Friday, December 12, 2003
Open FIRE on bake sale suppression
The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education has come out strongly to support "affirmative action bake sales":
"Parody and political satire are not illegal in this country," said Thor Halvorssen, CEO of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE). "College administrators appear to be under the mistaken impression that protesting affirmative action is not covered by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Freedom of speech is a right enjoyed equally and fully by both supporters and opponents of affirmative action."FIRE has started to fight back on the suppression of bake sales by tackling the shut down of one at the University of Washington. The university claims that it was simply a matter of the College Republicans group not getting the right permit to hold their event. The event led to someone tearing down the sign of prices for the bake sale and a CR having cookies thrown into his face; the University does not deny these claims but still preferred to ask the CRs to stop their sale rather than just remove the assaulting students.
