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First Amendment News

Mississippi community college punishes student for swearing outside of class

donal brown May 18, 2010

Free speech advocates say community college exceeded its authority in policing vulgarity. -db FIRE May 18, 2010 JACKSON, Miss.— Mississippi’s largest community college unconstitutionally bans “cursing and vulgarity” and has barred a student from a course for swearing outside of class. After Hinds Community College (HCC) student Isaac Rosenbloom was forbidden to return to class and given twelve “demerits,” he turned to the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) for help. “It is quite

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Pennsylvania: Federal judge orders school to allow students and parents to see Webcam spy photos

donal brown May 18, 2010

While authorities are investigating whether a school district committed any crimes in sying on students through school-issued Macbooks, a federal judge ordered the Lower Merion School District to allow students and parents to view the screenshots taken in their homes. -db Wired May 17, 2010 By David Kravets Suburban Philadelphia parents and their high school-age children soon will learn the extent of a potentially criminal webcam scandal. A federal magistrate on Friday ordered the Lower

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Wikipedia uneasy about alleged child porn on its site

donal brown May 17, 2010

Under criticism, Wikipedia has tried to remove what some call hardcore child pornography from its site amid rumors that their cofounder Jimmy Wales was resigning from his administrative position after being criticized for unilaterally removing some of the controversial content from Wikimedia Commons. -db VentureBeat May 16, 2010 By Paul Boutin [Update: Jimmy Wales tweeted me to say the change to his editorial status is ” A purely technical matter. I am not stepping down or

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Free speech: Federal judge rules for comic for onstage jokes about in-laws

donal brown May 17, 2010

A First Amendment Center director says that the First Amendment, properly understood, protects a wide range of humor, from satire and parody to editorial cartoons. -db First Amendment Center Opinion May 16, 2010 By Gene Policinski What is it about humor that all too often results in situations that decidedly are not a laughing matter? Free speech in comedy attracts controversy as well as belly laughs, and in the case of two “South Park” television

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Effort to end anonymous holds on pending laws blocked in Senate

donal brown May 17, 2010

A Republican senator successfully ended efforts in the U.S. Senate to pass a law eliminating “secret holds” that allow Senators to anonymously block legislation or nominations. -db Secrecy News May 17th, 2010 By Steven Aftergood A long-term, bipartisan effort to eliminate the Senate custom of using “secret holds” to anonymously block pending legislation or nominations was scuttled just as it was on the verge of approval last Thursday after Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) attempted to

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