The Hopkins chapter of Young Americans for Liberty (YAL), a libertarian group on campus, promoted freedom of expression with a free speech beach ball on Friday, April 8. Members of the organization encouraged students to write on the giant inflatable ball on the Breezeway.
Students wrote slogans and phrases such as “Taiwan is an independent country,” “Hillary 4 Prison 2016,” “Republicans 2k16” and “Contain Ignorance.” One participant wrote “Glory to Ukraine!” in Ukrainian.
The president of the Hopkins YAL chapter, Ava White, emphasized the importance of talking about freedom of speech on college campuses, especially in light of recent controversies at universities, such as Yale and Princeton, in the fall of 2015.
“There is a climate of censorship,” White said. “There is a culture of people wanting to be coddled and protected from free speech, and we believe that free speech of all kinds is important, so we wanted to promote that on the Hopkins campus.”
White said that YAL usually supports free speech by encouraging people to write on designated walls. Instead, the Hopkins chapter broke from that more traditional medium and opted to use the beach ball as their vehicle of expression.
“A ball is eye-catching. You can move it, and it gets more people engaged with the idea of free speech,” she said.
By writing on the beach ball, White hoped students would become more aware of the state of free speech at Hopkins.
“All I want students to do is think about [free speech],” she said. “I want everyone who is walking through the Breezeway this morning to think about what happens with free speech on the Hopkins campus. Do we actually speak our minds? Are people challenged in their beliefs regularly? Because that is what should happen as a college student — you should be challenged.”
White said Hopkins students are generally able to express themselves and speak their minds but there have been recent problems related to the suppression of certain ideas.
“Hopkins is known for having fairly restrictive free speech codes. We’ve kicked people off campus before. There was a recent backlash about the Blue Jay Statue [over the ‘End Israeli Apartheid’ message],” she said. “I was really shocked by, for example, Hillel’s reaction, the idea that we should censor that and cover it up. I disagree. I don’t agree with the message necessarily, but I’m glad that someone wrote something offensive, that someone wrote something that makes people think about their beliefs.”
Sean Akey, who is the Maryland State Chair for YAL and a senior at University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC), also attended the event. Akey explained that YAL is based on libertarian beliefs, which include supporting free markets, limited government and the Bill of Rights. He believes that libertarianism brings together the best elements of the left and right wings: free markets and capitalism from the right plus social tolerance and acceptance from the left.
Regarding freedom of speech, Akey said that since Hopkins is a private university, students do not have the full rights guaranteed by the Constitution because the University, rather than the government, establishes the rules.
“Hopkins promises in their mission statement to have a free and open campus, where the freedom of ideas and expression are allowed for learning,” Akey said. “That is the only way to get intellectual growth and discussion on this campus.”
Akey also noted that the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), a free speech advocacy organization, has criticized Hopkins in the past. FIRE assigns a rating to campuses based on the state of freedom of speech and often sues universities which do not guarantee their students the right to speak freely. According to FIRE’s website, Hopkins has a speech code rating of red because the University “has at least one policy both clearly and substantially restricting freedom of speech.”
“Red means very unsupportive of free speech, yellow is iffy and leaning towards red, and green is good,” Akey said. “Hopkins still has a long way to go for freedom of speech. Part of the problem itself is the students. Oftentimes on campuses like Hopkins, left-leaning groups will take offense to a speaker like Alan Dershowitz, and they will say that it is not acceptable to have a conservative speaker on our campus because he says hateful mean things. Well, that is what the First Amendment is actually about: the freedom to express oneself, no matter how vile or strange or ostracized that position is.”
The organizers observed that many students chose to self-censor themselves. One passerby declined to write on the ball, remarking, “I’m afraid this is going to turn into a political ball,” to which the organizers responded, “That’s the point.”
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