BY JOHN K. WILSON
Last week, Stanford Law School announced that it had suspended Tirien Steinbach, associate dean for diversity, equity and inclusion, in the wake of the outrage over the disruption by protesters of a Federalist Society speech by Judge Stuart Kyle Duncan.
Stanford must end this suspension immediately. Stanford’s suspension of Steinbach is a far more serious threat to free expression than the protest against Judge Duncan, because it involves an official punishment for speech without due process by the university itself.
As I have repeatedly argued, suspensions are a serious punishment that should never be imposed until after someone is found guilty of serious misconduct, unless that person poses an immediate physical threat to campus (which Steinbach obviously does not). Although five administrators were at the event, the fact that only Steinbach is being suspended suggests that the content of her speech criticizing Duncan is the reason for this action.
In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, Steinbach noted, “I was asked to attend the event by the Federalist Society, the organizers of the student protest and the administration. My role was to observe and, if needed, de-escalate.” When “Judge Duncan asked for an administrator to intervene,” Steinbach made her remarks.
However, Steinbach should not be responsible for enforcing rules against disruption. Student events fall under the purview of the Office of Student Affairs, and it was their obligation to try to control the event.
In her statement, Dean Martinez announced that “at future events, the role of any administrators present will be to ensure that university rules on disruption of events will be followed, and all staff will receive additional training in that regard.” This is a terrible idea. What happens when five administrators attend an event, and they disagree about what the university rules say? What are protesters and event organizers supposed to do when they get contradictory messages? It makes more sense to put a well-trained administrator in charge of a contentious event and provide coherent rules for what happens. But even if Dean Martinez disagrees, it should be clear that this new standard cannot be applied retroactively and used to justify the suspension of Steinbach.
The statement by Dean Martinez makes many dubious changes in campus policies and procedures. She announced that for any campus lecture, “limiting audience participation to signs, questions during a planned Q&A, and a non-disruptive level of audience reaction is appropriate to the nature of the forum.” This standard is excessively restrictive. A ban on all heckling is repressive and does not meet the actual disruption standard. If the audience has the right to cheer a speaker’s words in the middle of a lecture (clearly they do), then the audience has a right to boo and heckle a speaker even when it causes a momentary disruption. As FIRE has argued, some heckling is free speech and it should not be entirely banned.
According to Dean Martinez, “enforcement of university policies against disruption of speakers is necessary to ensure the expression of a wide range of viewpoints. It also follows from this that when a disruption occurs and the speaker asks for an administrator to help restore order, the administrator who responds should not insert themselves into debate with their own criticism of the speaker’s views and the suggestion that the speaker reconsider whether what they plan to say is worth saying, for that imposes the kind of institutional orthodoxy and coercion that the policy on Academic Freedom precludes.” No, this does not follow at all. In fact, it directly contradicts Dean Martinez’s claim that all individuals and institutions have the right to express their own views. One may certainly criticize Steinbach’s remarks for being unwise and rude and unproductive, but they cannot be called “coercion” or a violation of the Academic Freedom policy.
Dean Martinez claimed, “our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion is not going to take the form of having the school administration announce institutional positions on a wide range of current social and political issues, make frequent institutional statements about current news events, or exclude or condemn speakers who hold views on social and political issues with whom some or even many in our community disagree.”
It’s ironic to declare that the law school will no longer make institutional statements about current news events in a ten-page institutional statement about current news events. It’s disturbing that Dean Martinez announces the administrators will not be allowed to “condemn speakers” while she, an administrator, is condemning Steinbach for speaking her views. I support Dean Martinez’s right to condemn Steinbach, but (unlike Martinez) I also support Steinbach’s right to condemn speakers.
Some people will argue that administrators don’t have academic freedom and can (and should) be silenced by the orders of those in charge. This approach is wrong. Academic freedom and free expression are not properties possessed by the faculty; they are core values of all colleges. Universities should not be ordering anyone to shut up and administer. Universities should be institutions devoted to free expression and permitting dissent, even when it offends a judge or a top administrator, and even when the offender is a staffer.
Dean Martinez announced “mandatory educational programming for our student body.” As much as I love educational programs about free speech (I’d be happy to speak at Stanford about it), I do not like mandatory training. This also sets a terrible precedent. Will any event where someone is deemed racist result in mandatory anti-racism training for the whole student body? Instead of mandatory training, Stanford ought to develop a long-term program to discuss, debate, and analyze freedom of expression. Stanford law ought to have a center devoted to free expression that can voluntarily educate the public as well as its students, faculty, and deans–all of its deans.
But the most immediate action Stanford needs to take is to restore free expression by lifting this unjust suspension of Tirien Steinbach for her speech.
John K. Wilson was a 2019-20 fellow with the University of California National Center for Free Speech and Civic Engagement and is the author of eight books, including Patriotic Correctness: Academic Freedom and Its Enemies and the forthcoming work The Attack on Academia.
But her attack on this racist judge in the midst of the student disruption could very well be taken as inciting them further despite her explicit call for them to stop. She was right in what she said, but it was throwing oil rather than water on a fire, something it was her duty not to do.
I don’t think Steinbach was inciting the students, since many protesters left the talk after her comments. Saying to protesters that you understand them and share their concerns about the speaker but free speech needs to be protected can certainly be a way to de-escalate the situation.
I should also note that some people believe that Steinbach requested a voluntary leave from Stanford, and so this might not be a suspension. If so, it’s terrible that Martinez left the impression that this was a suspension for “pending personnel matters” rather than a leave for protection of a victim of a crime.
There is no excuse for a member of the faculty to engage in this type of activity. The left in this country are nuts and they have no tolerance for any opinions other than their own. They throw around terms like “racist” or “extremist” as a means to limit speech. When will the nuttiness end?
Why must anyone be punished for every uncomfortable event that occurs? Scapegoating is the way that institutions whitewash themselves. Just chill out.
The essence of this post seems to be that Dean Steinbach should not be punished for merely exercising her free speech rights. But is that really the reason why she is being punished (assuming being “on leave” wasn’t voluntary and is punishment)?
I would submit that she is being “punished” for doing a poor job. And the fact that “speech” was involved in her poor job performance shouldn’t somehow make it consequence free.
Dean Steinbach herself noted that her role at the event was, “…to observe and, if needed, de-escalate.” Did she “de-escalate’? Clearly, she did not.
In Dean Steinbach’s defense, Dr. Wilson notes that, “Steinbach should not be responsible for enforcing rules against disruption.” There is some truth to that statement. After all, she is not the school’s enforcer and, even if she were, she is not physically capable of muting the hecklers and stopping the disruption.
So what actions on her part might have been considered a good job? What could (should) she have done to quell the ongoing disturbance?
She – as a school official – should have reminded the audience that the school has a “no disruption” policy and that everyone who engaged in disruption was now “on notice” that if they continued to disrupt, then they would face disciplinary actions.
Moreover, she should have emphasized the fact that the event was being video- taped and that the identities of the unruly students would be available to the school officials.
Had Dean Steinbach made those critical points, she would have – at least – done her job and, most likely, there would be no disciplinary action from the school despite her rambling pontifications.
Framing the argument for disciplining Dean Steinbach as a violation of her right to free expression ignores her manifest job failure and is simply disingenuous.
Do you think it would be OK for a judge to openly try to convince the jury to decide in favor of either side in a court case? I hope you don’t think so, that’d be seriously unethical as a judge has an obligation to be impartial. While the judge in this case, if he/she decided to do what was described, should not (and would not) be punished for exercising his freedom of speech. He/she would lose his job because he failed to perform his job and involved in judicial misconduct. This is the exact case here, Tirien Steinbach’s not being punished for exercising her freedom of speech, she’s being punished for not performing her job of de-escalating the situation. The students should also be punished, not because they exercised their freedom of speech but because they knowingly violated the school’s policies against disruption of speakers. If I enter a library loudly advocating for my political viewpoints, I would be rightly kicked out, that’s not violating my freedom of speech. If I go to work fully naked, I would be fired immediately, that’s not violating my freedom of expression. If I go right through somebody else’s house to reach my destination on the other side of his home, I’d be arrested for trespassing, that’s not a violation of my right to freedom of movement. It seems these self entitled people are the only ones exempted from following rules & regulations. They seem to be the only ones allowed to collect their paycheck without doing their job because of “freedom of speech”. And they seem to be the only ones whose rights trump everyone else’s rights.
Well said, spot on.
The students that disrupted the event should ALL be put on notice. Those students violated the rules. They have damaged the reputation of Stanford Law School and may very well prevent future graduates from being hired. If law students believe that it is acceptable to shout down and prevent others from speaking then why should they expect to be able to freely express their views? This reflects very badly on Stanford Law School and what seems to be a one sided commitment to free speech.
Exellent points. The DEI dean and students violated the pricipals of free speech by supressing everyone elses rights.
She should be fired for her conduct.
She was suspended for unprofessional conduct, but the school cannot say that. The judge was invited as a guest speaker, not as a debate with a mob of students led by the administrator of DEI. Instead of de-escalating the event, she decided to make a speech. Maybe she should include diversity of thoughts and opinions into her administrating.
Steinbach’s countering of speaker Duncan was inappropriate for the occasion.
Pingback: Thoughts on the “Heckler’s Veto” | ACADEME BLOG
Similar to the depraved actions of slanderer, liar, and violent agitator, Meredith Raimondo, who used and abused her (gratefully former-) position as Dean at Oberlin college to conduct gender discrimination, Title IX inquisitions, and illegally incite a riot, extort, and libel a small business bakery who acted well within its similar rights, Steinbach used and abused her position to incite a left wing mob at Stanford Law School with the purpose to violate the speech of a judge and invited speaker, who has knowledge and expertise in the field of which he was presenting.
Fortunately, Wilson, who at least in constant in his legal ineptitude if nothing else, also wrote banal, apologia for Raimondo, which was ratioed into oblivion. Therefore, we can all take comfort in his defense of Steinbach, since his previous defenses for Raimondo, as well as violent, emotionally-unstable Melissa Click, turned out so very well.