Tag Archives: Freedom of Speech

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Dave Coppedge was fired by NASA for distributing intelligent design DVDs

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Evolution News explains.

Excerpt:

Before Coppedge was fired, he was demoted and punished — and this happened precisely because he was talking with colleagues about intelligent design. The evidence in the case is unmistakable on that point. Consider this exchange between Coppedge and his supervisor at JPL, Clark Burgess, on April 15 and 16, 2009:

Query from David Coppedge to Clark Burgess: “Per our meeting this afternoon, I just wanted to be sure I didn’t misconstrue what you told me. Is it correct to say that the allegation of harassment was limited to the activity of my handing out DVDs on intelligent design to coworkers, and that if I had not done that as to anyone here in the building, I would still be in good standing? (i.e., I would not have been investigated or gotten the written warning)? Or would you word it some other way? I just want to be crystal clear I was not being investigated/reprimanded for some other activity, personal flaw or deficiency in job performance.” (See Declaration of William J. Becker, Jr. Re: Plaintiff’s Opposition to Defendant’s Motion in Limine #1, Exhibits, p. 13)

Reply from Clark Burgess: “I believe the investigation was triggered by the discussion you had with Greg [Chin] on April 13th, when he demanded you stop passing out DVDs and discussing them in the workplace. When I first conversed with HR, they mentioned they were going to conduct an investigation based on that encounter. Whatever else they may have found, I do not believe entered into their decision to generate the written warning. It’s my belief, if that incidence had not happened HR would not have been contacted and the written warning would not have been generated.” (See Declaration of William J. Becker, Jr. Re: Plaintiff’s Opposition to Defendant’s Motion in Limine #1, Exhibits, p. 13)

(Burgess accidentally gives the wrong date for when Greg Chin “demanded you stop passing out DVDs.” The actual date was March 2, 2009.)

This clearly shows that Coppedge’s demotion and punishment had everything to do with his lending intelligent design DVDs to co-workers, and in fact had nothing to do with anything else.

Even JPL admits that the demotion had to do with Coppedge’s conversations at work. The AP story reports:

In an emailed statement, JPL dismissed Coppedge’s claims. In court papers, lawyers for the California Institute of Technology, which manages JPL for NASA, said Coppedge received a written warning because his co-workers complained of harassment. They also said Coppedge lost his “team lead” status because of ongoing conflicts with others.

[…]Indeed, as we expect Coppedge’s case will show, no one at JPL had complained of “harassment” against him until after Coppedge himself filed a harassment claim. Coppedge filed that harassment claim because on March 2, 2009, a JPL mid-level manager named Greg Chin yelled at Coppedge, ordered him to stop “pushing religion,” and told him to stop talking about intelligent design. No one ever stepped forward and proactively filed a harassment complaint against Coppedge for his conversations about ID. Rather, he was targeted by administrators who disliked his pro-ID views.

The reason I posted this is to just make it clear to everyone what is really going on here, as if there were any doubt about what happened. Darwinists, like global warmists, do not engage in debates. They exert power to coerce and silence dissent. Let’s be clear about that. They are the Spanish Inquisition and they smash anyone who dissents from their dogma.

News

Trial begins for former NASA employee fired for belief in intelligent design

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From Fox News.

Excerpt:

NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory has landed robotic explorers on the surface of Mars, sent probes to outer planets and operates a worldwide network of antennas that communicates with interplanetary spacecraft.

Its latest mission is defending itself in a workplace lawsuit filed by a former computer specialist who claims he was demoted — and then let go — for promoting his views on intelligent design.

[…]David Coppedge, who worked as a “team lead” on the Cassini mission exploring Saturn and its many moons, alleges that he was discriminated against because he engaged his co-workers in conversations about intelligent design and handed out DVDs on the idea while at work. Coppedge lost his “team lead” title in 2009 and was let go last year after 15 years on the mission.

Opening statements are expected to begin Monday in Los Angeles Superior Court after two years of legal wrangling in a case that has generated interest among supporters of intelligent design. The Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian civil rights group, and the Discovery Institute, a proponent of intelligent design, are both supporting Coppedge’s case.

“It’s part of a pattern. There is basically a war on anyone who dissents from Darwin and we’ve seen that for several years,” said John West, associate director of the Center for Science and Culture at the Seattle-based Discovery Institute. “This is free speech, freedom of conscience 101.”

[…]Coppedge’s attorney, William Becker, says his client was singled out by his bosses because they perceived his belief in intelligent design to be religious.

 

If Darwinism was all it was cracked up to be, then why do they have to resort to silencing people who disagree with them, and ruining their careers? This is not an isolated occurrence.

News

How the left uses “bullying” to restrict free speech that offends them

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From Hans Bader at the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

Full text: (links removed)

A school superintendant has labeled a column in a school newspaper thatcriticized homosexuality as “bullying.” (The Shawano High School newspaper decided to run dueling student opinion pieces on whether same-sex couples should be able to adopt children; the student article that was labeled as “bullying” answered the question “no.” The school district also publicly apologized for the column, and said that it is “taking steps to prevent items of this nature from happening in the future.”)

Whatever the wisdom (or lack thereof) of featuring something like that in a school newspaper, it seems strange to argue that a viewpoint in a student newspaper is “bullying.” (The Shawano School District’s bullying policy provides that “bullying” may lead to “warning, suspension,” “expulsion,” etc.) A conservative Christian who thought that homosexuality was immoral successfully challenged a school “harassment” code that punished students with such viewpoints in Saxe v. State College Area School District(2001), a case in which a federal appeals court ruled that there is no “harassment” exception to the First Amendment for speech which offends members of minority groups. Speech cannot be banned simply by labeling it as violence, either: for example, in Bauer v.Sampson, another federal appeals court ruled that a campus newspaper’s illustration depicting a college official’s imaginary death was protected by the First Amendment, even though the college declared it a violation of its policy against “workplace violence.”

But schools and anti-bullying activists have adopted incredibly overbroad definitions of bullying. The anti-bullying website NoBully.com, and schools like Fox Hill and Alvarado Elementary, define even “eye rolling” and other expressions of displeasure or hostility as bullying, even though doing so raises First Amendment problems.

The Obama administration claims bullying is an “epidemic” and a “pandemic.” But in reality, bullying and violence have steadily gone down in the nation’s schools, as studies funded by the Justice Department have shown. The Obama administration’s StopBullying.gov website defines a vast array of speech and conduct as bullying: it classifies “teasing” as a form of “bullying,” and “rude” or “hurtful” “text messages” as “cyberbullying.” Since “creating web sites” that “make fun of others” also is deemed “cyberbullying,” conservative websites that poke fun at the president are presumably guilty of cyberbullying under this strange definition. (Law professors such as UCLA’s Eugene Volokh have criticized bills by liberal lawmakers like Congresswoman Linda Sanchez (D-Calif.) that would ban some criticism of politicians as cyberbullying.)

It’s very important to understand what liberals mean when they say “bullying” and how they use it to silence those who might offend them. It’s using government power to force individuals to accept the morality of the state. There’s a word for that.