Abortion, Classroom Discussion, and the University of Idaho

Guidance given to faculty about effects of state abortion law raises troubling academic freedom questions

According to various reports, the general counsel at the University of Idaho has issued guidance to university employees regarding the state's new abortion law. Of particular interest is the guidance to university faculty about their teaching.

Classroom Discussions. Classroom discussion of the topic should be approached carefully. While academic freedom supports classroom discussions of topics related to abortion, these should be limited to discussions and topics relevant to the class subject. The laws discussed above, specifically including those addressing promoting abortion, counseling in favor of abortion and referring for abortion, will remain applicable. Academic freedom is not a defense to violation of law, and faculty or others in charge of classroom topics and discussion must themselves remain neutral on the topic and cannot conduct or engage in discussions in violation of these prohibitions without risking prosecution.

I have been able to confirm with faculty at Idaho that this report about the general counsel's guidance is accurate.

This is perhaps an effort to implement House Bill 220, which prohibits the use of public funds to "promote abortion." In the context of a bill that is generally concerned with the provision of or referral to abortion services, this may be an aggressive interpretation of the law, but perhaps the caution is warranted.

The academic freedom implications are disturbing. Set aside the problem of faculty introducing abortion-related discussions into a class in which such topics are not germane, there are classes in which abortion-related classroom discussions clearly are germane and appropriate. A moral philosophy class might well discuss the ethics of abortion. A constitutional law class might well discuss the constitutionality of abortion. A health policy class might well discuss the public health consequences of abortion and abortion policy. A women's studies class might well discuss the effect of abortions and abortion policies on the women's movement or women's status in society.

Can a state require that professors at public universities adhere to instructional "neutrality" in relation to the topics that they teach? Certainly from an academic freedom perspective, they cannot (the First Amendment issues are potentially complicated, but I think best understood as prohibiting such a requirement). Standard and widely adopted AAUP principles call for universities to respect professorial freedom in the classroom.

Teachers are entitled to freedom in the classroom in discussing their subject, but they should be careful not to introduce into their teaching controversial matter which has no relation to their subject.

Professors have traditionally had the freedom to stake out controversial positions in the classroom and advocate for a certain perspective on the topics being taught. A good professor will certainly allow discussion and debate regarding how to view such matters, but professors should not be expected to be neutral on such questions as, for example, whether Dobbs was correctly decided or whether abortion is a moral wrong.

If the Idaho law actually requires such instructional neutrality in regards to abortion, it poses a serious threat to academic freedom in the state universities of Idaho.

Comments

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Do professors have the freedom to stake out controversial positions such as "children deserve their mothers and fathers", or "biologically intact natural families produce better children", or "man made climate change is a fraud", or "COVID vaccines aren't really vaccines", "COVID vaccines harm children and young people", or "kids raised in homosexual households have worse outcomes", or "kids shouldn't be transed or groomed", or "the 2020 election was stolen"?

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Absolutely not! Disinformation against protected minority groups or the State is violence and should be banned!

Sincerely,
KEITH E. WHITTINGTON
Free Speech/Academic Freedom Advocate Extradordinare!

[AmosArch]

You don't understand the leftoid definition of 'free speech'. Here let me enlighten you.

1. Coach going off to pray by himself : sick and wrong and fireable

2. Professor sucking up tax payer money to indoctrinate children to rant about how great abortion is all year long in a math class and fail students who disagree with them: brave and protected.

ITS THAT SIMPLE why don't you understand?

[ah....Clem]

"Coach going of to pray by himself : sick and wrong and fireable "

You really believe that bullshit? The dude prayed on the 50 yard line with dozens of players around him. That's "going of to pray by himself"?

Yeah, I know, Gorsuch lied about this fact in his opinion, but the fact remains.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

" Yeah, I know, Gorsuch lied about this fact in his opinion, but the fact remains. "

To the clingers, it wasn't lying. It was a more a miracle. It seems like a lie to reasoning and informed adults in the reality-based world, but to the clingers it's understood as divine righteousness . . . something like speaking in tongues.

Speaking of miracles . . . and the sacred bleeding heart of Jesus . . .

[Armchair Lawyer]

If others join someone praying alone of their own free will...what you going to do?

I can just imagine the joy in liberal hearts when they walk into a church saying "I'm here now! You can't pray anymore, there's a non-believer here!"

[BravoCharlieDelta]

String them up for being white supremacists and ruin their lives of they so much as smile to some protected elite minority group.

[ah....Clem]

Tell me you've never played high school sports (with it's attendant needs to kiss the coach's ass if you want to get any playing time) without telling me that you've never played high school sports.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Does that logic apply to LGBT allyship and other pro-gay proclamations in other areas of the school? Or just one sport?

[Sarcastr0]

Yeah all those pro gay public proclamations they make in high schools.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

lol you should check out LibsOfTikTok

then you wouldn't be so ignorant.

[Sarcastr0]

Jesus Christ.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

The Volokh Conspiracy: Official Legal Blog Of LibsOfTikTok Fans

[Armchair Lawyer]

Yes, I've played high school sports. No, I didn't need to "kiss the coach’s ass" in order to play.

More to the point...So? What's your point? Can the coach not express his or her religious feelings at all? What about other items?

Must a lesbian volleyball coach suppress any mention of her sexuality, for fear of "persuading" members on the team to act gay to get playing time? Or is that OK, they just can't express any religious belief?

[Sarcastr0]

So Amos is full of it.

And also because state funded peer pressure can be as much an effective agent of establishing religion as directly funding a church with public money.

Oh hey what about all the stuff about if you take public money you don’t get to say what you want? Gone away if it’s Christian?

Lacking principles, seems to me!

[bevis the lumberjack]

The coach clearly had an agenda for doing it the way he did. Did he want to set what he thought was a good example? Did he want it to pressure players to join him? Did he simply want to show off his own piety?

I don’t know. Neither do you. Would have been better had he not done it. But does it reach the level of a state employee trying to establish a religion? Meh.

[Sarcastr0]

Does his intent matter for Establishment purposes?

[bevis the lumberjack]

No. Or maybe. Whatever his intent, one guy praying by himself, however ostentatiously, doesn’t amount to establishment. IMO.

[Sarcastr0]

You have a very idiosyncratic definition of by himself.

[shawn_dude]

Yes. It matters. Because if the coach can do it with his team, in uniform, loudly, at the 50 yard line in full view of the students attending the event, why can't the home room teacher pray "privately and alone" in her classroom right after the Pledge of Allegiance? What stops the principle from breaking into prayer during school events? And if there's a belief that following along will provide benefits to the students, then there's a de facto establishment of a specific religion.

Another way to consider it: if, on the 50 yard line, the coach was going all in on praying with his team and one member of the team chose to step to the 45 yard line and pray to Satan, do you think that player would be on the team much longer? Where's their right to pray after the game?

[bevis the lumberjack]

In your hypothetical the student would have an obvious discrimination claim.

If the home room teacher did what you described most high school kids would probably think she was weird.

It’s my memory that the coach prayed very prominently but silently.

Look, I agree that the coach is an ass. Please tell us what he did to “establish” anything.

[bernard11]

Can the coach not express his or her religious feelings at all?

Your usual dishonest BS.

He can express his religious feelings all he wants when he's not on the job. The school board even offered to let him go on the field and pray after everyone was gone.

Gorsuch lied about this case, and you are doing the same.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

Tell me you’ve never played high school sports (with it’s attendant needs to kiss the coach’s ass if you want to get any playing time) without telling me that you’ve never played high school sports.

Tell me you sucked so badly at whatever you played that you had to kiss the coach's ass to get any playing time without telling me....that.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

There’s an H. L. Mencken article you can find in print copies of The Nation in libraries, but finding it on the Internet is difficult. Here’s Mencken’s summary in another article:

“I had printed in the Nation, a week or so before, an article arguing that the anti-evolution law, whatever its unwisdom, was at least constitutional — that policing school teachers was certainly not putting down free speech.”

https://archive.org/stream/CoverageOfTheScopesTrialByH.l.Mencken/ScopesTrialMencken.txt

If anyone has a link, that would be great – Mencken was a great free-speech aficionado and he hated the “monkey” law and the Scopes prosecutors with a passion, so it’s not as if this was simply a partisan position to support his side in the culture war. Quite the contrary.

[NOVA Lawyer]

School teachers =/= university professors

For starters. But I would be interested in the article.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

I can't recall if good old HLM went into the college and university situation.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

OK, I found it at HathiTrust, "In Tennessee," by H. L. Mencken, *The Nation,* July 1, 1925, pp. 21-22.

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc1.b000550791&view=1up&seq=49&skin=2021

The last paragraph does indeed suggest that university professors, as teachers of the elite, have some freedom of teaching.

But grade-school and high school teachers, says Mencken, must teach the official line as defined by the legislature. Tennessee teachers don't have a right to teach evolution and (Mencken doesn't single out Tennessee here) Kansas teachers have no right to speak against Prohibition, New Jersey teachers have no right to speak in favor of prohibition, New York teachers have no right to criticize Catholics and Jews - bear in mind this was in the context of the 20s.

[OtisAH]

If H.L. Mencken said it in 1925 that pretty much ends the discussion I say…

[Clayton Cramer]

The textbook that the ACLU was defending includes this charming discussion of racial superiority: https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-osiIlHnWzf8/XX-R7v0syeI/AAAAAAAALWk/sVqfZ7c73sogy2XSbHkR7enwcBJesM3CgCEwYBhgL/s400/RacesofMankind.JPG

And here is a link to the page on books.google.com https://www.google.com/books/edition/A_Civic_Biology/-ylCAAAAIAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22civic+biology%22+race&printsec=frontcover

Today, the ACLU would sue to prohibit its use. As a taxpayer I would resent my money being spent this way. But Science! Remember that Progressives support mandatory sterilization. In several Nordic countries, Social Democrats also supported it.

[NOVA Lawyer]

For all the caterwauling from the "right" about censorship and free speech, we sure are seeing a lot of state level action from the right aimed at dictating what people may say (Idaho), must say (Texas), may not say (Florida), and punishing private companies for saying things the governor doesn't like (Florida) or the President does't like (Trump asking mergers to be blocked, choosing winners based on speech rather than bids, allegedly).

There are illiberal voices on the left, but they aren't the mainstream of the party. On the right, though, they are the leaders of the party.

[AmosArch]

TIL Joe Biden isn't a leader of the Dem party.

[ah....Clem]

plonk.

[mikeybates]

The curricula of a state school is going to be regulated by the state. Nobody else could regulate it.

[NOVA Lawyer]

The Idaho law does not regulate the curricula of a state school. It is so broadly targeted at disfavored speech that it effectively chills discussion of the topic among adults in university classrooms.

It probably is constitutional, but it definitely interferes with the free market place of ideas, it doesn't respect the choices of grown ups in an environment specifically intended to be a place for debate of competing ideas and challenging orthodoxy, and otherwise is an example of the government doing precisely what conservatives pretend to think social media companies (private companies) are doing. And for some reason, as you demonstrate, conservatives are less concerned with government censorship than with private "censorship" which turns actual conservative ideology on its head.

[Squirrelloid]

Tell me you never went to college without telling me you never went to college.

Universities don't have state-mandated curricula. It's not high school. Departments (and at upper levels, individuals professors) offer classes in subjects, and the professor(s) teaching it creates the curriculum of the class. (Lower level classes are partially dictated by the department and its needs).

[ah....Clem]

There is an all-out-assault on 1A freedoms going on. Actual laws on the books that criminalize saying or writing certain things, or criminalizing *not* saying or writing certain things.

It's not all coming from the right, e.g. the recent legislation in California or the European union, but it is disproportionally coming from people who might euphemistically be referred to as "conservatives".

And just a reminder, Facebook, twitter, et al, and undergraduate social justice warriors are not the government.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

What about when those groups collude with the government to censor speech?

[Michael P]

And also as a reminder, pubic school teachers, pubic university administrators, and government bureaucrats are the government.

[Krayt]

No, facebook, twitter, et al. are not the government. They are private corporations to which the government said, "Censor harrassment or we will gut section 230, which will open your business model up to lawsuits, causing hundreds of billions in stock losses as your business model comes under assault and changes to be like other countries, which had no such growth without it. Oh, and start with the harrassing tweets of our political opponents right before this election."

Those "not government" people. We know they are not governmrnt. They are us, Americans, threatened by government.

[Michael P]

Clem doesn't remember which notable 20th Century model of government involved a strong, socialist central government exerting pressure on private industry to ensure that disfavored groups and ideologies were thoroughly suppressed.

[shawn_dude]

By "harassing tweets" you mean the part where they stopped promoting violent conspiracy theories that contributed to the Jan 6th insurrection and attempted coup?

[Armchair Lawyer]

"must say (Texas)"

Requiring actual viewpoint neutrality? Oh gosh no.

[NOVA Lawyer]

Requiring private actors to be viewpoint neutral is not a problem? lol. I thought, as a private person, the whole point of the 1A was that I could express or not express whatever ideas I wanted. And Citizens United pretty clearly expanded that right of self-expression to corporations. If you want to argue that corporations don't have the same free speech rights as individual people, you're gonna need to make that argument explicit. Otherwise, requiring a private entity to be "viewpoint neutral" is a clear and direct violation of the 1A (unless you buy the common carrier argument which is bunk, but make that argument).

[Michael P]

"unless you buy the common carrier argument which is bunk, but make that argument"

Lol. Common carriers are "bunk".

When I call someone, the Baby Bell is not the one who is speaking.

[NOVA Lawyer]

Which is why telephone companies are common carriers. Social media companies are entirely unlike telephone companies.

The telephone company doesn't promote some calls and prevent others based on content (spam filtering excepted). The business model of social media companies is wholly dependent on promoting some content and suppressing or excluding other content. This difference is why the common carrier argument is bunk.

[Armchair Lawyer]

You seem to have a problem here.

Common carriers require viewpoint neutrality for what they carry. They're also private actors.

So yes, in some situations, as required, having viewpoint neutrality for private actors is entirely appropriate.

[NOVA Lawyer]

Nobody disputed that actual common carriers like telephone companies can't eavesdrop on conversations and deny service based on viewpoint. You aren't following the actual conversation if you think so.

But thanks, Captain Obvious.

[Armchair Lawyer]

As for the social media companies...they are really communications companies. That's their backbone, facilitating communications between people.

The problem with that is, when they selectively blacklist, ban, or shadow ban people based on their political beliefs. It's not one of a video showing up more or less in someone's feed. It's one of the speaker who had previously used the platform to communicate being outright eliminated, in order to stifle dissent.

This story is a good example of that. The wife of a whistleblower at the FBI is reached out to by a group that wants to support her and him. This woman isn't doing anything wrong. She's not really showing up on anyone's feeds. What she is doing is communicating (via Facebook) with a group that wants to provide support. This is regarding an FBI Whistleblower, that the FBI and Biden administration likely wishes would not exist.

Then suddenly the woman's Facebook page is "suspended." Communications between elements that are critical of the government are suddenly cut off. Organization deterred. Effectively, this is like cutting off the woman's phone line. But it's OK because Facebook is just "moderating what it wants to show and what it doesn't"?

No. Examples like this demonstrate the need for tighter regulation. Facebook is being used as a communications medium.

https://nypost.com/2022/09/25/facebook-silencing-activity-related-to-fbi-whistleblower-steve-friend/

[Voize]

this is like cutting off the woman’s phone line

Not unless the woman got her phone service for free.

[shawn_dude]

You seem to be sweeping a wide variety of problematic behavior into "political beliefs." If my political belief is that Biden is illegitimate, Trump won, and we need to organize a revolution, should Twitter promote that to the general populous? Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and similar companies aren't passing information along in a neutral fashion. Their algorithms intentionally create feedback loops that identify patterns and feed those patterns extensively. That level of curation on a per-viewer basis is not something common carriers do. Common carriers don't amplify messages in this manner.

[NOVA Lawyer]

As for the social media companies…they are really communications companies. That’s their backbone, facilitating communications between people.

You're playing word games. No, they aren't communications companies, though people communicate on their platforms. I mean, you can say newspapers and television stations are communications companies too. And they are, in a broad sense of the term that robs it of any meaning in this context. But Fox News still doesn't have to provide actually fair and balanced coverage of anything. Nor does Facebook.

You can't expand the term when it suits you, but then apply the narrow definition when you want to limit the activities of all the companies you roped in with the broad term.

Whether dishonest or just sloppy thinking, it's definitely invalid logic.

[Michael P]

"The business model of social media companies is wholly dependent on promoting some content and suppressing or excluding other content."

Most people would look at social media and conclude that the business model of social media is enabling person X to talk to person Y while the company advertises to both. How much revenue does Twitter get for banning The Babylon Bee?

[NOVA Lawyer]

Most people would look at social media and conclude that the business model of social media is enabling person X to talk to person Y while the company advertises to both.

Even if true, that doesn't prove what the business model of social media companies actually is. Moreover, you're doing the same thing Armchair did, you are using general terms imprecisely to mean one thing to define the scope of activity, then using the same term to mean something much more specific. The business model of social media companies is to provide a product that draws views so they can sell advertising, which is more like a television station or newspaper. Yes, they construct the product out of user submitted material, but they very clearly curate that material, promoting some, suppressing others, banning yet others, to create a product to attract views which views then are essentially sold to advertisers.

It's precisely why I find them close to useless, because they are far more interested in getting me to view promoted content than facilitating me seeing what my friends post.

But regardless of my personal experience, their business model presupposes curation and moderation. Denying that, including by pretending their core business is delivering messages from you to your friends, fails to comprehend what we're even discussing.

[Kenneth Almquist]

Person X doesn't need the services of a social media company to talk to person Y over the internet. See the Wikipedia page for Distributed Social Network. Or if X and Y are more old school, they could just use E-mail, which has been around since before the Internet was invented. I don't use social media companies, but as far as I can tell, much of their attraction is that they promote some content and suppress or exclude other content.

[Michael D]

Why can an employer not create an expectation such as this for their employees?

[NOVA Lawyer]

Nobody said they couldn't. Well, except for all those people whining about private social media companies moderating content on their private websites. You can try to be pro-government censorship in the classroom but anti-private moderation of a website, but I don't see how you can take both of those positions.

The converse lends itself of easy distinctions, the most obvious being the Idaho situation involves the government putting a thumb on the scale of public debate whereas the Texas case involves a private company exercising its 1A rights. It seems obvious that we should be less comfortable with the government censoring speech than with a private corporation "censoring" speech.

I mean, you seem to be okay with:

No government money can be used to advocate a pro-abortion message, but private money must facilitate both sides of the debate.

If this doesn't sound backwards to you, we have radically different understandings of why there is a free speech clause in the First Amendment to begin with.

[Krayt]

Ahhh, the purifying fire of government's insinuating fingers.

"We meant controlling the speech of the othet side. Not the other side controlling our speech!"

[OtisAH]

Am I the only person who remembers the group that gave us “Keep government out of my doctor’s office” during the ACA Tyranny is the same group who as no issue with state laws that instruct doctors what they can and cannot say to pregnant women?

[tkamenick]

" aimed at dictating what people may say (Idaho), must say (Texas), may not say"

Aimed at dictating what their own employees may say, must say, may not say... (the rest of the criticism is better).

[y81]

Conservatives are using the institutions they do control (mostly the political branches of state governments) to fight back against the institutions that leftists control (state universities being the most notable example). BTW, for Berkeley or UCLA (the employers of several of the Conspirators) to require diversity statements is just as much state action as the actions of the Idaho state legislature. So despite Prof. Whittington's vapors, the situation strikes me as the normal give and take of democratic politics in a liberal and diverse society.

[Clayton Cramer]

If teachers were teaching white racial superiority (as was the case in the Scopes case), would you be arguing that taxpayers are required to fund this?

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

There are illiberal voices on the left, but they aren’t the mainstream of the party.

You might want to consider putting the bong down for a while.

[Soronel Haetir]

Is "academic freedom" in the classroom however actually a legal right? I could well believe that a state school professor has a right to research and write on any topic that is not itself illegal for some other reason, but for any portion of the job that involves the classroom the state is paying that professor to teach and I am not certain it is unreasonable for the state to exert some degree of control over the content of that education.

If the professor wants a greater degree of academic freedom perhaps they need to work at a private school that tolerates or welcomes that kind of thing.

[Rossami]

A legal right? I think the answer is no, at least for things said in the course of employment. It may, however, be a contractual right if the university adopted the AAUP principles and the employee relied on such promises when deciding to accept the offer. But any such contractual right would be subordinate to a legislative change.

I believe there have been cases where the government was held to a higher First Amendment standard when the potential prosecution touched academic freedom but I'm not aware of any changing the government-as-employer standards of analysis.

[Squirrelloid]

States do not dictate college curricula. Departments and individual professors create curricula.

And universities have generally promised professors academic freedom as part of their job.

[Rossami]

re: "States do not dictate college curricula."

Yes and no. Governments (and their quasi-governmental partners) do set accreditation standards. And while detailed curricula are not set by the accreditation agencies, review of (and if necessary, amendments to) the curricula is definitely part of the accreditation process. Even the most ardent supporter of "academic freedom" does not allege that it requires a college/employer to sacrifice their accreditation.

[BadLib]

That has been my question as well. It clearly isn’t required by the First Amendment.

Perhaps some state constitutions or laws protect “academic freedom” in public schools. Perhaps contracts (union or otherwise) require it.

Overall though it seems to be a “right” invented by academics for their benefit. It seems not unlike a group of 12 year olds who invent a “roaming right” that would be violated by a parental imposed curfew or requirement to do homework before hanging out with friends.

That’s not to say that I don’t think some level of “academic freedom” is valuable — however limiting it to research and academic publications/speeches seems adequate. In particular, it need not extend to professors being able to bring up topics in class that are not clearly related to the curriculum (in part because that wastes valuable time that should be devoted to the curriculum that later courses will have expected the student to have covered).

[shawn_dude]

I think this is short sighted. Once we agree that academic freedom is not untethered from the requirements of the employer, it becomes something that directly impacts the university in its chosen market. Even public institutions, especially today, need to recruit students to keep the institution alive. They need to recruit qualified faculty that students would like to study under (this is more important post-grad, but professors can draw desirable students for undergrad degrees as well.) If the university depends on faculty research for part of it's funding (see: Research 1 schools), then the importance of faculty quality is even higher. And while school rankings are controversial, they are also important and faculty play a role there as well. In this world, telling faculty to self-censor and only research state-approved topics in state-approved ways is a sure-fired approach to recruiting only the very worst faculty available. These are people who are passionate about their subject and they aren't going to stick around if you tell them to STFU and teach according to the political whims of the legislature.

[Krayt]

"The handful of universities that refuse government money so government cannot command them are just clinger rootin tootin shootin broken down warehouses where people bark at the moon and WAIT WHAT GOVERMENT CAN'T DO THIS!

[Dan Schiavetta]

This reminds me of the Pope’s warning to Galileo that he could teach heliocentrism as a hypothesis but he must not “hold or defend” it.

[AmosArch]

TIL murdering babies is like heliocentrism.

[Don Nico]

On this I agree with you. Pretty much the same thing

[AmosArch]

As the leftoids would say if this was about some professor spouting off about how great Jesus is. You can hold whatever opinion you want on abortion but its completely reasonable for the government to not be forced to pay you taxpayer money to promote it in the classroom when you’re on the clock.

[santamonica811]

Amos,
Does that apply to all issues? Only to controversial issues? Only to controversial issues where the speaker's viewpoint differs from your own? Can a history teacher argue that our entry into WWII was a bad idea? Can she say that she thinks it was a good idea? Can a Health teacher say that the US govt deciding to restrict tobacco companies' rights to advertise to children was smart policy? Or a dumb policy?

I mean, they (and thousands of others) are, of course, all opinions. I can see the policy argument behind, "Teachers should teach facts and only facts. No editorial asides at all." I don't agree with it; but I do understand it. I just want to make sure I'm understanding your argument...are you advocating for that or not?

[Davy C]

I don't think it's a matter of banning all "editorial asides". Just some of them.

Surely if a professor were to argue, not just that we shouldn't have entered WWII, but that we should have entered on the other side, the university and/or state should be allowed to say "no, you can't teach that in our classrooms"?

[santamonica811]

Davy,
How would you formulate a rule for this that would pass constitutional muster? Or would it be something like the old saying about obscenity/pornography? "I can't define it. But I know it when I see it."

[shawn_dude]

In this particular case, that rule may already exist in the form of protections for, among others, Jewish students. Anyone thinking we should have joined Hitler is likely to go on to say things about Hitler's goals, including what he did to homosexuals and Jews along with his opinions on race. Outside of places like the rural center of Florida and some other rural areas in the old South, someone with those views who doesn't keep them to themselves will eventually create a hostile learning environment for their students.

[Thrax]

Oh, okay, in that case professors can promote abortion all they want on the 50-yard-line of the football stadium.

[Don Nico]

It seems that the U of I is trying to walk a fine line. But the message as relayed by the OP writer seems to be simple: The university may not fire you, but the state may prosecute you for violating the state law. In that case the university may be unwilling to defend you in court

[Ken Arromdee]

Let's be a little blunter about it. The university probably knows very well that the law doesn't actually make this discussion illegal. They're just saying otherwise because that's a way to drum up some hysteria against the right for "forcing" them to censor the classes.

[shawn_dude]

Are laws like this vague on what they cover intentionally or due to incompetence? Both Texas and Florida's laws are similarly vague on what they cover leading risk-averse administrators to play it safe resulting in a broader scope of coverage than the law could have achieved if it were more explicit.

[bevis the lumberjack]

It’s the fault of the people that vote. Why do we consistently elect people to office that are hostile to our rights?

This is just gratuitous suppression of the 1A because if you prohibit discussion of abortion among college age people they’ll just never know about it, right?

The Idaho legislature has an aggregate IQ in the single digits.

[AmosArch]

This is just some dumb college bureaucrat interpreting a reasonable law in a way that will not hold up. You can calm down and tomorrow we'll be back to rightwing views being whats overwhelmingly censored as usual.

[bevis the lumberjack]

If your side is gonna censor with your blessing why should anybody care about the other side censoring? Out here in non-zealot world we’re screwed either way.

[Longtobefree]

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I give you Title IX.

[Clayton Cramer]

Curiously, I feel no limitations on discussing slavery in all its horrors in an American History class in an Idaho community college.

[shawn_dude]

And how about discussing the modern ripples in Black America from that very same slavery through to Jim Crow and redlining? You know, the sort of stuff conservatives have branded "CRT."

[grb]

Violation of the law? That’s not surprising. As the news from Iran shows, it’s hard to enforce sharia law on a resisting population without the threat of government force. Why should Idaho's Taliban find it any easier?

[Michael P]

Idaho's Taliban? Are they like California's Khmer Rouge?

[mulch]

Indiana's Shining Path?

[bernard11]

So under the Idaho law a medical school professor who discusses situations where abortion is the indicated procedure can be arrested?

[Longtobefree]

While academic freedom supports classroom discussions of topics related to abortion, these should be limited to discussions and topics relevant to the class subject.
- - - -
there are classes in which abortion-related classroom discussions clearly are germane and appropriate. A moral philosophy class might well discuss the ethics of abortion. A constitutional law class might well discuss the constitutionality of abortion. A health policy class might well discuss the public health consequences of abortion and abortion policy. A women's studies class might well discuss the effect of abortions and abortion policies on the women's movement or women's status in society.

[bernard11]

You are quoting the OP, not a legislator or other ID official.

[Michael D]

Nor are you quoting a legislator. This is a “general guidance” based on what may be a biased interpretation of a law never intended for this use and likely never to be applied in that manner.

This guidance actually seems more like propaganda to muckrake.

[ThomasD]

Nailed it, the "guidance" is a Trojan Horse, and Whittington is playing along.

[Clayton Cramer]

That might be difficult. Life of the mother is a generally accepted reason. So she does have to explain to police how a 31-year-old impregnated a 15-yea-old is not so persuasive.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

So under the Idaho law a medical school professor who discusses situations where abortion is the indicated procedure can be arrested?

How you arrive at that conclusion only you and the voices in your head know.

[Longtobefree]

"Payback is a bitch"

[Sarcastr0]

Constitution bedamned if it owns the libs, eh?

[Krayt]

Thus do you draw the wrong conclusion.

In an election not so long ago when the Republicans won, people on the left ran around, panicked, "What if they do to us what we've been doing to them!??!!", meaning cancel culture and twisting the power of government against their opponents, meaning them.

The correct answer is it's wrong. Is this fighting fire with fire, or just ancient abuse by the powerful turning government against their politival enemies, something the Founding Fathers struggled mightily to girder against.

[OtisAH]

Yeah, nobody on The Left has ever said “what if they do to us what we do to them.” Primarily because The Left of rightwing fever dreams does not exist. And because recognizing the rights of others doesn’t actually do anything to The Right except trigger rightwing fever dreams.

[OtisAH]

“Payback” for what?

[shawn_dude]

Calling them a bigot for, you know, their bigotry. It hurts their feelings and they don't feel safe any more. Why does no one create a safe space for misogynistic racists?!

Think of the children!

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

One approach would be to simply let Idaho be Idaho . . . let all of the downscale clingers aggregate in a few diminishing corners of America, creating concentrating pools of ignorance and bigotry. West Virginia, Idaho, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Alabama, South Carolina . . . provide a lifeline for the smart and ambitious young people who wish to depart but leave the adults to marinate in dysfunction until the last of the depleted human residue dies off in the ordinary course.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

It's like you live in a bizarro world where people aren't fleeing your 3rd world blue state shit holes.

[Sarcastr0]

The conservative idea that cities are all crime ridden hellscapes persists well beyond what makes sense.

I suppose it’s as dumb as the country bumpkin stereotype that is dying out.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

What is dying out is rural America’s economies, towns, and thinking.

Natural selection. The great American sifting. Progress.

We should stop subsidizing, glorifying, and appeasing the losers of America’s culture war.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

What are the facts about where people are moving from and where people are moving to?

What do the data say?

[Sarcastr0]

They say nothing about the cause. Nor is there much danger of cities emptying.

[Michael Ejercito]

Like Detroit?

Camden?

Memphis?

[Sarcastr0]

Jesus how far are you reaching back here?

[KeithK]

In principle you're not wrong. This could infringe on academic freedom. The problem is that so many professors these days abuse that academic freedom. Advocating for one side is one thing. Advocating so strongly that students own freedom of speech is chilled is another. There needs to be pushback against this bad behavior by the academy.

[bernard11]

The problem is that so many professors these days abuse that academic freedom.

Data?

[Michael P]

Political donation statistics, for one set of data. There's an extreme bias in which faculty are accepted.

[tkamenick]

"have a bias" =/= "abuse academic freedom"

[KeithK]

For one thing, there are numerous polls where conservative students show that they are afraid to express political opinions in class for fear of retaliation. Loads of examples where conservative organizations on campus are targeted to be defunded or disbanded due to their beliefs (not the same as classroom discussion but evidence of the environment on campus).

[ThomasD]

Yep. Leftist indoctrinators want the "safe space" to dictate the terms of polite discourse.

Any attempts to limit them to the purported topic of their class is immediately (mis)construed as a gag on academic freedom.

[Clayton Cramer]

We went to college. We saw a lot of that.

[Sarcastr0]

First your personal anecdote is not proof of much.

Second it’s definitely not germane to the OPs present tense take.

Thirdly, conservatives feeling like victims is not really discrimination or abuse if power,

[Bill Falcon]

Easy..get rid of any majors that abortion is even a topic. Engineering, hard sciences, business, computer science and maybe economics...all other majors are bullshit anyway..shut them down.

[bevis the lumberjack]

No more doctors. Or nurses. Easy peasy, right?

[Clayton Cramer]

I think you exaggerate. It is certainly fair to present both sides. When I taught 14th Amendment, we discussed both originalist and living Constitution models.

[Michael D]

#AbolishGovernmentSchools

[F.D. Wolf]

The concern seems overblown. I don't think anyone would seriously contend that a state university professor's advocating abortion constitutes a "use of public funds". If it did, wouldn't it also apply to state legislators? I doubt any of them will be tempering their abortion advocacy.

[OtisAH]

You think the “Money Is Fungible” people won’t argue that a professor speaking in class or on university time about university business is using public funds to do so? You are very very wrong.

[ThomasD]

"Set aside the problem of faculty introducing abortion-related discussions into a class in which such topics are not germane"

Well sure, if we set aside the physical trauma and associated blood loss then stabbings are a much less problematic issue as well.

Shorter Whittington: "Today class we are going to discuss everything not involving the elephant filling up the room."

[ThomasD]

This article is just another example of "libertarianism" in action. Libertarianism purports to advocate for liberty but inevitable acts in support of leftists.

Whittington certainly could have questioned whether the "guidance" was perhaps a tad overwrought and misguided. He chose otherwise and we know why.

[OtisAH]

Looking forward to the first Idaho professor being charged with Felony Discussion just to see the “The guidance is ridiculously overblown” numpties switch to “fuck around and find out.”

[Clayton Cramer]

And you are projecting leftist hatred on us.

[OtisAH]

I’m predicting numpty behaviors based on well-established patterns. If you count yourself as a numpty and take offense that’s on you. Maybe some self-reflection is in order?

[Michael P]

Every accusation from you lot is a confession.