Catharine A. MacKinnon, a law professor at the University of Michigan, goes further still, declaring that free speech reinforces and amplifies injustice because it is now being used to defend ideas she finds distressing. “Once a defense of the powerless, the First Amendment over the last hundred years has mainly become a weapon of the powerful,” writes MacKinnon, who teaches such courses as “Evolution of Gender Crimes” and “Sex Equality.”
Speech does not need to be intelligent or compelling to be worthy of protection.
In reading through the New York Times piece it becomes abundantly clear that many liberals really never cared about “free speech” as such, but rather sought protection specifically for progressive ideas and behaviors. As soon as conservatives started demanding the same protections for their speech, it no longer seemed like such a good idea.
One law professor at Georgetown, Louis Michael Seidman, who used to defend free speech now sees his prior position as a mistake. “When I was younger, I had more of the standard liberal view of civil liberties,” Seidman said. “And I’ve gradually changed my mind about it. What I have come to see is that it’s a mistake to think of free speech as an effective means to accomplish a more just society.”