Let’s safeguard free speech, while learning how to engage in more constructive conversations about difficult topics

Video screenshot: Program speaker Prof. Nadine Strossen is seated immediately to the right of the podium, with DY on the left. Suffolk U. Law Review editor-in-chief Sara Levien is at the podium, opening the program. We are joined by a panel of Suffolk law students.

Earlier this month, I had the distinct pleasure of moderating a program on freedom of speech and expression, featuring Professor Nadine Strossen (Emerita, New York Law School), former President of the American Civil Liberties Union. The program was part of the Donahue Lecture Series sponsored by the Suffolk University Law Review. As a faculty co-advisor to the Law Review, I was delighted to be a part of this event.

In planning the program, Professor Strossen, an internationally recognized authority on free speech, suggested that we cast aside the typical lecture format and create a more interactive conversation. So we started with an interview that I conducted, followed by questions from a panel of Suffolk law students, and concluding with questions and comments from our audience.

The event was a tremendous success. Before an overflow room of attendees, and sparked by Prof. Strossen’s thoughtful, insightful, and engaged remarks and responses, as well as great questions from our student panelists, the program made for a lively 75-minute exchange. You can watch the full event by clicking here.

Prof. Strossen offered passionate defenses of free speech, while carefully dissecting the legal implications of speech and expression in various public sector and private sector settings. You can read a brief summary of some of her major points here. And if you’d like a very informative and accessible primer on speech protections in the U.S., then I happily recommend her 2023 book, Free Speech: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford U. Press).

But wait, there’s another big thing to consider!

I have long been in general agreement with Nadine Strossen’s embrace of freedom of speech. And especially during times like this, safeguarding free speech — subject to reasonable restrictions such as prohibiting defamation, fraud, or targeted harassment and abuse — is of paramount importance toward maintaining an open, democratic society.

In addition to protecting the sanctity of free speech, we all should learn and practice how to converse and listen more constructively. Whether one regards speech as a right or privilege, we have an obligation to exercise it responsibly.

By this, I’m not suggesting the adoption of intrusive speech codes. Nor should we jump all over something that isn’t said in just the right way, in just the right tone. Furthermore, there are instances where righteous anger may be a proper, or at least very understandable, response to deeply offensive or hurtful speech.

Rather, I mean coaching ourselves, and encouraging others, to engage in conversations on sensitive and difficult topics with as much respect and empathy as we can muster.

In addition, exercising self-restraint (which I do not necessarily equate with self-censorship) may be appropriate at times. After all, just because we’re allowed to say something a certain way doesn’t mean we should always do so.

Equally important, we should actively listen to what others have to say, and at least try to understand points of view that may seem opposite of our own. With that kind of listening, we see possibilities for genuine exchange, discovery of unexpected common ground, and perhaps even changing one’s understanding of, or position on, an important issue.

By the way, I fully confess that I have not always followed the precepts I am preaching. Everything I’m suggesting here is easier said than done.

Back to our Donahue Lecture

I was so pleased that the Donahue Lecture was an exemplar of engaging and respectful conversation about difficult and important topics. The event also meant a lot to me personally, as many moons ago, Prof. Strossen was my supervising professor in the Civil Rights Clinic at NYU School of Law, her first academic appointment before moving on to become a constitutional law professor at the New York Law School. Her warmth, intelligence, and student-centered focus were evident then and now, and I was proud to be able to show off our wonderful students at Suffolk Law.

Prior to the event, several student editors of the Law Review shared with me their understandable concern that someone might try to use this occasion to stage a protest in support of their views on some controversial public issue. After all, we’ve seen news accounts of such disruptions at other universities, at times requiring an event to be discontinued in midstream. But I assured them I was confident that, between the professionalism of our guest speaker, our students, and other attendees, I was not concerned about such a possibility.

This was no statement of false bravado. As I planned how to moderate the event, I did consider potential responses should a situation threaten to get out of hand. But I wasn’t girding myself for anything uncomfortable to arise. I had faith that our event would be an example of healthy and informed dialogue. I was so happy that it more than met my expectations.

Autobiographical reflections: Mark Satin’s “Up From Socialism”

At the start of my second year as an instructor in the Lawyering program at New York University School of Law in 1992, I looked at my new class list of first-year students and saw a familiar name: Mark Satin. I would quickly confirm that this was the very Mark Satin who had written and edited a self-styled, left leaning yet “post-liberal” political newsletter titled New Options, which I had enjoyed as a subscriber.

Mark was 46 years old when he arrived at NYU Law. He brought with him an established reputation as an anti-war and left activist during the 1960s and as a progressive political writer during the 1970s. His first book, New Age Politics: Healing Self and Society (1976 + several revised editions), had generated considerable discussion as an attempt to synthesize and make sense of the politics of the New Left during the 60s and 70s.

After many years of writing and editing New Options, Mark sought to gain a stronger understanding of, and greater impact within, the societal mainstream. He figured that law school would give him some insights on how the worlds of law, policy, and commerce operated, so he set his sights on obtaining a legal education and earning a law degree. He took the Law School Admissions Test, filed his applications, and eventually landed on my 1L class list at NYU Law.

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During our overlapping years at NYU, Mark and I shared many conversations about law, politics, legal education, and the general state of things. He was thoroughly invested as a law student, typically on his own terms and with a genuine curiosity about the Generation Xers who comprised the heart of the law school student body. Always attentive to emerging trends, and sometimes a key player in shaping them, he wanted to write a broad-ranging paper that surveyed and analyzed the linkages between law and psychology in many different aspects of legal thought and practice. That monumental research project would lead to a published article, “Law and Psychology: A Movement Whose Time Has Come,” in the Annual Survey of American Law, one of NYU’s student-edited law reviews.

Upon graduation, Mark held true to his goal of experiencing more of the mainstream, joining a small boutique business law firm in Manhattan’s Rockefeller Center. But sooner than later, he couldn’t resist the continuing siren call of writing and publishing. As the new millennium approached, Mark’s evolving social and political outlook were leading him to a place that he called the “radical middle.” His next newsletter creation was called just that. He wrote and published Radical Middle Newsletter (1999- 2009) (articles and back issues freely available here), and authored a book, Radical Middle: The Politics We Need Now (2004).

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Mark has brought together the chapters of a rich life in an engaging autobiography, Up From Socialism: My 60-Year Search for a Healing New Radical Politics (2023). Do not expect a political tome here. This is a life recalled and reflected upon in a first-person, journalistic style. It is very opinionated, not overly concerned with political correctness, and sometimes rather detailed about the author’s romantic connections, mostly with women of a certain political leaning.

And if I may put on my dime store amateur therapist’s hat, Up From Socialism is about the author’s search for healing as much as anything else. It flips an old progressive, feminist chestnut: The political is personal. If you doubt my assessment, then go to the last sentence of the second-to-last paragraph in Mark’s book. I don’t know if he has another book in mind, but if so, that’s its thesis statement and perhaps the starting point for shaping the rest of Mark’s life. (I won’t give it away, but has much to do with kindness.)

As for this book, I’m glad that Mark wrote it, and I’m glad that I read it. If any of this strikes your curiosity, then I’m happy to recommend it.

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I should disclose that I am a supporting bit player in Up From Socialism, and I have supported Mark’s various endeavors with board service, editorial feedback, and modest financial contributions. Upon Mark’s invitation, I reviewed an earlier draft of the book to provide feedback and suggestions, concentrating on the law school/legal practice chapter.

In addition, as I wrote in a 2019 blog piece, “Workplace bullying, worker dignity, and therapeutic jurisprudence: Finding my center of gravity” (link here), “the overlaps between Mark Satin’s ‘radical middle’ and my back-in-the-day brand of liberalism appear to be many, at least if my other affiliations with the workplace anti-bullying movement, therapeutic jurisprudence movement, and human dignity movement are any indication.”

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Editor’s Note: After I posted this piece, Mark Satin sent this reply by email and asked that it be added. I’m happy to do so:

COMMENT ON DAVID’S REVIEW OF MY BOOK, FROM MARK SATIN

Either David is being much too modest here, or he simply does not realize how much his perspective has contributed to my Up From Socialism book.  That book is, among other things, an exposé of the nastiness, competitiveness, ego-drivenness, and BULLYING that went on in the New Left of the 1960s, the supposedly more idealistic “transformational” movements of the 1970s-1990s, and the supposedly more buttoned-down radical-centrist activities of our day – not to mention what’s going on in the new New Left!

In Up From Socialism, I trace much of this awfulness back to many activists’ poor relationships with self, parents, and partners; that’s why there’s little separation in my book between the personal and the political.  And that’s why the explicitly stated moral of my book is, “Only by becoming kind people can we create a kind world.”  I think David has been saying the same thing in his own way, and he’s been saying it longer than I … I am a more or less Bad Guy through much of my book!

Thanksgiving Week: Writing and remembrance

Hello, dear readers, I’m enjoying my traditional U.S. Thanksgiving trip to New York City right now. The 12 years I lived in this city (1982-94) were a personally and professionally formative time for me, so I always get a bit reflective when I visit.

With this morning’s publication of a piece contemplating the notion of personal libraries (see below for link) to the blog of Harrison Middleton University, where I’m doing a side gig as a 2022 Fellow in Ideas,  I thought I’d pull together variety of more recent (2018-present) writings from other sites, heavily themed on lifelong learning, books, popular culture, and personal nostalgia. I hope you find something here that strikes your fancy.

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Contemplations on a Personal Library (2022) (link here)

Living history: The 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis as experienced by U.S. Navy officer on a destroyer (2022) (link here)

Forty summers ago, a first-ever trip to NYC (2022) (link here)

Pandemic Chronicles #26: Old postcards as time travel experiences (2021) (link here)

Embracing middlebrow culture: The Book-of-the-Month Club (2021) (link here)

Pandemic Chronicles #25: Monet, London fog, and memory at the Museum of Fine Arts (2021) (link here)

Studying the Great Books at the University of Chicago (2021) (link here)

Pandemic Chronicles #20: Witnessing “The Troubles” 40 years ago (2021) (link here)

Libraries as learning hangouts (2021) (link here)

What’s behind “More Than A Song”? (2021) (link here)

Pandemic Chronicles #8: And suddenly, our worlds became very small (2020) (link here)

Pandemic Chronicles #1: “Be careful what you wish for…” (2020) (link here)

Twenty-five years in Boston…whoa! (2019) (link here)

Music as a time machine: 1979 (2019) (link here)

What is it about cold weather that draws me to bookstores? (2018) (link here)

Two memorable semester breaks (2018) (link here)

On making a difference through writing

On this day of remembrance here in the U.S., I thought I’d pull together a collection of past articles related to the theme of writing, especially those forms designed to make a difference in this world — which, when you think about it, is the larger contribution of just about all good writing. And, of course, the earliest piece starts with coffee.

Using scholarship to make a difference (2020) (link here) — “When I first became a law professor, I was skeptical about the potential of legal scholarship to influence law reform. My intention was to do scholarship in sufficient volume and quality to earn tenure, and then to pursue writing and activist projects that didn’t involve lots of citations and footnotes.”

The privileges of creating a “body of work” (2019) (link here) — “Four years ago, I wrote about Pamela Slim‘s Body of Work: Finding the Thread That Ties Your Story Together (2013), which invites us to examine — in the author’s words — ‘the personal legacy you leave at the end of your life, including all the tangible and intangible things you have created’…”

On the social responsibilities of writers (2019) (link here) — “I’d like to take a Sunday dive into the nature of writing to fuel positive individual and social change. This may be especially relevant to readers who write about fostering psychologically healthier workplaces that are free from bullying, mobbing, and abuse.”

Even Shakespeare had a writing circle (2017) (link here) — “It was an interesting exhibition, and here’s what specially caught my eye: Shakespeare was part of a writing circle — Elizabethan style!”

Author Jenna Blum: “I didn’t become a writer to not say what I believe in” (link here) — “On Saturday, Jenna was the featured speaker for a program hosted by the Boston chapter of the Women’s National Book Association, speaking on the ‘crucial role of women’s literary voices in literature in the current political climate, and the fusing of art, writing, and activism.'”

How do you take and keep notes? (2017) (link here) — “At annual board meetings and workshops of the Human Dignity and Humiliation Studies network in New York City, I’ve taken delight in watching peace educator Janet Gerson‘s use of hardcover sketchbooks to take and preserve her notes, as well as to host her artistic forays and distractions.”

Three great authors on writing to make a difference (2015) (link here) — “For fresh, inspiring outlooks on the uses of writing and scholarship to make a difference, I often listen to voices outside of mainstream academe. Here I happily gather together three individuals, Ronald Gross, Mary Pipher, and John Ohliger, whose names I have invoked previously on this blog.”

Embracing creative dreams at midlife (2010, rev. 2018) (link here) — “Hilda’s desire to write novels was evident in college, but getting married, raising a family in Valparaiso, and becoming a high school English teacher would come first. However, she never let go of the idea of a writing life, and over the years she would exchange ideas, essays, and chapter drafts with friends and family members.”

Intellectual activism and social change (2013) (link here) — “For some time I’ve been studying a topic that I’ve labeled ‘intellectual activism,’ the practice of using scholarly research and writing to inform, shape, and influence social change initiatives.”

Mary Pipher on Writing to Change the World (2012) (link here) — “For all in this broad category, Mary Pipher’s Writing to Change the World (2006) is instructive and inspirational. Pipher is a bestselling author and therapist. Her book reflects upon the uses of writing to make a positive difference.”

Collegiate reflections: Working on the campus newspaper (2012) (link here) — “The Torch was the most important extracurricular experience of my college career. The topics of my articles and columns were limited largely to campus issues, but even this was heady business for me. There was something powerful and scary about writing pieces for publication with my byline appended.”

Coffee and work (2011) (link here) — “Coffee seems to be especially associated with writers. Crookes invokes J.K. Rowling, Marina Fiorato, Ernest Hemingway, Henrik Ibsen, and Malcolm Gladwell as examples of writers drawn to cafes and coffee shops to do their work.”

Historian David McCullough: He rang that bell gloriously

America lost one of its treasured storytellers several weeks ago, the renowned and beloved historian David McCullough (1933-2022). I’ve mentioned Mr. McCullough before on this blog and in my other social media writings, notably a post that praised his wonderful book, The Wright Brothers (2015).

So much has been said about this man since has passing, but I’d like to give him a bow by quoting a paragraph from his 2017 book, The American Spirit: Who Were Are and What We Stand For:

The world needs you. There is large work to be done, good work, and you can make a difference. Whatever your life work, take it seriously and enjoy it. Let’s never be the kind of people who do things lukewarmly. If you’re going to ring the bell, give the rope one hell of a pull. I wish you the fullest lives possible—full of love and bells ringing.

If it sounds like a line from a commencement-type speech, then you’re on the right path. This passage is from an address he gave at Dartmouth College in 1999. I think it’s a great sentiment for those of any age.

The thing is, David McCullough practiced what he urged these students to do with their lives. His life was rich and full and, well, “All American” in the best sense of the term. He fiercely loved this country and its many wonderful stories, and he contributed mightily toward our understanding of its history.

McCullough was not prone to regularly sharing his political views, which apparently tended toward the independent middle. He nevertheless stepped up in forming a group of prominent historians who jointly warned the nation of the dangers of a Trump presidency.

Boston was a favorite destination for his book talks, and I attended several of them. Each one was a treat. He will be deeply missed, even as his work lives on for future generations to discover and enjoy.

The Amy Wax situation: On academic freedom, diversity & inclusion, workplace mobbing, and cancel culture

Screenshot from Inside Higher Education

Applying just about any conventional measure, law professor Amy Wax has built a spectacularly successful career. She holds a chaired professorship at an Ivy League law school (University of Pennsylvania). She has assembled a ferocious c.v. (link here), loaded with sterling academic and professional achievements, publications, and awards. Her degrees include a J.D. from Columbia and an M.D. from Harvard.

And yet she is under heavy fire for an ongoing, alleged series of polarizing, critical statements and negative characterizations about people of color, women, and gays. For that she faces potential discipline and loss of tenure protections. The Dean of her law school has asked the university’s faculty senate to impose sanctions on her, a possible prelude towards eventual termination proceedings.

Scott Jaschik, writing for Inside Higher Education (link here), provides a lot of details about this situation, which has received national attention. Here’s his lede:

Some students and faculty at the University of Pennsylvania have been clamoring for years for the ouster of Amy Wax, the polarizing law professor who courted scandal with incendiary and racist remarks and writings and seemed to relish the resulting controversies. Despite the repeated calls for her removal from her tenured position, and the criticisms of her actions—including by university leaders—that followed each controversy, Wax remained in the position and seemed firmly protected by free speech and academic freedom rights.

That pattern may be about to change: the dean of the Penn law school has started a process that could lead to Wax’s termination.

To be clear, we’re not talking about an isolated instance or two of questionable speech. From Penn Law dean Theodore Ruger’s memorandum to the Chair of the Faculty Senate (link here), here are some of Prof. Wax’s alleged statements, made to individual students, her classes, and public audiences:

• “Stating in class that Mexican men are more likely to assault women and remarking such a stereotype was accurate in the same way as ‘Germans are punctual.'”
• “Commenting in class that gay couples are not fit to raise children and making other references to LGBTQ people that a student reported evinced a ‘pattern of homophobia.'”
• “Commenting after a series of students with foreign-sounding names introduced themselves that one student was ‘finally, an American’ adding, ‘it’s a good thing, trust me.'”
• Telling a Black student…”who asked whether Wax agreed with [a panelist’s] statements that Black people are inherently inferior to white people, that ‘you can have two plants that grow under the same conditions, and one will just grow higher than the other.'”
• Telling a Black student “that Black students don’t perform as well as white students because they are less well prepared, and that they are less well prepared because of affirmative action.”
• “Stating, based on misleading citation of other sources, that ‘women, on average, are less knowledgeable than men,’ women are ‘less intellectual than men’ and there is ‘some evidence’ for the proposition that ‘men and women differ in cognitive ability.'”
• “Stating that ‘our country will be better off with more whites and fewer nonwhites.'”
• “Stating that Asians have an ‘indifference to liberty,’ lack ‘thoughtful and audacious individualism’ and that ‘the United States is better off with fewer Asians and less Asian immigration.’”
• “Stating that ‘there were some very smart Jews’ among her past students but that Ashkenazi Jews are ‘diluting [their] brand like crazy because [they are] intermarrying.'”
• “Stating that low-income students may cause ‘reverse contagion,’ infecting more ‘capable and sophisticated’ students with their ‘delinquency and rule-breaking.'”
• “Stating that ‘if you go into medical schools, you’ll see that Indians, South Asians are now rising stars. . . . [T]hese diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives are poisoning the scientific establishment and the medical establishment now.'”

In her recently posted GoFundMe appeal to create the “Amy Wax Legal Defense Fund” (link here), Prof. Wax states that Dean Ruger’s charges of inappropriate conduct are an attack on her conservative principles and are “littered with indignant invective and unsubstantiated and distorted claims.” She adds:

Penn Law Dean Ruger’s latest steps are part of a longstanding campaign at Penn Law School against me based on my stated positions, opinions, and speech, and despite my stellar performance as an award-winning teacher and academic during my decades-long career as a law professor. Penn’s actions represent an unprecedented and deeply destructive threat to the practice and traditions of free expression on campus and the tenure protections afforded to professors who express unpopular views. They are further evidence of the “woke” takeover of our university system, which seeks to stifle and punish dissent and purge our campuses of any deviation from a narrow set of progressive dogmas.

Academic freedom and tenure

While academic tenure may not be the lifetime job guarantee that some claim it is, it’s true that tenured professors at stable institutions who perform their work satisfactorily can expect continued employment. (For more about this topic, see my blog article, “What is academic tenure?,” link here.) And as a tenured professor at a prestigious university, Prof. Wax enjoys some of the strongest job protections available to any American employee.

One of the main purposes of tenure is to safeguard academic freedom in teaching, scholarship, and service activities. This includes freedom of expression, written or spoken. I regard academic freedom and tenure as carrying both rights and responsibilities. They include earned protections and accompanying obligations to perform one’s job with integrity. Tenure revocation is possible in cases of serious misconduct.

For controversial speech in such a context, I suggest that we establish a spectrum between being a thought-provoking scholar and being a simple provocateur.

The thought-provoking scholar pushes the boundaries of our assumptions and perceptions, using facts, analysis, interpretation, and sometimes creative expression. At times, this may include voicing or supporting unpopular viewpoints. The simple provocateur is more akin to a keyboard warrior, playing to the crowd in the comments section. This is the stuff of the internet troll and has very little to do with reasoned thought.

Where Amy Wax places on that spectrum may help us understand how her situation should be resolved. If her statements are considered so outlandish, irresponsible, and hurtful as to constitute misconduct, then sanctions may be in offing.

One of the most challenging considerations here is that we don’t have a bevy of comparable situations to give us guidance on how this should be handled. Assuming that Prof. Wax said or wrote most of the statements attributed to her, then this is a far cry from more typical scenarios that involve isolated instances or a small cluster of utterances deemed problematic.

It’s fair to point out that if Wax had been employed in a standard-brand, private-sector job setting (like a law firm or medical center), then it’s likely that she would’ve been terminated for cause already, perhaps following disciplinary warnings or a suspension. But academic freedom and tenure provide both substantive and procedural protections that most jobs do not offer.

Diversity and inclusion

You can easily see how the Wax situation is tailor-made for America’s tortured and fraught political and civic dialogue about diversity and freedom of expression. Her alleged statements have caused such an uproar because many have found them to be outrageous, hurtful, and wrongheaded. They’ve come at a time when “DEI” (diversity, equity, inclusion) is a deep focus of the day, in academe and corporate America alike.

Wax’s defenders range from those who agree with the substance of her alleged statements to those who place a very high value on academic freedom. 

Workplace mobbing

Folks have every right to criticize or defend Wax. She should be subjected to appropriate discipline if she’s crossed a clear line. From my concededly distanced perch, I believe that she is at that line or has even crossed it. While some of her alleged statements may fall under the cloak of academic freedom, many others appear to be grounded in animus towards difference.

Whether one agrees with Wax or not, there’s always a risk that critical voices can become an unruly mob. I find Wax’s worldview deeply objectionable, but I’m not happy about workplace mobbing scenes either. Prof. Kenneth Westhues’ pathbreaking work on mobbing in academe has repeatedly illustrated how quickly and dramatically such behaviors can escalate.

I imagine that Prof. Wax is feeling quite under siege right now. I don’t envy her. If she does face any disciplinary proceedings, then I hope — for everyone’s sake — that they will be conducted with dignity, fairness, and honesty.

Cancel culture

Especially because there is no legal definition of cancel culture, it’s important that we have some understanding of what it means in the employment context. I suggest that we define cancel culture at work as a response claimed to be disproportionately harsh — typically, either severe discipline or termination — to statements or actions deemed objectionable, hurtful and/or controversial.

At this juncture, it’s hard for anyone to legitimately claim that Amy Wax has been “cancelled.” However, the University’s moves toward possible disciplinary action and/or termination will cause the term to be used. And especially if her tenure is revoked and she is dismissed, then notwithstanding any due process she had been accorded, the cries of cancel culture from certain circles will be loud and sustained.

If Wax does leave Penn under whatever circumstances, then she will very likely land on her feet. She will be accorded martyr status and will no doubt be hired by an institution more compatible with her social and ideological views.

Summing up

While admitting that I’ve waded into this conversation with some trepidation, I feel obliged to share my own sense of this situation. I consider many of Amy Wax’s alleged statements to be hurtful and divisive. They sound like those of a provocateur fueling an ugly, exclusionary worldview, rather than those of a thought-provoking professor who occupies a position of enormous privilege and responsibility.

Yup, issues surrounding diversity and difference are challenging and can yield honest differences of opinion. There is a place in that discussion for strong language. But I don’t think that the heart of Wax’s rhetoric is contributing to our understanding of these issues. Sadly, one thing I’m certain of is that the eventual outcome of this situation — whatever it happens to be — will drive a deeper wedge into our political and social divide. 

Storytelling to change the world: Skip the PowerPoint?

From the Harvard Business Review

Writer and communication coach Carmine Gallo, writing on “What the Best Presenters Do Differently” for the Harvard Business Review (link here), reminds us of the importance of storytelling in trying to reach an audience:

Our minds are wired for story. We think in narrative and enjoy consuming content in story form.

Understanding the difference between presenting and storytelling is critical to a leader’s ability to engage an audience and move them to action. Unfortunately, presentation software often gets in the way. Slides should be designed to complement a story, not to replace the storyteller.

Gallo offers five core pieces of advice, and I’d recommend the full article for anyone who wants to dive into the detail. For this post, however, I want to emphasize Gallo’s first point: “Presenters open PowerPoint. Storytellers craft a narrative.” He adds:

If you want to engage your audience, you have to tell a story. But for most people who prepare presentations, storytelling is not top of mind.

Most “presenters” do what sounds logical: They begin by opening the slideware. But most presentation programs aren’t storytelling tools. They’re digital delivery mechanisms. PowerPoint’s default template asks for a title and text.

A bulleted list is not a story. A story is a connected series of events told through words and/or pictures. A story has a theme, attention-grabbing moments, heroes and villains, and a satisfying conclusion. Nicely designed slides cannot compensate for a poorly structured story.

OK, I’m biased. I’m a frequent public speaker, and I tend to get very positive feedback on talks before groups, both in-person and online. I think this has something to do with my not using PowerPoint.

Even when I’m not telling a story per se, I’m trying to educate and persuade an audience, typically about workplace bullying, dignity at work, or workers and workplaces generally. If an audience doesn’t know me, then I also have to establish my credibility and personal appeal, in addition to offering my content. Which brings me to…

…Aristotle’s On Rhetoric

In his work On Rhetoric, Aristotle — one of the greatest of the Ancient Greek philosophers — outlined three major properties of speech for purposes of persuasion:

• Logos, or the core logic of the speaker’s argument;
• Ethos, or the speaker’s essential credibility; and,
• Pathos, or the speaker’s emotional appeal.

Of these three properties, logos can be translated into PowerPoint content, but ethos and pathos come from the speaker. The latter are harder to convey when the lights are dimmed and folks are gazing at slides flashing by on a screen. After all, one’s credibility and personal appeal come from developing a rapport with an audience.

In a typical 10-20 minute presentation, that means making a personal connection quickly. It’s still vitally important even if you have the stage for, say, 30-60 minutes.

Looking at those classic Greek philosophers, would Aristotle, Plato, Socrates, or Homer have used PowerPoint had such wiz-bang technology been available back in their day? Maybe, but if so, they would’ve done so sparingly, I think. In Homer’s case, I think he would’ve stuck to the tried-and-true oral tradition.

I understand the usefulness of PowerPoint and similar platforms for presenting content. They can be very useful for certain types of teaching, as well. But if a speaker wants to persuade rather than merely inform, then I believe the Aristotelian properties of logos, ethos, and pathos counsel in favor of pulling up the screen and looking at one’s audience in the eye.

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Related posts

• Stories can drive change, but workplace bullying stories often defy quick summaries (2016) (link here)
• Storytelling for social change (2015) (link here)

Sharing insights about workplace bullying and mobbing in SafeHarbor, Part III

This year, I’ve been writing about my visits to SafeHarbor (link here), the online site created by Dr. Gary Namie, co-founder of the Workplace Bullying Institute, to serve as “a community dedicated to the people affected by workplace bullying and those devoted to helping them.” I’ve also shared some past blog articles that I’ve posted for SafeHarbor members.

During my visit to SafeHarbor this evening, it struck me how a combination of knowledge, understanding, and — yes — technology has brought us to where a site like this can exist and sustain. Members can start discussions, comment on existing threads, and link articles, thereby contributing to an educative and supportive dynamic that can overcome distance and physical separation.

When I joined forces with Gary and Ruth Namie in the late 1990s, the internet was still in its infancy, with the first generation of online discussion boards offering a glimpse of what might come. While I have very mixed feelings about the omnipresence of digital technology in our lives, I am glad that we can harness it for good purposes such as this one.

Once again, here are more past blog articles that I’ve posted to SafeHarbor:

• Not “Set for Life”: Boomers facing layoffs, discrimination, and bullying at work (2012) (link here)
• Are calls for resilience and “grit” an indirect form of victim shaming & blaming? (2016, rev. 2019 & 2022) (link here)
• Typing your workplace culture (2009; rev. 2022) (link here)
• Music as therapy (2021) (link here)
• On the social responsibilities of writers (2019) (link here)
• Myths and realities about working in the non-profit sector (2014) (link here)
• Let’s follow an Eightfold Path to psychologically healthy workplaces (2019) (link here)
• Dealing with “gatekeepers” at work: Beware of Dr. No (2011; rev. 2020) (link here)
• “How can I make a living doing workplace anti-bullying work?” (2019) (link here)
• Five signs of the eliminationist instinct in today’s workplaces (2015) (link here)

Using scholarship to make a difference

I’ve been spending large chunks of recent weekends working away on a law review article about therapeutic jurisprudence (TJ), the school of legal thought that examines the therapeutic and anti-therapeutic properties of laws, legal systems, and legal institutions. In this article I’m trying to pull together many aspects of TJ as a field of study, scholarship, and practice. As steady readers of this blog may know, I’ve been deeply involved in the TJ community for many years. TJ’s emphasis on the psychological impact of the law and the importance of human dignity has strongly shaped my own thinking and scholarship.

When I first became a law professor, I was skeptical about the potential of legal scholarship to influence law reform. My intention was to do scholarship in sufficient volume and quality to earn tenure, and then to pursue writing and activist projects that didn’t involve lots of citations and footnotes.

But my final law review article before going up for tenure was my first piece about the legal implications of workplace bullying, “The Phenomenon of ‘Workplace Bullying’ and the Need for Status-Blind Hostile Work Environment Protection,” published by the Georgetown Law Journal in 2000. (Go here for free pdf.) The response to that article helped to persuade me that scholarship can make a difference in the real world. And so I continue to go at it.

In the meantime, I’ve also written two law review articles that dig into the practice of legal scholarship and how it can be used to engage in law and policy reform activities.

The first article is “Therapeutic Jurisprudence and the Practice of Legal Scholarship,” published by the University of Memphis Law Review in 2010. (Go here for free pdf.) Here’s the abstract describing it:

The culture of legal scholarship has become preoccupied with article placement, citations, and download numbers, thus obscuring a deeper appreciation for the contributions of scholarly work. This article proposes that therapeutic jurisprudence (“TJ”), a theoretical framework that examines the therapeutic and anti-therapeutic properties of the law and legal practice, provides us with tools for understanding and changing that culture.

More prescriptively, the article applies a TJ lens to: (1) identify a set of good practices for legal scholarship; (2) examine the TJ movement as an example of healthy scholarly practice; (3) consider the role of law professors as intellectual activists; and, (4) propose that law schools nurture a scholar-practitioner orientation in their students to help them become more engaged members of the legal profession.

As law review articles go, it’s a fairly brisk piece that covers a lot of ground about the culture of scholarship in American legal education and proposes ways to make the practice of legal scholarship more genuine and attentive to addressing challenges of law and policy.

The second article is “Intellectual Activism and the Practice of Public Interest Law,” published by the Southern California Review of Law and Social Justice in 2016. (Go here to freely download a pdf of the article.) Here’s the abstract describing it:

Intellectual activism is both a philosophy and a practice for engaging in scholarship relevant to real-world problems and challenges, putting its prescriptions into action, and learning from the process and results of implementation. In the legal context, intellectual activism involves conducting and publishing original research and analysis and then applying that work to the tasks of reforming and improving the law, legal systems, and the legal profession. This article explores the concept and practice of intellectual activism for the benefit of interested law professors, lawyers, and law students.

This is a very personal piece, grounded in extensive scholarly, public education, and advocacy work that I have done in two areas: (1) fostering the enactment of workplace anti-bullying legislation and building public awareness of the phenomenon of bullying at work; and (2) participating in an emerging legal and social movement to challenge the widespread, exploitative practice of unpaid internships. It also discusses my involvement in multidisciplinary networks and institutions that have nurtured my work, examines the relevant use of social media, and provides examples of how law students can function as intellectual activists. This article closes with an Appendix containing a short annotated bibliography of books that are broadly relevant to the topics discussed in the text.

This is a somewhat longer piece, as it goes into considerable detail about how legal scholarship can be harnessed to engage in law reform activities. I discuss my scholarly and advocacy work concerning workplace bullying and unpaid internships as illustrations of intellectual activism. For those seeking guidance and inspiration on how to translate ideas into action, this article may be useful.

In my last blog post of 2019, I suggested that we should make 2020 a year of working on solutions and responses. This world is a very fractured and divisive place right now, and a lot of people are hurting as a result. For me, writing — of both the scholarly and popular varieties — is a way of answering my own call to action. It is a modest but hopefully meaningful path toward lighting candles amidst the darkness.

On the social responsibilities of writers

(Photo by DY, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston)

I’d like to take a Sunday dive into the nature of writing to fuel positive individual and social change. This may be especially relevant to readers who write about fostering psychologically healthier workplaces that are free from bullying, mobbing, and abuse.

The writing bug bit me a long time ago. I can trace it back to being an editor and reporter for my college and law school newspapers. More recently, I’ve been blogging for over 10 years and writing academic articles and book chapters for over 25 years. In addition, over the decades, I’ve written dozens of other shorter pieces, op-ed columns, and newsletter articles.

Over this long span of time, I’ve tried to be responsible about what I put out there for public consumption, however modest that readership might be at times. I have debated and argued with editors about how certain information is characterized. For the briefest of pieces, I have sometimes spent hours tweaking sentences and paragraphs. When writing about legal matters, I have tried to exercise care and clarity in how I discuss ideas and concepts relating to the law and the need for reform.

But I confess that only within the past few years have I started to regard writing for a public audience as a more sacred responsibility that requires close consideration of how my words will be received. That understanding has come about mainly via reader feedback to this blog, especially from those who have been experiencing workplace bullying or mobbing. On several occasions, I have received e-mails or comments from readers, saying that my writings helped to save their lives, mostly by giving them validating knowledge and understanding about the nature and effects of work abuse, and sometimes by giving them ideas for how to address their respective situations.

Of course, I do not assume that all readers pore over my words with close scrutiny. After all, for better or worse, especially during the digital age, we’ve become used to skimming more than reading. Furthermore, as I sometimes chide my professorial colleagues when we’re whining about students not paying sufficient attention to our golden insights, we shouldn’t expect them to await our every word with breathless anticipation.

Nevertheless, when someone shares with you that your writings have been validating and even life-saving, then it’s time to sit up straight and grasp the potential power of the written word. Those of us who are writing about work abuse need to comprehend that at least some of our readers may be experiencing terrible mistreatment at work and suffering greatly as a result. For me, this includes, among other things:

• Keeping in mind a readership of bullying/mobbing targets when I write about this topic;
• Avoiding any suggestion that work abuse situations lend themselves to easy, one-size-fits-all responses and solutions;
• Staying away from use of clickbait-type titles that promise more than the article delivers; and,
• Maintaining a Need Help? resource page on my blog (link here).

This doesn’t mean that I’m going to get it right every time. I’ve written over 1,700 pieces for this blog, and some of them have fallen well short of excellence — or even very good. Especially during my earlier years of blogging, some of my posts were unnecessarily punchy or facile in tone. Within the past few years, however, I feel like I’ve found my “blogging voice” in a way that presents my most authentic self.

We badly need writing that embraces authenticity, careful judgment and analysis, and the speaking of truth to power, at a time when the Powers That Be aren’t listening closely enough. Words that endure are more valuable than those whose relevance disappears within a news cycle. In this spirit, I hope that fellow writers who are devoted to making the world a better place are also finding their best voices to enlighten us.

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A quick P.S. about Twitter: I know lots of people who use Twitter very effectively. And some have graciously used Twitter to share posts from this blog. However, I’ve avoided opening a Twitter account. For me, writing in 280 character (or less) blocs, and paying attention to the same, is not my preferred form of engagement. Furthermore, it tempts a more biting side of my sense of humor that is best reserved for friends. 

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