Commentary: Amy Wax Has Become a Right-Wing Troll. But Her Punishment Is Wrong.

Cathy Young October 04, 2024 1 min read

Cathy Young
The Bulwark

Excerpt: THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA’S DECISION last week to punish tenured law professor Amy Wax with a one-year suspension and other sanctions for what her defenders call controversial opinions—and her detractors call racist hate speech—has been widely criticized as an egregious assault on intellectual freedom.

What ultimately emerges from an attempt to dig through the murky and complicated facts is an all-too-familiar story: that of a once-acclaimed conservative scholar on the path from heterodoxy to crackpottery and from outspoken to deliberately offensive. It is also one of those cases in which supporters of academic freedom must defend the right to express odious views without sugarcoating their odiousness.

Click here for link to full article

Leave a comment

Comments will be approved before showing up.


Also in National Free Speech News & Commentary

After punishing people for Charlie Kirk comments, colleges are paying steep settlements
After punishing people for Charlie Kirk comments, colleges are paying steep settlements

Graham Piro  July 16, 2026 1 min read

Violating the First Amendment will cost you. Universities and other public institutions are learning this lesson the hard way as the dust settles on a series of lawsuits brought by university faculty and staff who were punished for their comments about Charlie Kirk’s murder last September.

Read More
Inside An Elite University’s Campaign To Bring Conservatives to Campus
Inside An Elite University’s Campaign To Bring Conservatives to Campus

Vince Bielski July 16, 2026 1 min read

If Johns Hopkins University wanted to signal its seriousness about creating an alternative to the left-leaning orthodoxy that permeates higher education, it couldn’t have done better than the recent hire of economist Peter Arcidiacono.

Read More
House Republicans Advance Legislation to Formally Dismantle ED
House Republicans Advance Legislation to Formally Dismantle ED

Jessica Blake July 16, 2026 1 min read

House Republicans have now formally backed President Donald Trump in fulfilling his campaign promise to dismantle the Department of Education, voting Wednesday to advance 10 bills that would codify the White House’s efforts to disperse numerous education programs and offices to other federal agencies.

Read More