Princeton Allegedly Told Student Journalist Not to Write About Activist Who Got "No Contact" Order Against Journalist

“The safest course of action in terms of a possible violation of the NCO would be to refrain from writing or to be interviewed for articles that mention the name of the student with whom you have an NCO (or to retract them if that’s possible).”

From today's letter by FIRE and the Anti-Defamation League, send to Princeton University:

Princeton is stifling … discussions [about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict] and newsgathering by its student press, by permitting students who dislike certain speech to be granted no-communication or no-contact orders against other students. While no-contact protocols are important tools to keep students safe from properly defined discriminatory harassment, and threatening, intimidating, or assaultive conduct, Princeton appears to be granting these orders for any student who requests one, so long as minimal procedural prerequisites are satisfied.

These orders are being issued by administrators with disciplinary authority, under threat of punishment, without a modicum of due process, and—most unconscionably—where the student-speaker is not even alleged to have violated any university policy. This practice is deeply chilling, in blatant violation of Princeton's laudable free expression policies, and must end immediately….

Princeton … [has issued a] no-contact order against a [Princeton] Tory journalist who reported on a student demonstration against Israel. A Tory journalist covered a November 9 protest held by Students for Justice in Palestine. While she was recording footage of the protestors' chants and signs, a graduate student attempted to block her camera. The graduate student followed the journalist, and remained in close physical proximity to her, despite the journalist voicing her discomfort.

When the journalist reported this to an on-duty Public Safety officer, the officer informed the journalist that she was "inciting something." Following the officer's inaction, the graduate student continued to attempt to physically obstruct the journalist from filming, eventually pushing her and stepping on her foot. {The recitation here reflects our understanding of the pertinent facts. We appreciate that you may have additional information to offer and invite you to share it with us.}

After the protest, the graduate student who pushed the journalist obtained a no-contact order against her. The journalist met with her Assistant Dean for Student Life to discuss the order and asked the dean whether she could publish articles written before the issuance of the no- contact order that mention the graduate student's name. The dean later informed the journalist via email {on file with author} that the university "cannot determine if they would be a violation of the NCO—it is possible that some statements may be interpreted by the other student as an indirect or direct attempt to communicate. The safest course of action in terms of a possible violation of the NCO would be to refrain from writing or to be interviewed for articles that mention the name of the student with whom you have an NCO (or to retract them if that's possible)." …

This censorship is utterly inconsistent with Princeton's unequivocal promises that students have the right to engage in even the most challenging conversations. Your Statement on Freedom of Expression, for example, declares "the University has a solemn responsibility not only to promote a lively and fearless freedom of debate and deliberation, but also to protect that freedom when others attempt to restrict it." The Statement further notes "it is not the proper role of the University to attempt to shield individuals from ideas and opinions they find unwelcome, disagreeable, or even deeply offensive." Nor can a desire for "civility and mutual respect … be used as a justification for closing off discussion of ideas, however offensive or disagreeable those ideas may be to some members of our community." Likewise, Princeton's protest policy explicitly forbids students from abusing university systems to "obstruct or otherwise interfere with the freedom of others to express views they reject or even loathe."

Just last week, you observed that despite "[c]ontroversy over the war in the Middle East," Princeton would "never" censor or discipline students unless their speech "falls under one of the enumerated expressions to [Princeton's] free expression policy, such as those permitting the University to restrict threats of harassment." Yet your administration continues to turn a blind eye to the use of no-contact orders to silence students who seek to express their pro-Israel ideas, simply because their peers find these ideas "heterodox, shocking, or offensive."

Princeton's commitments to free speech are admirable—but only to the extent to which they are followed. As written, they properly align with First Amendment jurisprudence and prevailing conceptions of free speech and free press principles. Any reasonable student or student journalist reading these policies would be confident they have the right to engage in difficult discussions without worrying they will be slapped with a no-contact order, under threat of discipline. Student journalists are also promised their right to engage in dogged newsgathering, including contacting student leaders in the ordinary course of their reporting. But Princeton has betrayed its promises by allowing students to censor their peers on the basis of subjective offense. These outcomes cannot be squared with the university's mission or purported commitments….

To be clear, when properly utilized, no-contact orders are an important tool to ensure the safety of victims of physical violence, sexual misconduct, true threats, or discriminatory harassment. But Princeton is allowing students with ideological disagreements to transform no-contact orders into cudgels to silence the "lively and fearless freedom of debate and deliberation" that Princeton promises all students. This is at least the second time in the last two years [for details on the first time, see the full letter -EV] that a Tory student journalist has been silenced by a no-contact order at the behest of community members offended by his or her pro-Israel journalism. This systematic weaponization of no-contact orders to silence pro-Israel journalism—or any journalism—cannot stand….

Comments

[Randal]

FIRE and the Anti-Defamation League write to express our collective concern...

Ew no! The ADL has become part of the problem, don't team up with them! They've already tainted the SPLC. Please, avoid the ADL's noxious taint.

[Eugene Volokh]

It seems to me that FIRE's view, which I think is generally quite right, is that they're looking for coalitions, not for ideological purity. Just as the NRA and ACLU can helpfully team up on free speech in NRA v. Vullo (disclosure: I'm counsel of record in that case) even though they may disagree on gun rights, so it make sense for FIRE to team up with groups that might not see eye-to-eye with them on various other free speech issues. That, I think, is how battles are usually won in a pluralistic political system.

[Randal]

As long as it's a temporary alliance I'll accept it. Just, be sure to shower thoroughly.

[Bwaaah]

Not a hint of stink on you, Randal. Not a hint.

[Dr. Ed 2]

I was of the opinion that the man running the SPLC is the one who tainted it.

[Archibald Tuttle]

Listen to yourself Randal. You're trying to frame it as a tribal squabble. Tribalism is corrosive. Resist it.

[Randal]

No, I think the ADL’s recent transmogrification into a pro-Israel propaganda outfit that badmouths Jews who question the party line and works to suppress free speech is what’s corrosive. They make for a bad bedfellow for FIRE, which is actively working against the ADL in other contexts.

I get the let’s-try-working-together concept that Eugene is talking about as a bridge-building attempt. I’d love for the ADL to turn back to its better days if FIRE can influence it to do so.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Does FIRE have much reputation to taint? FIRE is a partisan hackery that whores its ostensible principles for right-wing donations.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Yep, FIRE is real right wing.
I believe the director is a practicing Buddhist.

[tkamenick]

Going to bat for SPLC does not help your argument here. That organization was at the forefront of the "you disagree with us therefore you must be evil" movement. That has been a significant contributing factor to the current cancel culture and attacks on free speech.

[Randal]

the “you disagree with us therefore you must be evil” movement

Isn't this the whole raison d'etre of MAGA? I'm not impressed.

[VinniUSMC]

It speaks volumes already that you think FIRE tainted the cauldron of hate and bigotry that is the SPLC. I'm not impressed too.

[Randal]

Not FIRE. ADL.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Journalists, students or otherwise, publish stories about newsworthy occurrences. At least in this nation, journalists worth paying attention to do not permit themselves to be dissuaded by the kinds of trivial threats Princeton can muster. If Princeton makes a case out of it, that is a blunder. The journalists' job is to report that blunder to make the story bigger.

Press freedom is not some shrinking privilege that needs to get special protection from the likes of FIRE. Press freedom is real power—power available full strength to anyone enterprising enough, and courageous enough, to deploy it, and to defend it forthrightly. Press freedom does not need special pleading from the likes of FIRE, or the ADL.

Let advocates like FIRE and the ADL find weaker parties to champion. It is important for governments and major institutional players in this nation to understand that the institutional press has power enough, and independence enough, to take care of itself. The plight of an institutional press which has lost power to teach that lesson on its own will not be improved by turning its helplessness into the kind of public spectacle which draws the advocacy of self-appointed busybody defenders.

[Michael P]

Do you think getting expelled is "trivial"?

[Stephen Lathrop]

Michael P, I think that for an institutional publisher armed with press freedom the threat of getting expelled is trivial, and the remedy against the threat is to laugh at it in public. Cringing is unbecoming. It also has the disadvantage of emboldening an adversary to make the problem worse.

Princeton, like any major American University, cannot afford to set itself in public opposition to press freedom. For an institutional press, leveraging that reality to make would-be opponents of press freedom back down in public is the best protection. To do it enhances the prestige of the press, and chastens other would-be opponents.

Remarkably, that same dynamic works well against opponents far more powerful than universities. It works against governments too.

You may suppose otherwise. Fans of Joe Keyboard style internet "publishing,"—typically not publishers at all; they do not practice characteristic publishing activities—enjoy no such institutional publishing advantages. They remain vulnerable. They rightly fear adversaries that an institutional press has power to laugh at, and defend against.

Explaining that to internet utopians has proved impossible for me, at least in this forum. You will have to take my word for it.

But I continue to suppose that if I could find even one internet utopian to engage out of genuine curiosity, and conduct a dialogue extending over multiple threads, explanation might succeed. Alas, I do not believe I have ever encountered a potential audience less curious, and thus less journalistically inclined, than the internet utopians who comment on this blog.

[VinniUSMC]

What are you on about? Princeton is the one attacking the press. Free speech advocates are defending the press. Publishing has nothing to do with it.

[Absaroka]

His position here, I assume, is just a continuation of a long term objection to, inter alia, the ACLU supporting the NYT and WaPo in the Pentagon Papers case. His view seems to be that freedom of the press is best played by big boy rules, where publishing powerhouses like the NYT, WaPo, and student newspapers MTFU and fight it out with their equally powerful peers, like the US government or university administrations, without outside interference.

Having the ACLU or FIRE express an opinion is like a boxing match with two equal weight opponents, and then the ACLU/FIRE guy climbs into the ring and helps the NYT or student paper beat up on the poor overmatched USG or school administration. Why do you hate fair play?

[VinniUSMC]

Having the ACLU or FIRE express an opinion is like a boxing match with two equal weight opponents, and then the ACLU/FIRE guy climbs into the ring and helps the NYT or student paper beat up on the poor overmatched USG or school administration. Why do you hate fair play?

Ah, I see what you're saying. SL, consistently backwards.

[Randal]

Allow me to put a potentially more substantive spin on what Lathrop is saying.

The student journalist in this scenario was cowed by Princeton, via the NCO, into suppressing her own journalistic speech. That’s prior restraint, which as we all know is like, the worst.

Strong, sophisticated journalism institutionalists understand that the best antidote to prior restraint is to flaunt it. Just publish those Pentagon Papers! If you’re dicking around asking for approval, you’ve already lost.

So for the good of journalism, this student should’ve just published her articles and then litigated the consequences. Instead she ran to FIRE. By doing so, she’s already succumbed to prior restraint and effectively lost. Sure she gets some schadenfreude by the smackdown of Princeton in the National Review etc., but that would’ve happened anyway if she’d gone ahead and published and then been disciplined for it. Which a smart journalist would know.

And which FIRE should know. If they weren’t such media whores, they would’ve advised her to publish. That’s the actual pro-free-speech move.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Vinni, Samuel Adams showed again and again that publishing had everything to do with it. He and Tom Paine used publishing to wrest an independent nation from the most powerful empire in the world. You ought to familiarize yourself with what their adversaries said, in reports to their superiors.

[David Nieporent]

Have you ever considered that the problem is that you’re wrong and that your arguments are bad?

[Stephen Lathrop]

Nieporent, sure. Those arguments were arrived at after years of that kind of consideration, backed by real-world experiments with practices of the sorts I mention. The ideas proved out. They are right as rain.

But maybe you suppose some specific bit is wrong. Why not mention it and open a dialogue?

[Dr. Ed 2]

Steven, as someone who was associated with an institutional publisher -- and who had a stack of newspapers stolen from me in front of a campus police officer, I don't know what dimension of reality you are living in.

[Don Nico]

"the threat of getting expelled is trivial,"
Says you as a 77-old retiree.That takes nerve.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Nico, as you rightly impute, after a lifetime in the trenches, the threats recede during retirement. That has nothing to do with the lessons learned. Quailing before threats will always be an unwise choice for an institutional publisher armed with the genuine power provided by the Constitution's Press Freedom Clause.

That, by the way, is an insight which provokes curiosity. Why has it become so commonplace for something so obvious—and so generally beneficial and long-celebrated—to get hostile commentary from folks like you? What counter-interest do you suppose you defend?

[VinniUSMC]

How dare a free speech group defend a journalist! Outrageous!

[Stephen Lathrop]

Vinni, see EV's comment above, where he commends an essentially parasitic relationship. EV wants lawyers and advocacy groups to take over a fight that publishers must be able to win on their own. If that cannot happen, meaningful press freedom is already gone. The publishers will become beholding to their parasites.

For what it's worth, and to be fair to EV, his individualistic ideology seems to unsuit him to understand institutional publishing, and its constitutional role. So EV speaks by default about a different model of expressive freedom. It is the individualistic, atomized model which applies when institutions with more power attack individuals acting alone, who typically command essentially no power. Such parties must take their allies where they can find them—but the practical limits of their freedom will thereafter be defined not by the individuals, but by their defenders.

For that individualistic task the lawyers and advocates may well be needed, and they can be counted on to delight in the opportunity to participate. But none of that has much to do with protecting press freedom. Individuals acting alone are almost never practicing publishing at all, at least in context of the constitutional meaning of press freedom, which was intended to protect an institutional press.

I get that the law says individual's internet utterances have been, "published." But that is irrelevant to my discussion. To insist that kind of individual utterance fully encompasses the constitutional meaning of the press freedom clause is a category error. Individual utterances are dots scattered within a much broader circumference.

EV has written extensively in defense of that error. He has found an audience eager to applaud it. That does not mean EV has been correct. It just means the audience defines itself by the prejudice it cherishes against an institutional press. Thus, the audience welcomes a show of authority, however spurious, to endorse its prejudice.

[VinniUSMC]

You're really good at filling up space with half-baked ideas, off topic gibberish, and barely tangentially related nonsense. Good job.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Give me some reassurance, Vinni. If you weren't restricting yourself to cellphone two-liners, could you figure out something to say?

[David Nieporent]

EV wants lawyers and advocacy groups to take over a fight that publishers must be able to win on their own.

I remember when Sulzberger personally marched over to the Pentagon, punched McNamara in the face, and said, “Go away, Floyd Abrams; we’re publishing the Pentagon Papers without your help. That’s just how we in the Institutional Press roll.”

[David Nieporent]

(And, yes, I know it wasn’t McNamara at that time. But it made the snark snarkier, IMO.)

[Stephen Lathrop]

Randal, thanks for your comment.

It can seem peculiar, but I get two kinds of readers, distinctly different. Most insist on outlandish characterizations that make me wonder where my writing went wrong. But then someone like you comes along, with an accurate explanation, or an excellent paraphrase, to prove I did write what I intended.

[David Nieporent]

I'm pretty sure he was mocking your comment.

[Randal]

Not mocking. I seemed to have gotten something different out of it than everyone else had. So I thought it might be helpful.

My own thoughts are...

Student newspapers would be more fun if they picked more fights with the administration, especially free speech battles. Isn't that what they're for?

I don't think this incident is a threat to journalism.

I do think FIRE are media whores.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Nieporent, tin ear, as always. You ought to ask yourself, if you could not see Randal and I had communicated, how much of the message did you miss? Typically, on the subject of institutional journalism, your commentary shows you miss most of what you read.

No experience, no context, and no interest add up to a substantial reader’s block. But actually, “no interest,” mistakenly gives you at least small credit for disinterested attention.

Instead, you come in with an active prejudice against institutional journalism. Which makes your endlessly repeated jibes against that kind of expressive freedom especially noxious. You seem to me to be the smartest commenter on the VC who continues stupid enough to oppose the very notion of a constitutional role for the institutional press.

It's a puzzle. You look like you are making yourself stupid on purpose. I guess that is what being a slave to ideological hyper-rationalism looks like.

[ReaderY]

What you say may well have been true a generation ago. But today, we live in a world where Joe Keyboard publishers have far more practical power than traditional institutional publishers. You may not like this situation. And you can certainly pretend that things you don’t like don’t exist. Many, many people in this country routinely pretend that things they don’t like exist.

But if you do that, I’m not sure you can be in a position to give this student useful practical advice.

If might be the best thing for this student and the Princeton student paper to double down, publish the administration’s warning and, if it comes to it, publish any disciplinary hearings and their outcome.

But I don’t think a person looking at the state of the country today can share your unshakable confidence that the risk the student coming out of this wihout a college degree if taking this course is trivial.

[Stephen Lathrop]

But today, we live in a world where Joe Keyboard publishers have far more practical power than traditional institutional publishers.

That, right there, is the most conspicuous field mark of internet utopianism. And it is partly true. Joe Keyboard has notably more power than previously to do harm to the public life of the nation. That is beyond dispute.

But if you are talking about advancing the public life of the nation, essentially all of the power, way over 90% of it, still resides with shrinking remnants of the institutional press. Without them, Joe Keyboard would have nothing to talk about. Take away the institutional press and you will get nothing further from Joe Keyboard except opinions about hoaxes, and quasi-medical discussions about belly button lint.

What separates the institutional press from Joe Keyboard?

An institutional press typically is a news gatherer. Joe Keyboard is almost never a news gatherer.

An institutional press curates an audience. Joe Keyboard does not curate an audience. Joe Keyboard depends utterly on the audience the institutional press curates; without it Joe Keyboard might as well unplug his internet connection, and just read what he types on his own screen.

The institutional press pays all the bills for Joe Keyboard's self-supposed publishing activities. Joe pays none of them. Joe Keyboard typically does not even know there are bills. Did you suspect, ReaderY, that Meta's (Facebook's) annual operating expenses are more than 40 times those of the New York Times?

And please note carefully, every conceivable remedy now being bruited for metastasizing vexations from Joe Keyboard involves some kind of government censorship of institutional publishing. Until internet utopians figure out some alternative to get around that problem, they are in fact inviting expressive disaster every time they think they demand expressive freedom.

You example the problem, ReaderY. When you posted your comment above, you had no notion you were talking about facts, instead of just your own opinion. That is another field mark of internet utopianism.

[juris imprudent]

Institutions have a tendency to rot, particularly when insulated from criticism and captive to their own groupthink. And Princeton isn't cracking down on the Tory here, they are subjecting an individual to prejudicial treatment.

[VinniUSMC]

SL is an outspoken proponent of the rot. He just thinks he'll be in charge of it.

[ReaderY]

What you say may well have been true a generation ago. But today, we live in a world where Joe Keyboard publishers have a great deal of practical power, and may well have more, perhaps significantly more, than traditional institutional publishers. You may not like this situation. And you can certainly pretend that things you don’t like don’t exist. Many, many people in this country routinely pretend that things they don’t like exist.

But if you do that, I’m not sure you can be in a position to give this student useful practical advice.

If might be the best thing for this student and the Princeton student paper to double down, publish the administration’s warning and, if it comes to it, publish any disciplinary hearings and their outcome.

But I don’t think a person looking at the state of the country today can share your unshakable confidence that the risk the student coming out of this wihout a college degree if taking this course is trivial. Nor do I think an objective observer can share your confidence that everyone but a tiny minority will rally around this student.

Some might even say that it is you who are living in an ivory tower, and Princeton whose perspective is grounded in practical reality.

[ReaderY]

Not sure why it posted the edit as a separate comment.

[Lee Moore]

What is a NCO ? And what are the consequences of ignoring it ? Lathrop seems to think we're talking "trivial threat" here. By the law of averages, one must therefore assume that the threat is actually yuuuge - suspension, expulsion, maybe even execution.

I presume that since it is Princeton imposing it, it's a Princeton administratuive procedure, backed up by whatever authority Princeton has over the student.

However that seems to be inconsistent with this :

The dean later informed the journalist via email {on file with author} that the university "cannot determine if they would be a violation of the NCO—it is possible that some statements may be interpreted by the other student as an indirect or direct attempt to communicate. The safest course of action in terms of a possible violation of the NCO would be to refrain from writing or to be interviewed for articles that mention the name of the student with whom you have an NCO (or to retract them if that's possible)." …

ie if it's a Princeton deal, it seems unlikely that Princeton "cannot determine" what it betokens.

Or perhaps if Princeton "cannot determine" whether X is a violation, the student is being advised that if she does X she cannot be held in violation, since Princeton "cannot determine" what a violation is.

What is going on here ?

[Randal]

I suspect it means that whether or not it’s a violation depends on exactly what the article says, how she came by the information, and how the article is received by the other student. Without those specifics, the university “can’t determine” whether it would be a violation based on generalities alone. They don’t want to issue an advisory opinion, in other words.

[Drewski]

"What is a NCO"

No-contact order, of course.

[Stephen Lathrop]

What is going on here?

Lee Moore, here it is in a few bullet points:

• Benighted Princeton administrators are attempting to crack down on a Princeton journalist writing for a well-established right-of-center Princeton institutional publication, the Princeton Tory.

• Sensing an opportunity to promote their own ideological preferences, FIRE and the ADL have offered their services where they should not be needed. The Princeton Tory commands power sufficient to defend itself.

• EV approves of the intervention anyway. He too seeks occasion to bruit his ideological preferences.

• What happens next is potentially interesting. The Princeton Tory has an opportunity to embrace the proffered help, but at the cost of losing a conservative free press opportunity to solve its own problem by exercise of its press freedom, and forcing Princeton to back down—which might or might not happen.

• If Princeton chooses to double down, and enforce arbitrarily a policy at odds with expressive freedom, it will make a right-wing martyr out of the journalist it attacks. Even if expelled from Princeton—or perhaps especially if expelled from Princeton—her journalistic future will become solid gold. She will be empowered to take her pick among conservative-leaning employers.

That seems to be it so far.

[VinniUSMC]

What are you so afraid of?

[Stephen Lathrop]

Cowards.

[VinniUSMC]

Ah, I see why you hate yourself so much.

[David Nieporent]

The Princeton Tory commands power sufficient to defend itself.

It does not.

If Princeton chooses to double down, and enforce arbitrarily a policy at odds with expressive freedom, it will make a right-wing martyr out of the journalist it attacks. Even if expelled from Princeton—or perhaps especially if expelled from Princeton—her journalistic future will become solid gold. She will be empowered to take her pick among conservative-leaning employers.

All of this is cuckoocloudbananapants crazy, especially given that the person in question is not a professional journalist in the first place and may have no interest in a "journalistic future."

[Bored Lawyer]

"cuckoocloudbananapants" -- is that your creation, or did you read it somewhere?

And, yeah, I knew SL was off, but did not realize until now what a nutcase he is.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Nieporent, if she does not have any interest in practicing institutional journalism, she is a liability to the Princeton Tory, and ought to be replaced with someone who does.

You could be correct, but more likely mistaken. Generally speaking, newspaper jobs on privately operated publications at the nation's most-competitive schools are in heavy demand. They have for more than a century provided the best possible entree to professional journalism the nation has to offer. Thus, they attract journalistic candidates willing to essentially take on what amounts to near-full-time job responsibilities, in addition to academic workloads. Dabblers are not encouraged.

[David Nieporent]

I'm not sure that it really matters, but the Tory isn't a newspaper. It does not involve "near-full-time job responsibilities," except maybe for the top editors? And why the fuck do you think that running an obscure newspaper in Idaho gives you some insight into the campus culture at Princeton — let alone the conservative campus culture? That is not what the Tory was for. It was an extracurricular, as it should be, not a job application for the newspaper industry.

[Bored Lawyer]

"What is going on here ?"

Vague rules are the handmaiden of petty tyrants. It allows them to persecute their enemies and protect their friends by selective application of the rules.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Every time I think I have seen it all....

[Ed Grinberg]

compare:

You are a college administration. You have two groups of students at your college: Group A and Group B. Group A really doesn't like Group B. It holds daily demonstrations, expressing its feelings toward Group B. You do nothing. When Group B puts up its posters around campus, Group A tears them down. You do nothing. However, when members of Group B record members of Group A tearing down their posters, you investigate / punish ... them.

https://nypost.com/2024/01/17/news/jewish-students-file-antisemitism-claim-against-american-university/

[alconnolly]

A real journalistic effort would be to find out how many "no contact" orders have been issued.
Figure out if any were requested with a reason listed for the request. Look into that reason. Interview the operson who took out the order and find out their side etc etc.
This is a pure propaganda piece as though two unsubstatntiated with zero investigation into them claims over the course of a year and a half. Represent the totality of misuse and that it is all aimed at pro Israeli individuals.
It makes a mockery of journalism. Instead it is literaly promoting a self serving press release as though it should be taken at face value.