To the Editor:
It bothers me that in forming a contradiction to my column, Henry Shi, in his Oct. 15 letter "Clarifying Free Speech," failed to read and comprehend it. His response carries shock value, and demeans my piece based on the speculation that I did not address the two issues he set out.
Mr. Shi's first point, that the courts have provided for exceptions to freedom of speech, is true, but completely unrelated to the bulk of my argument yet still provided for within the article. I mentioned originally "the Supreme Court has held time after time that there are very few exceptions to the rule of free speech." "Very few" is a relative term, it is true. There are few, but some exceptions. Among them include sexual harassment, as well as yelling "fire" in a crowded room, libel, etc.
These certainly do not makeup the breadth of the free speech spectrum, nor did I imply that there were not exceptions. My point was to talk about freedoms the courts have held up, and have been restricted at Dartmouth. I would have no problem with the handbook saying, "You may not shout fire in a crowded building." My main example on campus involved a conservative publication not being permitted to circulate. Further examples involved protests of racist nature by the Ku Klux Klan and a disgusting sexual parody made by Larry Flynt.
Mr. Shi reminds that Dartmouth is a private institution and discusses this in the context of the Constitution. He could have saved himself some time and read the main paragraph of my article which begins, "Dartmouth is a private institution. It is not bound by the Constitution in this respect. This is the stark reality."
Mr. Shi failed to understand that I did not imply Dartmouth was doing something illegal, but rather, morally dishonest and contradictory. I granted that it has the right to make rules at its discretion. However, I called for the school to either admit that it does not value all types of speech that the U.S. government does, or to repeal the codes at its own will based on the immorality of their duplicitous statements about a free academic community.