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Free Speech Movement Digital Archive 60

Posted by michael from the keeping-it-real dept.
Logic Bomb writes: "Freedom of speech comes up quite a bit on Slashdot. How would you like to browse through a massive historical record of another modern free speech movment? According to an article from the San Francisco Chronicle, the archive located at UC Berkeley of records related to the 1964 Free Speech Movement has been digitized in its entirety and is available on the web for anyone to look at. It comes to over 35,000 pages of documents, not to mention digitized version of fliers and photographs. Much of the Slashdot readership, including myself, was born long after this amazing period in history ended. Archives such as this one allow those currently fighting for free speech to make connections to the past and even garner ideas to reuse. Read the article, then browse the archive."
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Free Speech Movement Digital Archive More

Free Speech Movement Digital Archive

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  • Too bad the requirement that your speech be reasonably correct if not opinionated disqualifies you.

    Tell me what makes you so afraid
    Of all those people you say you hate

  • Try to get a broad view of history. (Score:5)

    by Tech187 ( 416303 ) on Saturday April 14, 2001 @05:26AM (#291868)
    It's fine to explore this era of history, and great that Berkeley has done a comprehensive job of covering one side of the story so well. But it's important to remember there are always two sides of the issue. For a point of view from someone who was on the side of the 'rebels' during this period, but who has had a lot of second thoughts, read some of these [barnesandnoble.com] well thought out [barnesandnoble.com] perspectives [barnesandnoble.com] on the history of this movement. I was a 'student radical' at the U of Minnesota in the late 70's. I even called the U of M Board of Regents 'Motherfuckers' once on a bullhorn. I've changed my opinion, and now think I was a damn fool back then. Make sure you look at both sides and don't get involved in foolish adventurism.
  • The FSM veterans maintain their own extensive Web site at www.fsm-a.org/ [fsm-a.org].
  • The Trotskyites sure thought so. They never let me speak at a rally again.

    The old saying was 'Be careful, you'll offend the liberals'
  • The "free speech movement"? Yes, free speech started in Berkeley in the 1960s. Nobody ever talked about it before then.

    And, as for those people who pushed to have freedom of speech written into the US Constitution in the late 1700s, who's heard of 'em?

  • hrmmmmm. berkeley, unix, free speech, lsd think they may be somehow related?
  • Umm...you might as well ask "Were the Baby Boomers the only baby boom?" It's just a term. Don't get all worked up about it.
  • It is interesting that many of those radicals who were yelling about their 'free speach rights' on campuses completed their 'long march' through the institutions and arrived as administrators on many of those same campuses, where they now deny the same 1st Amendment rights to any who did not agree with their Marxist-Leninst philosophies. Strangely, it seems that anyone who is not far left of Harry Trueman is considered a facist. Actually, it a family fight. Facists want to control production and distribution via cartels which the government controls, while Marxists want to control production and distribution directly. Other than that, their policies and methods of controlling the general population are identical because they are spiritual brethren. Their new smoke screen and mantra is that the previous socialists regimes of the USSR, East Germany, China, Cuba, Cambodia, Viet Nam, etc..., weren't 'truely' socialist governments. But, they tell us not to fear because they will install 'true' socialist regimes. Meanwhile, if you don't mouth their views and support their policies you can't have your own social and political organizations on campus, which proves they are of the same cloth as their predecessors because while they spout slogans about 'diversity' and 'freedom' they are as oppressive as their mentors were.

  • Horowitz. (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    ...yeah, Horowitz went from being an angry radical to an angry conservative. Some journey. All he did was switch sides. He's still nothing but a confrontational hothead who delights in being a shit-disturber without real purpose.
  • Berkeley has been recently the home of fascist anti-free speech tactics lately by today's crop of intolorent students who are wonderfully open-minded to every point of view that they are in full agreement with. As for Netanyahu, Connorley, or Horowitz, these people and their views are deemed worthy of a violent gagging that would make the KKK proud.
  • I've been poking around that site and I'm having trouble figuring out how to get to any photographs on scanned images. It seemed at first like it would be easy, but I seem to be failing miserably. Anyone have any success finding anything graphical?

    --

  • The beginning of FSM corresponded with the move to register blacks to vote in the south. People forget that what sparked FSM was the fact that UC Berkeley made a rule against _any_ political speech or activity on campus. A group of students was handing out flyers about supporting voting rights for blacks in the south, and the police tried to get rid of them, and this sparked a near riot.

    People may whine about how some students might try to "stifle" speech on campus today, but that's nothing compared to how the UC Board of Regents prevented _any_ political speech at all on campus in bygone days.

    -Dean
  • Hmm, ok. I found this [berkeley.edu]. Good, but I want more. Are photographs really too much to ask for?

    --

  • Don't really know, but I just found this picture in the archive with the caption: "Barrington Hall Panty Raiders [berkeley.edu]". Free speech never felt so good.

    --

  • If they weren't criminals, they wouldn't be suspect, now, would they?
    ---
  • Free Speach is undeniably one of the cornerstones of US political system, and is incredibly important (no disrespect, but as someone who grew up in USSR - and experienced reprecussions for speaking up - I can probably appreciate it even more than people who lived in U.S. all their lives :)

    However, a lot of people, including (or may be especially) on /. seem to misunderstand what free speach is about. I'd like to see someone (where's a good lawyer when you need one?) to take a crack at describing - in human language - exactly what is and what is not a free speach issue (Free Speach FAQ anyone? :)
    Make it required reading for anyone who wants to post on the topic ;)

    It seems a lot of people mistake the First Amendement (which prohibits *THE GOVERNMENT* from restricting the speech of The People), with an unrestricted permission to anyone to say anything they want in any forum under any circumstance. However, in reality, it does not place restrictions on *purely private* forums (as was duly noted by the more level-headed people in the freerepublic thread), and there are even some government-initiated restrictions on speech that are in no violation of 1st A.

    Well, IANAL, so i'd like to see a professional do a good writeup on this. (wishing for everyone to read it would be rather naive but may be at least some people would take notice).

    -DVK
    Vive diu prosperaque! (Live long and prosper!)

  • this is true. :)

  • "I found out that it was possible to download and even install RedHat Linux from the Internet for free, through illegal so called "FTP mirror" servers!"

    blink

    Is this guy for real?

    Assuming the worst-case scenario that you really are completely dense (which is quite possible, sadly enough), let me assure you that it is 100% legal to download RedHat, as long as the people you're downloading from also allow you access to the source code. RedHat makes their money on providing support services. Try reading the liscense some time.

    "The people behind Linux deserves to be paid for their hard work! "

    I agree, but that doesn't mean that the people behind Linux aren't offering the code for free. I like how you're trying to decide for them what is illegal and what is not. Are you one of those people who insists that open source is the death of intellectual property and capitalism in general?

    "Why do you think Bill Gates of Microsoft (the creator of MS-DOS and Windows) has become a wealthy man, when Linus Torvalds of RedHat (the creator of Linux) hasn't? "

    Um... well, aside from the fact that Gates created neither, and that Torvalds has jack to do with RedHat beyond being in charge of kernel development (for ALL Linux distributions), I'd say it's because Torvalds is a programmer while Gates is a businessman (who couldn't code his way out of a paper bag).

    "Even though there must be millions of dollars lost because of this murky business"

    It's a business?

  • I agree 100%. Just look at the treatment of David Horowitz. He wanted a rational discourse about the slave reparations movement, but the assholes didn't have the intellectual capability to handle a debate. I can only assume that they were aware of the weakness of their arguments and chose to hide behind yelling and shouting.

  • Where you here when the infamous Mr. Horowitz came to Berkeley's campus? He spoke freely and the people outside protested freely as well. What I can't understand is why Mr. Horowitz hides behind the Free Speech banner to shout his RACIST and baseless claims. He came to campus and all he talked about was free speech, not his imflamatory and worthless statements. Stop hiding Mr. Horowitz, and maybe someone will actually respect you... Actually you'll never get respect here because you're just plain wrong...
  • Horowizt delivers a message completely free of Racism. The racists these days are the people trying to garner special privledges and renumeration for certain people based on their race.

    Take off your blinders. Get a clue.
  • Because you have freedom of speach noone has *stopped* you from yelling " FIRST POST!!"

    You do have to pay a $500 extra exclamation point fine though.

    KFG
  • He wanted not such thing... He came to campus and talked only about Free Speech, hiding his worthless claims behind that banner. He never spoke about his book or any of his infamous theories. Since the entire forum was 1) understaffed by security (except for Mr. Horowitz) and 2) Preceeded by a severe goof-up in the school newspaper (the Daily Cal), it's no wonder that the open debate session turned into a shouting match after aprox. 3 minutes. I believe the entire thing was a setup to portray the current UC students as a bunch of free speech quashing fascists, which by the way is completely false. Free Speech on campus is alive and well here, just look at all the people out on Sproul during lunch time and you'll see a wide variety of opinions being expressed, not just the dominant liberal view on campus.
  • Why do you think they call starting a computer "booting up"?

    Computer geeks have always had a strange sense of humor.

    KFG
  • Or communist either.

    But they sure as hell were what every socialist or communist attempt turns into in a damned hurry.

    Danger, danger, run Will Robinson, run!
  • Hey, Horowitz was there. From the beginning of the Berkeley scene in the early 60's. His book 'Student' in 1962 was pivotal. His more recent books are just as relevant. If you want to present all sides of the history, you have to be open to all who were involved.
  • interesting...I always thought that many of the so-called rebels were just being a tad pompous - touting free speech in a country where free speech is *more or less* guaranteed by the constitution. This was probably their chance to play the glamorous activist role. Maybe it makes good dinner table conversation - yeah, I fought for free speech in the 60s....we had to battle the evil establishment and mean people over 30....and good lord, we had to consume all that LSD while listening to Sgt. Pepper. I am not totally dissing them - just trying to say that these student activists had their 15 minutes, so what's the big deal now?
  • of which, 34,000 consists of "All Your Base Are Belong To Us" and links to goatse.cx
  • I was reading the article and found it all fascinating. However by the end of it the only thing that came to mind were the lyrics to an old Tom Paxton song...

    "I'll sing of Spiro Agnew and all the things he's done."

    That was the whole song and only people alive when Nixon was president or people who enjoy political history will find that amusing, but I thought I would share anyway.
  • So-called free speech at Berkeley is a joke. Sure, you can say whatever you want, as long as your views are squarely to the left. Otherwise you get shouted down and threatened. Ask David Horowitz [frontpagemag.com], a former prominent Berkeley sixties radical who is now an articulate conservative writer. He wrote a now-famous ad for the Berkeley paper on why reparations for slavery are a bad idea. Although his views are shared by something like 80% of the public, he was labeled a racist bigot by the newspaper, which was pressured into formally apologizing for the ad. It's a new McCarthyism, folks, and it's coming from the left this time.

    Horowitz recently spoke at Berkeley (his alma mater), where the administration at first refused to guarantee his physical security despite threats of violence. At the event, a large group of protesters chanted communist slogans through a bullhorn (even Al Gore and Ralph Nader are too far to the right for them) and denounced Horowitz as a bigot. Find out what is going on in our so-called institutions of higher learning, folks. It is nothing short of chilling.
  • "If you're not a rebel at 20, you have no heart.

    If you're not establishment by 30, you have no brains."

    I'd appreciate it if someone could tell me who said that originally.

    Peace,
    Amit
    ICQ 77863057
  • You're a moron... You weren't there... I was. Oh BTW, Horowitz is a bigot. Plain and simple. The reason the Daily Cal appologized for the ad was because it is against their policy to publish obviously inflamable material in its advertisements. Get your fact straight before you acuse Berkeley students of being fascist. The students have a right to protest his speech don't they? Did Mario Savio use a bullhorn as well? I think he did. The students protesters (with the bullhorns and such) were mostly outside. They were not trying to suppress his rights to political speech, rather they were voicing their own political speech which is done frequently on campus. You have a right to belive (and speak about) Mr. Horowitz's rediculous claims, and I have the right to counter that speech with my own.
  • Thugs with placards huh? I'm sure that's what many Americans thought of the student protests during the 1960's as well. Just as they were wrong then, they are wrong now.
  • Yes, I was there. And the rest of your comment is just as accurate as your false assertion that I wasn't. By the way, how could possibly know if I was there or not? You Berkeley fascists are frightening. Thank God you are a small fringe minority.
  • I think the real quote was "If you're not a liberal when you're 25, you have no heart. If you're not a conservative when you're 40, you've got no brain." and I think Winston Churchill said it although I could be wrong.
  • Been to Cal recently? Hell, I'm a student, I go everyday (including weekends), and I'm not part of a liberal fringe group either. I belive that there is large portion of students here that are liberal in their leaning, myslef being part of that group. If your message is to say that conservatives are the majority on campus, you're dead wrong. if you are saying that there is a general state of apathy for political activity on campus, you would be right. Most students I know actually care about political expression (the only ones that don't happen to be involved in majors like Engineering and Business). Is the campus becoming more and more conservative? Hardly. Take a look at what out African American recruitment and Retention centers just anounced they are doing... That's right they are actively trying to disuade black applicants from enrolling to try to force the Regents into re-instating Afirmative Action. That is not the work of conservatism at all. while I don't agree on their tactics, I do agree that the re-instation of A.A. is needed.
  • Blinders? It is you my friend who is blind to the plight of African Americans and other minority groups. Do you think theere is equality in this country? Take your blinders off and look around. How many blacks do you see working in your IT department at whatever company you work for? Not very many I bet. You should think about the reasons why this has occured.
  • Uh,huh... A small minority, right. Ask the students on campus if they support Mr. Horowotz and his claims, and I think you will realize that theya re not in the minority at all. Your claims of fascism are baseless. There is room for all types of speech including Horowitz's type. The conservatives on this campus are the minority, and if you fail to realize that, then you have problems.
  • Who do you think abolished A.A.? The students? Nope. The Berkeley, faculty or administration? Nope. It was the UC Regents, a group so far removed from the voices of the students that only HUGE political uprisings can adjust their policies. I am an engineering student at Cal. I know many more liberal studetns here than conservatives. All the conservatives need to bond together under one group in order to get their minority voices heard. There's nothing wrong with that, but it further weakens your claim that this campus is becoming more conservative. The liberals on this campus, myslef included, do not feel the need to join groups like that because our voices and concerns are the predominant one already. I think the conservative grups have their place on campus and I support their freedom of speech as well. What I, and the majority of the students here don't support are their opinions.

  • Re:Try to get a broad view of history. (Score:3)

    by blair1q ( 305137 ) on Saturday April 14, 2001 @09:41AM (#291906) Journal
    The beginning of the FSM at Berkeley was righteous.

    But it quickly turned into a faddish, party-like, power-mad atmosphere.

    Mario Savio and the people he led were protesting a legitimate problem caused by the Berkeley administration.

    By the time it was being copied on campuses across America, it had become the "make up an excuse to go protest, get high, get laid, get your jollies" movement. A combination of hero worship, beatnik ethics, and youthful experimentation run amok.

    It might have been fun, but it wasn't very constructive.

    But then, maybe we should bring it back, because college students now riot when the women's basketball team loses a national championship game. They're obviously not being distracted well enough by chemicals, politics, and the acquisition of knowledge, to keep them from being mobbish and violent for completely stupid reasons...

    --Blair
    "Four bored in O-hi-o."
  • You misunderstood me. I did not claim that left-wing fascists are a minority at Berkeley (though they may well be, I don't know). What I am saying is that they are a fringe minority of the general public, thank God.

    Was it Berkeley or some other campus where some lefty-loonies went out and confiscated all the copies of the newspapers with Horowitz's ad. Ah, now there's free speech!
  • Very good points... I agree with you on many issues then. Going by your definition, then I suppose I am not a liberal either. I agree that the pendulum has swung to the right slightly in California for exactly the reasons you state, but I don't really think it has moved that far here on campus. An overhwlming majority of students are in favor of A.A., and I think of these as "liberal" causes. Thank you for the clarification.
  • This is typical of the baloney Horowitz constantly faces. Rather than respond directly to his arguments, his adversaries usually revert to ad hominem attacks against his character. So, Horowitz is an "asshole," eh? And why is that? Oh, because you disagree with him. I see. And his ad was an "attack on blacks," eh? And why is that? Oh, because you disagree with him. I see again.

    Just for the record, Horowitz is sincerely trying to help blacks. I realize some of you will never accept that fact, but he actually meets with conservative black leaders in LA and tries to develop a strategy to help them. He believes that they need real educational reforms (e.g., vouchers), not the phoney reforms that the teachers unions propose.

    By the way, I believe that Horowitz has an African-American son-in-law (or daughter-in-law, one or the other), whom he accepts fully into his family. The notion that he is a racist or bigot is nothing but a politically motivated slander.
  • And rather cleverly, too. The original AC is lampooning the style of those pro-capitalism fanatics who have made such a religion out of the Law of Supply and Demand that they find anything outside of Capitalism unthinkably horrible and evil, no matter how reasonable or mild it might be.

    He is also lampooning the current paranoia of the right wing which thinks the current mild criticisms launched (generally on op-ed pages and at protests) at their ideas are somehow comparable to the centuries-long armed suppression of Left thought, and that if these alien ideas triumph it will somehow mean the End of the World As We Know It (tm).

  • Re:Try to get a broad view of history. (Score:3)

    by blair1q ( 305137 ) on Saturday April 14, 2001 @11:41AM (#291911) Journal
    someone goes to Purdue...

    I ruled out Purdue when they recruited me to be a Teaching Assistant...while I was in high school...

    --Blair
  • There is a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can't take part; you can't even passively take part, and you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you've got to make it stop. And you've got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless you're free, the machine will be prevented from working at all!
    -Mario Savio [savio.org], of Free Speech Movement [fsm-a.org] at Berkeley December 2, 1964 (context) [fsm-a.org]
  • my terse post.

    Basically I agree with you.

    KFG
  • Good points... I'm glad someone for once has the correct thinking on this one. No one at the Horowitz speech prevented him from talking. Rather, it was the understaffed people who put it on who ended the dialogue after shouting began. Horowitz talked freely as did the people outside. The students on campus who don't agree with the dominant radical views of others have a right to speak about them, and both sides did that.
  • It's not only the people of color you refer to trying to reinstate A.A. In fact, I know many whites who believe in A.A. and want it reinstated as well. The irony you refer to is the point they are trying to make. Neo-Marxists and anarchists as you call them only had a significant impact for a short time, and that went out in the 1970s. I odn't unserdtand how you think that a student body that is completely unrepresentative of the state of California's demographics is the "correct" way to run a state-funded higher education system.
  • The man wrote an entire RFC to be studied by other professionals, not a short FAQ ;)
    (but thanks for the link :)

  • Well, I suppose if you ask "those that care about the issue" you will see the result I have stated. There are many majors out there (like all the humanities) that are filled with people who are passionate about these issues and others. I am an engineering student, and I do care about this issue and many others. Am I active in protests? Not really. Are there plenty of people like me who have ideas about this issue but rarely voice them in public. You betcha. Just because someone never comes forward in public and says, "Yes! We need to reinstate Afirmative Action now!" does not mean that they are antagonistic toward the idea. I'm not sure on the numbers, but humanity students outnumber engineers + business school students by like 2:1 by my rough estimate.
  • Duh! Like I didn't know that?

    I SAID that computer geeks have always had a strange sense of *humor.*

    KFG
  • Listen to the people who were involved when they talk about it. They actually seem to believe they were the first and only free speech "movement" in history.
  • Lurking in our nations colleges in the mid 1960's, I was a radical. We were struggling for the heart and soul of a nation against dark and sinister forces. When Dwight Eisenhower left office he warned of the great danger that our own arms manufacurers posed to America. Currently, the new administration has crashed tech stocks by verbalizing a desire to refund the classic defense industry. This is the very same dangerous element that Eisenhower warned us about. It is all about your loss of freedom. It is real and it has set its fangs upon you now. Good luck to all - Pray for Peace
  • The local authoritarian left-wing cult, the Spartacist League, hold a protest outside where they chant their usual bullshit. The Sparts are NOT a group that any sensible person supports. Other left groups avoid them like the plague.

    LOL, they are still around!?

    I may not even be old enough to be in college yet (I'm 16), but I remember my World History teacher (who went to Yale in the late 70's) telling my class a story about how one day, someone from their group came up to his door in an attempt at recruiting him. He described them as basically believing in the "workers" violently overthrowing authority by killing all those who are in charge. Kinda like Communists but more violent. Anyway, his roommate happened to be a Pol Sci major who, after being called to the door by my teacher, met with the woman and tore down, one by one, the woman's political ideals and claims. My teacher acutally thought it was kind of amusing. You're absolutely right, those people are part of the lunatic fringe.

    Anyway, that's my $0.02.

  • Newspapers weren't stolen at Berkeley (at least none that I know of), and reporters weren't threatened here. So, for people to say the Free Speech is dead at Berkeley, is complete fallacy. Your arguements about the nazism is likewise useless in this context, and your correlation between student protestors and fascists is despicable.
  • Actually, free speech appears to be the right to
    ignorantly distort other people's message.
  • Are you the Avakianites? Or is this yet another
    new RCP?

    Do you embrase Marist-Leninist-Mao Zedong
    thought? Or are you possibly more of the Enver
    Hoxa persuasion?

    And what about Trotsky?

    Can Socialism be built in a single country?

    Do your cadre who are 'young looking' have to
    pretend they are students, while the older ones
    inflitrate the Union movement?

    Where do you hawk your paper?

  • Ah, you are the Avakianites.

    Was it fun throwing weighted fishooks at the
    police when Deng came to DC back in 1979?

    Have you reintegrated the Revolutionary
    Workers Headquarters     cadre yet? Their
    student front group, the PSO (Progressive Student
    Organization) is one of the strongest MLM front
    groups in the country, you should assimilate them
    if possible.

    Does your newspaper still suck?
  • People may whine about how some students might try to "stifle" speech on campus today Your comments were insightful, but it does show your disrepect for views that differ from your own when you use the term 'whine' to describe a legitimate complaint.

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