Free Speech First

A woman’s right to choose is a crucial freedom; we strongly believe in abortion rights and stand with those who ardently defend them. But at the same time, no one should try to silence those in this nation and on the Harvard campus who would like to see those rights abrogated. The University community must steadfastly resist the urge to infringe upon the right to speak out against abortion. No matter how infuriating some speech is, open discourse is central to the University.

Last week, Harvard Right to Life (HRL), an anti-choice student group, set up an approved display on the lawn in front of Science Center featuring 440 miniature American flags to represent the 4,400 abortions performed each day in the United States. On Tuesday, nameless opponents defaced the display and on Wednesday all of the flags were uprooted. In recent weeks, those who disagree with HRL’s message have also torn-down many posters from its current “Women Deserve Better” campaign in the Houses and the Yard. At Harvard, where free speech is so central to the learning environment, these actions are unjustifiable.

We steadfastly support abortion rights. With much of the campus, we strongly oppose HRL’s message and the way they have chosen to present it. But anti-abortion groups still have the right to hold their beliefs and to introduce them into the Harvard marketplace of ideas. Tearing down posters is not a form of speech; it is a form of censorship. Students who rightfully disagree with HRL should exercise their own freedom to speech, not limit the freedoms of others.

Harvard has an obligation to prevent infringement of the rights of its students and student groups. The administration must make it clear that they are ready and willing to effectively punish anyone who defaces a poster or otherwise challenges an official student group’s freedom of speech. Students who do infringe upon the rights of their peers should face the Administrative Board. And because it is easy to vandalize a poster without being seen, the punishments students face when they are caught must be sufficient to effectively deter such an action.

Because free speech almost always conflicts with the status quo, it is one of the most precious commodities of the academic community. In the absence of free expression, long-held views are not easily challenged, and individuals can blindly hold their own preconceptions without submitting them to critique in the continuing search for truth. Minority voices—no matter how much we disagree with their principles and no matter how much they irritate us—must be tolerated so that the benefits of free speech will be maintained for all.

Dissent: A Coercive Campaign

The Harvard Right to Life (HRL) anti-abortion campaign ought to be openly criticized and recognized for what it is: coercive propaganda. The members are abusing their club advertising privilege by employing visceral scare tactics and misleading information that is offensive to members of the Harvard community and alienating to the very people the group ostensibly wants to reach. While HRL has a right to their free speech, if they really believed that “women deserve better,” they would utilize their resources more productively by publicizing alternatives to abortion and generating an honest discussion of the issue. Their current strategies are neither helpful nor effective.

—Judd B. Kessler ’04, Lia C. Larson ’05,

Ronaldo Rauseo-Ricupero ’04 and Benjamin J. Toff ’05