PSC: It's OK To Restrict Speech "In a Post-9/11 World"

From Inside Higher Ed:

Dorothee Benz, a spokeswoman for the Professional Staff Congress, said via e-mail that the union “is not a party to Susan O’Malley’s lawsuit against Sharad Karkhanis. We are unfamiliar with its details and cannot judge its legal merits.”

As to the newsletter and its author’s rights, she said: “The PSC is a strong defender of free speech, and we defend Karkhanis’s right to free speech. The PSC itself has been a frequent target of Karkhanis’s vitriol, and much of what he has said about us is inaccurate and repugnant, but we have never questioned his right to free speech.”

Benz added, however: “Free speech, however, has limits, as any first year law student knows. O’Malley’s case concerns one of those limits, where the right to free speech comes up against the harm caused by libelous statements. Whether accusing someone of aiding and training terrorists, in a post-9/11 world, rises to meet the legal standards that define libel is up to the courts to decide.”

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