{"id":1084,"date":"2017-02-09T17:12:12","date_gmt":"2017-02-09T21:12:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jparnell.com\/blog\/?p=1084"},"modified":"2017-02-09T17:12:12","modified_gmt":"2017-02-09T21:12:12","slug":"kim-strassel-uncp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/battle4liberty.com\/?p=1084","title":{"rendered":"Kim Strassel @ UNCP"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Kim Strassel was on the UNCP campus yesterday (<a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/OA5eOZse05Y\">https:\/\/youtu.be\/OA5eOZse05Y<\/a>) addressing threats to individual, corporate, and political speech. Strassel recently penned\u2014and I just finished reading\u2014<em>The Intimidation Game: How the Left is Silencing Free Speech<\/em>. It\u2019s a great book that chronicles efforts to silence corporations, nonprofits, executives, board members, professors, and anyone else whose point of view challenges the left wing orthodoxy.<\/p>\n<p>After the presentation, several students expressed surprise that the lives of individual Americans and their families can be destroyed by government bureaucrats and political activists simply because they dare to express the wrong point of view or choose to contribute financially to the wrong organization or candidate. This just shouldn\u2019t happen here, but it does.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s difficult to hear Strassel speak or read her book without getting angry. I\u2019m appalled at the IRS-nonprofit scandal, Brendan Eich\u2019s demise at Mozilla, and Obama\u2019s grilling of Frank VanderSloot. Rather than debate ideas on their merits, the abusers in these cases bullied, manipulated, and intimidated. This isn\u2019t how America is supposed to work.<\/p>\n<p>The implications of the intimidation game are legion, from politics to business to academe. As a university professor, I understand and cherish the importance of free expression without the threat of reprisal. While respect and a sense of humor go along way when discussing contentious topics, none of us have a right <em>not<\/em> to be offended. The college experience should teach us how to respond to different views directly. \u201cSafe zones\u201d may be well intended, but they shield students from intellectual development.<\/p>\n<p>The past eight years have been filled with Obama and Democrat abuses, I\u2019m sure there are some Republicans in Washington who would love to get even. Strassel\u2019s book is a wakeup call for anyone who thinks our first amendment rights are eternally secure. Let down your guard at your own risk.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Kim Strassel was on the UNCP campus yesterday (https:\/\/youtu.be\/OA5eOZse05Y) addressing threats to individual, corporate, and political speech. Strassel recently penned\u2014and I just finished reading\u2014The Intimidation Game: How the Left is Silencing Free Speech. It\u2019s a great book that chronicles efforts to silence corporations, nonprofits, executives, board members, professors, and anyone else whose point of view [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/battle4liberty.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1084"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/battle4liberty.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/battle4liberty.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/battle4liberty.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/battle4liberty.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1084"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/battle4liberty.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1084\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/battle4liberty.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1084"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/battle4liberty.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1084"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/battle4liberty.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1084"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}