Update (10/30/15): In response to overwhelming , SXSW apologized for canceling the panels and has on the topic of online harassment to its 2016 programming. The summit will include original panelists from both cancelled sessions, plus a number of additional speakers, including ACLU Senior Staff Attorney Lee Rowland.
#GamerGate is the controversy — and the hashtag — that won’t die. Ask four people what #GamerGate is about, and you’ll get four different answers: A movement to challenge lack of ethics in video game journalism. A campaign to harass women in the video game industry. An example of how social media can be a catalyst for misogyny. And biggest of all, a debate about how women — how all of us — grapple with and respond to hateful online speech.
One thing is indisputable: Women who speak online are too often threatened and harassed by trolls desperate to veto a meaningful discussion about any of these topics.
Sadly, the trolls scored another victory this week.
Two panel events at this year’s South by Southwest Interactive festival would have provided a forum for people of all opinions to debate the topics of online harassment and gaming culture. No longer. In response to threats of violence, targeted presumably at feminist panel members, the festival organizers that they will cancel forums titled “SavePoint: A Discussion on the Gaming Industry” and “Level Up: Overcoming Harassment in Games.” They explained that this was necessary to preserve “the sanctity of the big tent at SXSW Interactive” and “keep the dialogue civil and respectful.”
In reality, this move silences all voices in the debate except for the most extreme. In fact, it puts a definitive end to all discourse — including that which is “civil and respectful” — while granting the wishes of those who seek to curtail the debate with misogyny and threats. That result is what we call a classic “heckler’s veto.”
Harassment of women in the video game industry is not a recent phenomenon. But attention on this issue intensified in August 2014 after Eron Gjoni published an online rant about independent video game developer Zoë Quinn, alleging, among other things, that she had a relationship with a video game journalist. The essay fueled a Twitter debate, coalescing around the #GamerGate hashtag, about misogyny in the video game industry, political correctness, and media ethics. It also provoked a campaign of harassment and violence against women in the industry, including many of the panelists who would have spoken at SXSW.
Threats of violence, and their devastating effects, are not to be taken lightly, and they’re just as criminal online as off. Women in the video game industry who have spoken out in defense of Quinn or criticized the portrayal of women in video games have received rape threats and death threats, had their personal information published online for all to see, and even been forced to flee their homes. No one should have to tolerate this behavior.
And yet, , those who have been subjected to this heinous treatment have continued to do the important — and heroic — work of leading public conversations about gender, gaming, and online harassment. (Indeed, SXSW panelists that they were aware of the risks involved in speaking and had been collaborating with SXSW staff on safety.)
We’re encouraged to hear that the SXSW solutions in response to the criticism arising from their decision. The conference’s move may have been well-intentioned. But rather than protecting “civil and respectful” dialogue, the decision silences all voices in the debate around #GamerGate except those who seek to control the debate with threats of violence. In organizing the forums, SXSW created a soapbox for all. In cancelling them, it has given a bullhorn to those who threaten violence against women.
Far from controlling its hecklers, SXSW has succumbed to the heckler’s veto.
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Press ReleaseDec 2024
Free Speech
National Security
ACLU and Partners Urge Supreme Court to Block TikTok BanACLU and Partners Urge Supreme Court to Block TikTok Ban
WASHINGTON — Today, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), and the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University filed an amicus brief urging the Supreme Court to block the enforcement of a law that would effectively ban people in America from using TikTok as soon as January 19, 2025. Earlier this month, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit rejected TikTok’s challenge to the law. TikTok has asked the Supreme Court for a temporary injunction to prevent the app from being banned while the court considers whether to take the case, saying that unless the justices intervene, the law will “shutter one of America’s most popular speech platforms the day before a presidential inauguration.” “The Constitution imposes an extraordinarily high bar on this kind of mass censorship,”said Patrick Toomey, deputy director of ACLU’s National Security Project. “The Supreme Court should take up this important case and protect the rights of millions of Americans to freely express themselves and engage with others around the world.” The brief argues that the D.C. Circuit failed to fully address the law’s profound implications for the First Amendment rights of the 170 million Americans who use TikTok. While the lower court’s decision correctly recognized that the statute triggers First Amendment scrutiny, it barely addressed users’ First Amendment interests in speaking, sharing, and receiving information on the platform. The court also perplexingly attempted to cast the government’s ban on TikTok as a vindication of users’ First Amendment rights, which it is not. The rights groups also explain that the law was intended to suppress certain content and viewpoints that many legislators believe could be amplified on TikTok, including the risk of foreign “propaganda.” But under the First Amendment, the government must meet a very high bar to restrict speech based on concerns about its “motivating ideology” or “perspective,” and the government has not come close to meeting that bar here. “The government should not be able to restrict speech, especially to the extent here, based on guessing about the mere possibility of uncertain future harm,” said David Greene, civil liberties director at EFF. “The Supreme Court should put the TikTok ban on hold while it considers the DC Circuit’s erroneous ruling.” Finally, the brief underscores that the government can’t impose this type of sweeping ban unless it’s necessary to prevent extremely serious and imminent harm to national security. But the government has not provided evidence of impending harm, or evidence that banning TikTok is the only available way to address its concerns. As the brief explains, the D.C. Circuit improperly treated the government’s invocation of “national security” as a trump card and failed to hold the government to its burden. “Restricting citizens’ access to foreign media is a practice that has long been associated with repressive regimes, and we should be very wary of letting the practice take root here,” said Jameel Jaffer, executive director at the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University. “It would do lasting damage to the First Amendment and our democracy if the Supreme Court let this ban go into effect even temporarily.” You can find the brief online here: https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/24/24A587/335380/20241217144322392_24A587%20TikTok%20v%20Garland%20Amicus%20Brief%20pdfa.pdf -
MississippiJul 2024
Free Speech
Privacy & Technology
NetChoice v. FitchNetChoice v. Fitch
Whether a law that mandates age verification for all users of social media services violates the First Amendment. -
News & CommentaryDec 2024
Free Speech
Can you define pornography? Neither can the government.Can you define pornography? Neither can the government.
We break down the absurd-but-true history of trying to censor sexual speech under the guise of "keeping kids safe." -
Minnesota Supreme CourtNov 2024
Free Speech
Energy Transfer LP v. Greenpeace International, Unicorn RiotEnergy Transfer LP v. Greenpeace International, Unicorn Riot
This case in the Minnesota Supreme Court asks whether the MFFIA's protections apply to newsgatherers even if they are alleged to have engaged in trespassing while newsgathering. The ACLU’s State Supreme Court Initiative, alongside the ACLU of Minnesota and law firm Biersdorf & Associations, filed a brief representing Unicorn Riot, a media organization that covered protests of the Dakota Access Pipeline. The brief argues that MFFIA and constitutional reporter’s privileges, under both the U.S. and Minnesota constitutions, protect Unicorn Riot from having to comply with Energy Transfer’s subpoenas.