Many of those concerned about free speech warned of creeping totalitarianism imposed by “social justice warriors” run amok, intent on imposing a stifling orthodoxy of “wokeism.” Some confused vehement criticism of a person’s ideas with attempts to stifle that person’s speech. The wider debate often turned nasty - especially on social media - with loud voices on each side engaging in alarmist, bad faith arguments ascribing the worst intentions to their opponents. ” The letter argued against what the signers saw as “intolerance of opposing views, a vogue for public shaming and ostracism, and the tendency to dissolve complex policy issues in a blinding moral certainty.” The letter drew sharp criticism from many journalists, writers and intellectuals for being “tone-deaf,” “privileged,” “elitist” and detracting from or even hurting the struggle for racial justice. The entrenchment of so-called “cancel culture” caused around 150, mostly liberal, writers and intellectuals to sign an open “ Letter on Justice and Open Debate. Social media companies came under intense pressure to take a more robust stand on “hate speech.” A letter signed by hundreds of Princeton faculty members, employees and students demanded a faculty committee be established to “oversee the investigation and discipline of racist behaviors, incidents, research, and publication” and write “Guidelines on what counts as racist.” The newsroom revolt led to opinion editor James Bennet resigning.Īcademia was affected too. In another instance, New York Times staffers protested that the newspaper put “Black staff in danger” by running a provocative op-ed by Republican Senator Tom Cotton, which argued for deploying the military to quell riots. A Democratic data analyst named David Shor was fired after tweeting a study that showed that nonviolent black-led protests were more effective than violent ones in terms of securing voter support. President Trump accused a Black Lives Matter leader of “treason, sedition, insurrection” and labelled protestors as “terrorists.”īut demands for structural change also led to calls for de-platforming people whose views were deemed hostile to or even insufficiently supportive of racial justice. A disturbing number of incidents of police brutality and excessive force against peaceful protesters and journalists were documented. Free speech was also affected in the process. Millions took to the streets in support of racial justice under the rallying cry “Black Lives Matter.” Most protests were peaceful, but several cities experienced large-scale violence. after a video emerged of a white police officer killing a black man named George Floyd. In May 2020, protests erupted all over the U.S.
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