Democracy Gone Astray

Democracy, being a human construct, needs to be thought of as directionality rather than an object. As such, to understand it requires not so much a description of existing structures and/or other related phenomena but a declaration of intentionality.
This blog aims at creating labeled lists of published infringements of such intentionality, of points in time where democracy strays from its intended directionality. In addition to outright infringements, this blog also collects important contemporary information and/or discussions that impact our socio-political landscape.

All the posts here were published in the electronic media – main-stream as well as fringe, and maintain links to the original texts.

[NOTE: Due to changes I haven't caught on time in the blogging software, all of the 'Original Article' links were nullified between September 11, 2012 and December 11, 2012. My apologies.]

Monday, February 08, 2016

Student Calls For LSE's Free Speech Speakeasy Society To Be Banned

A free speech society, set up at a London university to challenge the growing trend of censorships and "safe spaces", is facing being banned.

The Speakeasy society, set up by LSE students Charlie Parker, Chiara Cappellini and Christian Benson, hopes to challenge the "problem" of student unions banning speakers and objects in case students are offended.

"Our society is emerging from this growing sense of censorship that seems to be a problem on loads of campuses in universities across the country," Parker previously told the Evening Standard.

Ironically, the society itself is now under threat of being banned.

Writing for LSE's student paper, the Beaver, Maurice Banerjee Palmer said: "Well to be honest, I don’t really want to ban the Speakeasy/ Free Speech society. But I want to make a point; that, and it would be hilarious if the anti-ban society was actually banned.

"Firstly, they are ill-informed. At best Speakeasy/Free Speech seems to be naïve to the limits on freedom of expression. At worst they pretty much endorse hate speech (which is illegal).

"Secondly, they are self-important."

Speakeasy outreach officer Connor Naylor told spiked: "We first heard about the motion to ban the Speakeasy in a Facebook thread but we really thought it was just a joke or a clever bit of irony.

"If anything, it’s only strengthened us, and our support as well."

Charlie Parker, president of the society, added: "Obviously, it’s a ludicrous motion, but the fact that there is a motion to ban our society, after just over a week of its existence and before we’ve even held an event, proves the need for this group better than we ever could."

The LSE students' union has previously suspended the rugby club for distributing sexist, homophobic leaflets, banned The Sun from union shops, while the athiest society was barred from from wearing t-shirts depicting Jesus and Mohammed holding hands.

A statement from LSESU, posted on Tumblr, read: "There has been some recent coverage concerning a forthcoming motion to be debated at the UGM about whether we should ban the recently approved Free Speech Society.

As is the case with all motions like this, any student is able to put a motion forward and all students are able to vote on it.

The Free Speech Society has already been approved by the Students’ Union, and students will now debate whether that was the right decision. "

Original Article
Source: huffingtonpost.co.uk/
Author: Lucy Sherriff

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