This short documentary covers FIRE's case at Missouri State University, where social work student Emily Brooker was threatened with expulsion after she refused (as a matter of personal belief) to send a signed letter to the Missouri state legislature in favor of homosexual foster parenting and adoption. This violation resulted not only in a federal lawsuit (which the school settled) but also in an official report that found that a culture of intimidation rife in the schools School of Social Work. For instance, many students and faculty stated a fear of voicing differing opinions from the instructor or colleague, and bullying was used by both students and faculty to characterize specific faculty. The 12-minute documentary features interviews with Brooker, faculty at MSU involved in the case, and Missouri state legislator Jane Cunningham.
In the fall of 2007, the University of Delaware's Office of Residence Life employed mandatory dormitory activities to coerce students to change their thoughts, habits, and values to conform to a highly specified ideological agenda. Following FIRE's campaign, which called the attention of the national media to the Orwellian program and outraged people from all over the political spectrum, UD President Patrick Harker terminated the program. This documentary—produced by FIRE and Free to Choose Media—explains the program's invasive thought-reform activities, the horrified reactions of students and faculty, and FIRE's response.
One of FIRE's most shocking cases in 2008 was that of Keith John Sampson, a student-employee at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) who was found guilty of racial harassment for merely reading the book Notre Dame vs. the Klan: How the Fighting Irish Defeated the Ku Klux Klan during his work breaks. Thanks to FIRE's involvement and the extensive media coverage of the case, the finding against Sampson was eventually overturned and his school record was cleared, but the story behind this incident is still disturbing months later. Filmmaker Andrew Marcus has produced a short documentary on Sampson's case in the hopes of restoring his reputation and bringing to light the incidents of censorship that are all too common on college campuses today.
This video, directed and produced by "Indoctrinate U" director Evan Coyne Maloney and Andrew Marcus, serves as an introduction to FIRE, its principles and issues, and its commitment to liberty on campus. It then turns to FIRE's case at San Francisco State University, where students endured a months-long investigation for stomping on Hamas and Hezbollah flags during an anti-terrorism protest.
This week's episode of FIREside Chats features part one of Adam Kissel's lecture at Binghamton University last week. "Liberty in Peril: Speech Codes on our Nation's College Campuses" discusses speech codes nationwide and the recent events at BU involving Andre Massena and the Department of Social Work. Check back next week for part two of Adam's speech.
FIRE's Adam Kissel went on a tour of the University of Wisconsin system to speak to students and faculty about due process and the proposed changes to Chapters UWS 17 and 18 of the Wisconsin Administrative Code.
At this year's Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), FIRE Co-founder Alan Charles Kors gave a presentation entitled "Higher Education and the Loss of Liberty." During his speech, Kors said, "Speech codes are inherently illiberal but they become insufferable by virtue of their intended double standards in practice, without which they could not last for one second." He counted numerous FIRE cases over the past several years where this happened, and he described FIRE's "Red Alert" list of the institutions which have displayed a severe and ongoing disregard for the fundamental rights of their students or faculty members: Michigan State University, Colorado College, Brandeis University, Tufts University, and Johns Hopkins University.
