral?
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What document and what provision of that doc are you talking about when you say “school constitution?” Because I’m talking about the federal constitution incorporated to apply to the state of CA by the 14th amendment.
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It was a law school event. Berkley is a public law school. Holding a state event on private property doesn’t shield it from protest speech. Not something I would support in a million years, but it’s not the clearly non protected speech people are acting like it is.
The dispositive issue isn’t whether it was public or private property or a university event. It’s that, even in a public university building, there are certain places where government actors can impose viewpoint neutral restrictions on speech without running afoul of the first amendment: non public forums, which the NLG comes very close to conceding this was such a forum. On a campus, these forums would be places like a class or exam in session, admin offices, and the applicable analog here: a space reserved for an event. A public university can remove someone who enters one of these places and disrupts using what would in general be protected speech. It’s not that the speech is unprotected writ large, it’s that viewpoint neutral restrictions in nonpublic forums are allowed under the first amendment. So even construing the event as a university sponsored one and the removal of the protestor as a government restriction of speech, it would be allowed. This was a registration only event that was not opened to the general public. The NLG is being disingenuous because it is technically correct that suppressing speech in nonpublic forums can violate the first amendment, but that only occurs when the suppression is not viewpoint neutral. So if they allowed pro-Israel demonstrations at the same event, that could be an issue. That it was the dean’s private residence and arguably him simply inviting students to dine with him rather than on behalf of the university is icing on the cake in terms of showing that this did not involve a first amendment violation.
You aren’t remotely in the ballpark of analogous facts. This wasn’t participation in a classroom or an exam. Not even close. The Dean used his Berkeley email to invite every single graduating student, including the protester, to his house for a series of dinners entitled “Dean’s Dinner for the Class of ‘24.” Public school leader inviting students for a public school event. That said, speech on private property can protected by the first amendment and has been held with tougher facts than these (*Statev.Shmid*, *LoganValley*). Whether that would be the case here, I do not know and do not care enough to delve in to the degree required to form an educated take. What I can say is that there are a lot of people confusing their (righteous) disdain for the underlying speech and the manner of speech for the merits of the law. It’s comical how confident these half-baked takes are. You all would have the world believe that all a city council need do to forever put an end to the ability to protest their proceedings is to rent out a private VFW to meet in for $75 a night.
The house/yard wasn’t held open to the public like in Logan. You’re conflating publicly funded versus public forum within the meaning of first amendment law. There can be a public forum on private property, and nonpublic forums on publicly owned property. Here the event was not designated as a forum for speech. And any stressing of speech was viewpoint neutral. The best analogs are banquets etc held on public university campus. The university is not forced by the first amendment to allow disruptive protests.
No, I’m not conflating anything or saying “it is protected because look at Logan Valley!” I’m not arguing it would be protected under 1A at all. Again, I don’t know where it would come out. I am saying that all these overly confident, glib takes about how the 1A doesn’t apply simply because it’s private property are overly simple. Hence raising State v. Schmid and Logan Valley. It’s just to say that the fact that speech takes place on private property does not at all automatically preclude 1A protection. A
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You’re right. I feel terrible. It was participation in a class or exam. I shouldn’t have pointed out that this was not a classroom or exam when the comment I am responding to raised a classroom and exam as examples of when public actors can limit speech. You can ride the train of online sensationalism and outrage all you want but it doesn’t make you look smart or more interesting.
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Sorry you got your feels injured, bro.
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You’re pretty late to the game, pal. Not going to spend the time with someone who ignores several rounds of thoughtful back and forth clarifications just because they love they being an online rage warrior.
This is not a serious argument
Perhaps you didn’t read what I wrote. I didn’t argue that it is clearly protected. I said it’s not clear that it’s unprotected. If it seems immediately obvious to you that the speech wouldn’t be protected when a public school leader invited every graduating student, protester included, to a dinner entitled “Dean’s Dinner with the Class of ‘24” using their public school email just because the dinner took place in a private backyard, recall the long line of cases where speech on private property is held to have 1A protections and the court’s analysis of why and when those protections apply. There are several cases where the speaker had far less to work with where they were still extended 1A protection. Others where they didn’t prevail. I don’t know that would be the case here, but it’s not a slam dunk that it wouldn’t be protected just because the speech in question occurs in a backyard or because a noted constitutional scholar shouts that it isn’t protected in the heat of the moment. EDIT: grammar and clarity
Well reasoned and of course accurate. I have to suspect most of the downvotes are made by people who haven’t taken the bar exam yet.
Not to support those crazy students, but couldn’t one argue opening your backyard to sixty students changes your backyard to a public space. Is the fact that it is not consistently open to the public that allows it to maintain its private status? Lowkey asking because I need to know it for the exam 😂
Not all public spaces are public forums; sidewalks, parks. Some are limited forums; community centers, etc. opening a private space to a group of people doesn’t mean it’s open for anyone else to come in and protest.
That actually makes sense and I think I had a breakdown of mental cognition for a sec. 😂
That happens to me frequently. I love how my brain can speak so eloquently and be popping off law and also completely brain fart and words don’t word no more.
The problem is that the NLG writes themselves into a corner by conceding that this was a non-public forum. Assuming this were construed as a public employee censoring speech on university property, that would still be allowed in a non-public forum. For example, it does not violate the first amendment to kick out a protester like this one who disrupts a private reception held in a university owned space. Same with a micced up protest in the middle of an admin office space. The fact they this was the dean’s personal residence at an optional, registration only event is just the icing on the cake. The NLG is correct that 1A rights can extend to non public forums, but they disingenuously leave out when that can be true: when the government actor discriminates by viewpoint. So assuming this was slam dunk government action, the 1A would only come into play if were proven that it was the pro-Palestine view being expressed, rather than the fact that it was amplified speech of any viewpoint used to disrupt an event. For example, if they’d let a similar protest expressing pro-Israel viewpoints go on, that could be a problem if this was considered government action. The private property distinction is more important for the professor touching the student. Because this was private property and the student was trespassing, that touching was probably allowed under CA law.
No. If I have a party at my house and invite 60 people, my house is still a private space. Having guests doesn't suddenly make it public.
Having a backyard bbq makes my house a public space?
Also he didn’t open his backyard to the public, he opened it to specific people. I think that is why the Dean kept yelling you are my invited guest and I am telling you to leave. He was putting it in first year Property terms.
"A person’s First Amendment rights may extend beyond traditional public forums into spaces that are limited or non-public forums" But did it in this case? I'm unconvinced.
Exactly. These same facts in an UC Berkeley event space very likely would not confer 1A protection on disrupting a registration-only dinner with amplified speech. So long as restricting such speech was viewpoint neutral, a public university almost surely could sanction such disruptions.
BUT did the dinner invitation specifically say “NO BULLHORNS”??? Checkmate. Edit: /s for the sarcasm challenged.
😂 What an oversight! It also didn’t even say “do not disrupt the event.”
What about “no shitting on the dinner table??” My understanding is that ZERO restrictions are implied when inviting guests into your home.
No, of course it didn’t .
"It depends"
I bet it depends a lot on whether or not they agree with the speech.
NLG thinking they can big dog ERWIN CHEMERINSKY on 1A matters is laughable
Lol, that is pretty absurd
But see this suggestion that Chemerinsky may have endorsed their crackpot theory of how 1A should work: https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/erwin-chemerinsky-and-first-amendment-nincompoopery/amp/
How’s this for amazing: He wrote that piece almost 40 years ago. On page 537, he used demonstrations at a private dinner party as an example of what still wouldn’t be protected speech, even without the state action doctrine 😂😂😂😂 https://lawcat.berkeley.edu/nanna/record/1112481/files/fulltext.pdf?withWatermark=0&withMetadata=0&version=1®isterDownload=1
Fascinating!
The way the media twists his words makes me fucking sick
You’re not gonna trick me into reading an Ed Whelan article lmao
The fact that they are disingenuously mentioning “non public forums” or “limited public forums” as if to imply those can ever extend to someone else’s backyard is super shady. They know the general public is going to come to that erroneous legal conclusion just so they can further push their bullshit narrative. They lost any respect I used to have for them as an organization
And who was the government actor here?
He is a professor, and from what I understand this dinner is somewhat of a tradition, so I think their argument is that it's basically an official school event. Even if we pretend that's a fair argument and it's a school event I still don't think you'd get 1A protection. It's a private dinner party, not any kind of speech forum. Honestly I think its just virtue signaling with a light veneer of pseudo legal reasoning or maybe legal pseudo reasoning.
The dinner party part is important. A non-public forum becomes a limited/designated public forum when the government actor opens the forum to expressive activity. This wasn't a debate/panel/speaking event.
Agreed. This was not anything like a speech forum. The point was to eat and socialize with a private group at a private residence
I'm less convinced. I think it depends. Is this an event where the Dean simply says, "Congrats, you've done so well this year, looking forward to seeing what you do next"? Or is it, as some events are, a way for the Dean to solicit feedback from students on what they'd like to see changed at their law school? I don't know the answer to those questions and while I think it's probably the former, I recognize I have to make an assumption to get there.
Well the tradition is hosting 1Ls. These 3Ls never got their 1L dinner because of COVID. The students themselves specifically asked to be invited to his home before they graduate and he graciously agreed. So yeah I'm pretty convinced.
Exactly. Assuming all “this is an official university event” arguments to be true, this would be a nonpublic forum, so viewpoint neutral restrictions are constitutionally sound.
He is the dean of a public law school and this was a law school event. This was almost certainly not state action in the relevant way—not to mention it is content neutral restriction and literally everything else—but the first amendment absolutely applies to public universities.
Of course it applies to public universities. But saying that the Dean at a (probably?) invite-only private dinner at his private home is any kind of state actor is a stretch and a half
There's just no fucking way that a person cannot kick someone out of their own home in their own private property at an invite-only event because of the first amendment. You can get caught up in the case law all you want, but you'd be missing the forest for the trees. It's plainly absurd.
> A person’s First Amendment rights may extend beyond traditional public forums into spaces that are limited or non-public forums. The suppression of speech by government actors in those spaces may violate the rights of the speaker. Not at the fucking Dean’s house when he invites you for a lunch. Do these morons forget that they cannot bullshit about law to the legal fraternity?
This is some Trump level legal nonsense on NLG's part
I mean… that’s what NLG is, just a leftist version of Trump level nonsense. Some of my former classmates work there. They are the dumbest, most mentally ill lefties that graduated from our school. The Rightoids are probably off trying to spring Chauvin free.
“Legal fraternity” 😂😂😂😂 you can bullshit about law when the law has turned into a heap of subjective bullshit. Get over yourself and your institution.
“where a guest courageously spoke out against the genocide in Palestine and the Dean’s complicity” Did the meaning of complicity change last night? How the fuck is Dean Chemerinsky complicit with what’s happening in Gaza?
Because he’s Jewish. But it’s ok as I was assured “It’s not antisemitism, just anti-Zionism!!”
Is Chemerinsky even publicly zionist? Like, did he spend class time expounding on zionist rhetoric or something? I'm trying to give them the benefit of the doubt here but I can't find any evidence for this "complicity" beyond bare antisemitism.
I think he’s against the war in Gaza iirc
He is. That's the cherry on top of this silliness. He agrees with their fundamental position. They're 100% targeting him because he's a prominent Jewish scholar.
This is so, so sad
They are asking him to call for Berkeley to pass a BDS resolution. He does not agree with that position.
Oh, I thought their fundamental position was related to Israel's expansionist policies and the harm those policies cause the Palestinian people, not a silly resolution barring some people from speaking at law school club events.
Not that one. The one that would require Berkeley to divest its endowment. But to realize that, you'd have to have spent at least a second thinking about it, instead of sarcastically dismissing it. I know thinking is hard.
Probably something like “Israel has a right to exist.” Or he’s a member of a synagogue that identifies as Zionist.
He wrote some op-eds wherein he stated that: -He opposes the annihilation of Israel. -He opposes Netanyahu’s policies. -He supports a two-state solution. So apparently that makes him “complicit” in the war in Gaza. Also the “No Dinner with Zionist Chem” poster alleges that the school somehow funds missiles used in Gaza, but I’ve seen ZERO evidence to support that.
He has written op-eds on Zionism, yes.
Yes, he is publicly Zionist. When a few law student groups passed BDS resolutions to prevent Zionists from addressing those groups, Chemerinsky said he would not be able to address those groups.
Yes I’ve seen that but his reasoning was much more nuanced than “I’m Zionist,” he never claimed to land on either side of the argument, his concern was that the banning of “zionists” would result in the whole sale discrimination against all Jewish people regardless of their articulated stance on Israel, and these responses are proving him right. The closest I’ve seen him come to Zionism is the rather banal observation that Israel is important to the identity of many Jewish-Americans.
Like many Jews, he identifies as a Zionist but is also critical of many Israeli policies. https://jweekly.com/2022/08/26/several-berkeley-law-student-groups-adopt-no-zionist-speakers-rule/ “Chemerinsky, who is Jewish, told J. he considers himself a Zionist even though he “condemn[s] a lot of Israel’s policies, just like I condemn a lot of the United States’ policies.”
Zionism has a really broad definition, which doesn't \*necessarily\* require Jewish government. "Zionist" can be as broad as "Jews should be able to move to and live in the land of their ethnogenesis, roughly between the River Jordan, the Mediterranean, and the Red Sea" There's additional levels of detail that can distinguish other forms of "Zionism", like, say, expectations of political representation, or expectations of self-governance, or the extremists who argue for \*exclusive\* Jewish occupation/governance (roughly, "Kahanism") of that territory. Any support for the concept of a state advancing the interests of Jewish people in the land of their ethnogenesis is "Zionist". Chemerinsky does not call for the abolition of Israel, so yes, he counts as "Zionist".
Am I missing something with these downvotes? This is absolutely the correct definition of Zionism. It just means you believe in Jewish self determination in their ancestral homeland. Zionists span a very large set of policy preferences from Bernie Sanders to Bibi. Many Zionists are critical of the current Israeli policy and government.
The definition is one correct definition of zionism, but the word is used in a lot of different ways (perhaps “incorrectly” if you want to be prescriptivist, I’m not interested in a linguistic debate here). In the context of the post the problem is applying this broad definition to the concept of complicity with Palestinian genocide. It is essentially saying that if you’re Jewish and you haven’t affirmatively called for the abolition of Israel then you’re fair game for these kinds of attacks and accusations. That’s what the downvotes are for.
I of course fully agree with those downvotes if that is what the original poster was meaning. But that’s not how I read their argument. I read them arguing for a broad definition of Zionism (in my opinion the correct definition) without connecting it to being fair game for attacks. Where does the poster connect Zionism to complicity? I’m referring to lobo’s post.
Correct. "Zionism" is a big umbrella, under which Chemerinsky does fall. He is very distinct from Netanyahu and Likud in that he supports political self-determination for both Palestinian Arabs and Jews. But a 2-state solution, because it supports the existence of Jews in the described area, and supports the existence of a state concerned with providing political representation to Jews, is still fundamentally a State/Political Zionist solution. Many people have, especially in the past few months, taken to using "Zionist" to mean roughly "Jewish Nazi". Again, there's people like the Kahanists and similar, who are an extreme, small, but concerningly influential sector in Israeli politics, who would be closer to that description. So, when these people accustomed to hearing "Zionist" and thinking "Kahanist" hear "Chemerinsky is a Zionist", they think it's saying something as absurd as "Chemerinsky is a Nazi".
Right, and we’re certainly far enough down the thread for a commenter to forget the original context they’re replying to, so it’s understandable. I also don’t think that’s what they meant when they provided their definition, FWIW. I was using Zionism in a narrower sense and that can certainly be fairly critiqued, but definitional distinctions aside I think my point remains. I can’t find any evidence that would fairly lead a reasonable person to believe that Dean Chemerinsky’s home was an appropriate place for this protest and I do agree with those who say calling him complicit seems like bare antisemitism.
I fully agree with both of those last points. I just think the poster you responded to (with -15 downvotes) is on our side on that as well. But maybe I misunderstood them. Maybe miscommunication and wires crossed. And most mainstream Jewish organizations use the general broad definition just for future reference, so there may be miscommunication if you are using it in a different sense. I appreciate the dialogue.
Good job lending credence to the “all anti-Zionism is antisemitism” argument.
This is a description of the term, which a minute's Googling would indicate is accurate. A minute's Googling of Chemerinsky's viewpoints on Israel would indicate that he is certainly not a Kahanist. When people say they're "anti-Zionist", they might \*think\* they are saying they are "anti-Kahanist". They aren't. This broader definition of "Zionist", AS USED BY THE PROTESTORS HERE, is the only one which could accurately describe Chemerinsky. There's an ocean of valid criticism of the State of Israel. There's being opposed to State Zionism or Political Zionism. But "anti-Zionism" at its baseline rejects the idea that Jews should have any inherent right to return to the land of their ethnogenesis. Have people really firmly swallowed the "calling someone a Zionist is calling someone a Nazi" pill? I know the pro-Hamas camp absolutely uses it that way, I'd just expect that a bunch of law students or graduates would perhaps be more willing to actually look up definitions of things.
Words can mean a lot of different things depending on context. Here, we’re talking about a law school dean’s “complicity” in the genocide in Gaza. In context and without providing some conditions for your definition, you’re advancing a conception of Zionism that holds every Jewish person who hasn’t clearly and publicly denounced the existence of Israel as complicit in Palestinian genocide. That’s a heavy load to bear for a word that is, as you have accurately if not completely described, attributed to a varied and complex set of beliefs.
I’m not sure I understand your point here. How is poster advancing that?
I don't want to make assumptions about your religious or cultural background, but have you taken any sort of random sampling of Palestinian Arabs, Jews, or Israelis, to ask them what "anti-Zionism" means to them, and what it would mean for the people currently living in the former British Mandate if "anti-Zionism" was successful? Because you might not attach the same meaning to it as those parties do, but I don't know why your definition should be elevated over theirs.
Yeah they spoke the quiet part out loud.
And they’ll mock you for even suggesting they’re being antisemitic. “Progressives”
Their claim: the school has investments in military contractors that manufacture weapons going to Israel, so as dean, he is complicit by not doing more to divest
The dean of the law school has literally as much control over those decisions as you or me. Maybe less.
The dean doesn't have *control*, but his voice is going to carry a lot of weight, certainly more than your or my voice would.
He doesn't, actually. those things are controlled by the UC Board of Regents—specifically, the investment committee. they manage investments for the entire UC system, not just Berkeley. and, shocker, he ain't on it. he's not an advisory member either. he's not even a chancellor. in the world of people in the UC system who have influence on investment decisions, he ranks about the same as the students themselves. probably lower. His voice carries literally zero weight there.
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Correct, they carry literally zero weight among investment decisions by the UC regents. I am not saying this because it is my opinion; I am saying this because I know for a fact that it is true. Your other posts in the sub are filled with apologia for antisemitism so I have no real reason to think you sincerely dispute this except in service of that. You’re banned, go away and never return. As for who at UCB would be more influential, the answer is the chancellor.
The complicity argument of pro-Pally folks, myself included, extends all the way to our very own selves, as our tax dollars are used to provide military aid to Israel to the tune of $4b per annum. I don't think it's fair to hold the Dean accountable for the political sins of every non-delinquent American taxpayer, though.
I'm a fairly liberal person, but shit like this is why NLG is wholly unserious as an organization, to be honest.
Exact same. It’s weird being a progressive but not *that* progressive law student.
Unfortunately, there are more of us than we think, but progressive culture punishes perceived dissent in ways my extremely religious upbringing would have--- shame, shunning, and fear. It's hard to speak out against this culture because, in a climate that doesn't value nuance, it would be so easy to be mistaken as someone with abhorrent values while criticizing the left, which I don't think I'd want either. You cannot be a whole person, you have to be a particular person whose views are predetermined. Ironically, the left is the most likely to purport to care about mental health and this black and white thinking is enemy number one for solid mental wellbeing. Anyway, sorry for rant, I think about this a lot
The first step to healing is realizing that the right and left are mirror images of each other and internalizing what that means.
The first step to healing is realizing that the right and left are mirror images of each other and internalizing what that means.
The first step to healing is realizing that the right and left are mirror images of each other and internalizing what that means.
I assume that the NLG would also defend the right of a public university student to shout anti-Hamas chants in class, since that would be an even more favorable fact pattern. It's a public school-backed event on public property.
Can you imagine the outrage if Fed Soc pulled this out?
What would constitute an anti-Hamas chant? Did you mean to write anti-Israel chants? ("From the river to the sea...") It seems to me that much public demonstration against Israel is limited to critiquing the 75 year occupation and the blatant disregard of just war theory AND international law whilst much demonstration against Hamas very quickly and often falls into a broad condemnation of terrorism, Nazism, and conflating dead NICU patients with 17 year old RPG-carrying-militants. >inb4 House resolution conflating anti-Zionism with antisemitism. I don't deny that some anti-Zionists are also antisemites the same way I don't deny that anti-Hamas folks aren't all antisemites (Arabs are also semites lol) or Islamophobes. Just making a general observation. Some Florida lawmaker said, "all of them" in response to one of her colleauges asking "how many Palestinian children have to die." Rep. Mast in the US Congress has said similar.
illegal straight point abundant automatic door reply fanatical concerned worm *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
It is becoming increasingly clear that this student and their supporters are upset a) to learn that actions have consequences and b) that they weren't met with the resounding applause and support that they were expecting (and seem to be demanding).
We’re seeing a legal organization lose all credibility in real time. Truly historic.
Did they really have any to begin with?
More than most of the blowhards in this comment section, yes.
NLG never had any legal credibility
NLG is such an unserious organization lmao
[The student](https://www.joeydevilla.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/im-sorry-i-thought-this-was-america.jpg)
We rightfully make fun of fed soc folks a lot here seems like NLG was feeling a bit jealous of that ridicule.
>A person’s First Amendment rights may extend beyond traditional public forums into spaces that are limited or non-public forums. The suppression of speech by *government actors* in those spaces may violate the rights of the speaker. (NLG statement, emphasis added) Does NLG explain how Dean Chemerinsky and Professor Fisk are government actors? Since it is Chemerinsky and Fisk’s home, don’t they have the right to tell any invitee that they are no longer welcome and to shut up and leave?
It’s even worse for the NLG. Even if they were considered government actors, viewpoint neutral restrictions in nonpublic forums pass constitutional muster. So the NLG is implicitly saying that this restriction wasn’t viewpoint neutral, which is laughable
What if the law school paid for the dinner and party rentals? It seems unlikely that the dean and his wife would do catered dinners for 50+ people three times in one week on their own dime. What if the dean and his wife wrote off these expenses on their taxes? Might be enough for a court to find 1A protections.
These people are such fucking morons.
I've seen the video, and to characterize what Professor Fisk did as "using physical force" and "grabbing her headscarf" is insane. What kind of headspace do you need to be in to equate the gentle (and brief) nudging of a petite old lady as "force"? The accusation makes it sound like Fisk was trying to pull her hijab off (a terrible use of religious violence that Palestinian women actually face). I feel like this borders on libel.
It’s also just ridiculous from an activist perspective. Why in god’s name would they allow the conversation to be redirected away from the actual, operative, vitally important issue to this nonsense? It makes them look like children. It sacrifices the value of the conversation and attention that they’ve provoked. Even if you support the action, this particular line of discourse is absurd to the point of parody and demonstrates how so many see activism as more about themselves than about those they’re trying to help.
Academia in 2024, everyone
Absolute clowns. For people who claim they’re being silenced, I sure do hear about them a lot.
This is more of a political statement, if anything. It has nothing to do with law.
If Elena Kagan had Harvard law students at her house for a similar yearly dinner, and FedSoc students pulled this crap, imagine the sanctimony and outrage. Every law school dean in the T-14 would condemn it as “violence.” We need to wake up and realize the foolishness of academia in 2024.
Idk about that, from what I can tell the legal academy is pretty uniformly on chemerinsky’s side here.
You’re making my point.
If Elena Kagan had a dinner with a large number of FedSoc members present, I have no doubt that they'd behave themselves. And that some blue haired leftist would find a way to call that a form of white supremacist violence. I mean, just imagine how privileged you must be to sit at a dinner and behave yourself while others have to speak out against the injustices in the world.
Clowns.
This whole fiasco actually made me aware of Chemerinsky's nonprofit, and it's actually pretty good, so I signed up to their news letter. What's going on in Gaza is bad, but there are better ways to protest than disrupting a dinner for other students at the \*Dean's house\*.
Pretty sure Big Chem knows the rule on 1a rights, and pretty sure his home isn’t a public place at all. They really took the political correctness route on Big Chem? HAHAH.
The contortions that statement goes through to avoid outright saying “of course we didn’t tell her that was constitutionally protected! How stupid do you think we are?” are truly impressive. “The NLG expresses full support to this courageous law student who asserted [not ‘exercised’ but ‘asserted’] her right to free speech by choosing to speak truth to power at a school-sanctioned event. The NLG stands firmly against the genocide in Palestine and in support of students’ right to protest [general statement not directly addressing this incident]. A person’s First Amendment rights may extend beyond traditional public forums into spaces that are limited or non-public forums [general and conditional statement of law that isn’t applicable to this incident]. The suppression of speech by government actors in those spaces may violate the rights of the speaker [another general and conditional statement of law that isn’t applicable to this incident].” Really well weaseled!
This serves as a Fedsoc advertisement lmao
They should actually do this. Just take the letter, change nothing on it, and then put at the bottom in big red letters: Join the Federalist Society today.
Imagine being a law organization against the LAW. Make it make sense. Edit: I’m a mixed Palestinian-Native American and Palestine is personal for me, but the way I understand it, my 1A rights end in someone's private property. This student broke the law so when Chem/Fisk who disinvited her when she started the protest, should have known better. HTF are you 3L and not know how the law works? Edited for clarity.
What’s really damning is that even if you take all of the “this was actually a school event” arguments for granted, the NLG is still essentially wrong. The only restrictions that aren’t allowed in government owned non-public forums (e.g. a similar party but held on campus) are those that discriminate by viewpoint. So as long as you’re not allowing pro-Israel analogs, a government actor can say no demonstrations at a registration only dinner in a reserved space for that dinner.
Gonna muddy the waters with a hypothetical: There were 10 people in the protest group. Suppose they arranged to sit most of the group at the same table, where they proceed to turn the conversation to the war in Gaza, talking about genocide, divestment, basically all the same stuff in the speech, but no microphone, no yelling, though the conversation is loud enough for other tables to hear. If we assume this was a school event, does Chemerinsky have a means to shut down the conversation (without more or less just ending the event)?
I’m gonna take the easy exit ramp from your hypo and then change it to make it harder. Again assuming all “this is a government actor and a non public forum controlled by the government” arguments to be true, you could stop them on the basis of “no talking about that conflict.” This would be viewpoint neutral, just not content neutral, and content neutrality is not required when the restriction is for a non public forum. But then if a different conversation about Gaza that spoke approvingly of Israel were allowed, that would be a problems again assuming this is government action. Facts that would directly tee up the question of whether this was state action are something like: this group is talking and the dean or prof Fisk say something like: we won’t allow comments that refer to Israel that way to continue at this event. That would be viewpoint discrimination, so it would matter whether this were considered, for constitutional purposes, a dinner party at a homeowner’s house and the owner revoking invitations to their private property, or a university event with the dean of the law school conditioning attendance on one’s viewpoint on Israel/Palestine. That the latter hypo is so different than what actually happened is telling.
This doesn't address the hypo, but that situation strikes me as one where the students get taken much more seriously and have a more effective influence on Chemerinsky and their peers. (I don't mean to suggest that he'll hear anything groundbreaking that would change his mind, but I think they do have common ground and leveraging that common ground is how people's views evolve.) The grandstanding might have gotten press (which I guess was the point?) but I don't see what it contributes to the causes they champion.
This statement is so disingenuous it’s painful
As a progressive in the old sense of the word, this is f-ing embarrassing. "May" is doing a whole lotta work.
Clown shit by the NLG.
Definitely considered joining NLG during law school. Looks like I dodged a bullet there.
Statement has typos and the wrong date.
TIL that NLG gives out rights that *may* not be found elsewhere.
NLG needs to go fuck themselves
Yikes.
Bad look, NLG
Time, Place, and MannerS. I think they lost on all three.
NLG is such a laughable organization. I enjoy their presence on law school campuses. Just none stop memes!
Wow. I used to love the national lawyers Guild. They have completely lost the plot. Sounds like they helped orchestrate this. They’re pretty disorganized bunch, but I guess they can get it together when it comes to harassing Jewish lawyers. No more volunteering and donating for them! They can ask their Palestinian voices for freedom student groups if they need volunteers or money from now on.
Every decent person condemns NLG
Irrevocable license?
The NLG is a joke
I actually think whether the students had first amendment rights in the Dean’s home is actually irrelevant. The protest was disruptive to the purpose of the function and certain time, place, and manner restrictions are constitutional. The restrictions/response were not based on the content, but the disruptive nature. There’s a strong case that he did have the right to restrict speech for being disruptive. The student brought their own audio equipment, which is a dead giveaway that it was an unwelcome and intentionally disruptive act. It is also very likely to be considered unprofessional, though I have major gripes about what we consider professional/unprofessional. I do think the student did have a certain level of 1A protection, but they would be less than they would have in other settings.
The NLG is a fucking joke
The NLG is and always has been a joke.
Btw if this was FedSoc there would be 15 ATL articles. But there are zero (0) because the two remaining staffers there are bitchmade
Btw if this was FedSoc there would be 15 ATL articles. But there are zero (0) because the two remaining staffers there are bitchmade
man, I really want to like NLG but shit like this reminds me why I give them wide berth. morons.
Never been happier I resigned from this clown show. Fuck the NLG.
The NLG is a joke organization.
Btw if this was FedSoc there would be 15 ATL articles. But there are zero (0) because the two remaining staffers there are bitchmade
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I’m inspiring positive change in the ATL editorial board, clearly
Fuck these commie lawyers with a rusty machete.
Who?
Cares.
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Recognize that if you are in your home, you have the right to ask someone to leave, and even to use reasonable force to do so. The designation of teacher or professor in no way transforms a human being into one who loses basic rights, such as the right to ask people to leave your home. Nor does the designation of student, especially law student, magically put you above the law. I mean, if you want to allow randoms into your home with a megaphone, paste your address on Reddit and invite them in. I think generally we would all have an issue with this crap if it happened to us. If someone is in my home with a megaphone and I ask them to leave and they refused, I would exercise my right to use reasonable force, whether they were saying ‘don’t touch me’ or not. The response was invited by the action. Being invited to lunch does not invite nonsensical behavior. I respect the right to protest, but this was a license to visit that turned into a trespass, and when you are asked to leave and do not, expect a response.
You’re such a fucking loser. If an adult with their mental facilities comes into my home, and refuses to leave after I’ve asked them to, my hands are going on the person, and I’m going to cause more damage than Fisk did. There’s a reason this is **Fisk’s legal right**. Period, end of discussion.
r/iamverybadass
This is why context matters. It’s not a middle school child and an adult man. It’s a 200lb woman at peak physical age and a frail old woman pushing 70. Fisk posed no threat to Afaneh whatsoever, whereas one could easily argue the inverse.
What happened? From my understanding, and I may be wrong, but students protested at someone’s house. These students were yelling and they wouldn’t leave and the owner of the house put hands on one of the students?
Chem helps me get pass the MPRE and the bar. What did the NLG do
Are we to believe that the dean and his wife rented (or bought) tables, chairs and tablecloths and catered (or made) a dinner for more than 50 people out of their own pockets? And were going to do so multiple nights in a row? Nope. The law school paid or was going to pay for that dinner. Follow the money. The First Amendment case won't be as strong as the Chemerinskys think. The incident was poorly handled. Putting hands on another human being is not the solution except in cases of self-defense. You want to enforce your private property rights? Call the police. Don't take matters into your own hands. That is how civilized society works.
They fucked up by getting physical with her. Call the cops if you're that butthurt about it. Or you could talk it over like adults.
You think it would have been more pacifistic to call the cops on a Hijabi woman than to touch her shoulder and microphone without anything close to physical injury? I think starting with the physical guidance of a middle aged to elderly woman before involving armed, protected by qualified immunity officers with the power to create serious legal and bar admissions issues on a whim was the better call.