Neil Gaiman Helps Save Free Speech At The University Of Wisconsin

Brendan Connelly of Bleeding Cool reported yesterday on the case of University of Wisconsin professor James Miller. Miller was targeted by Stout, Wisconsin police chief, Lisa Walter, over his choice to hang a poster of Nathan Fillion, as Firefly‘s Mal Reynolds, outside his office door. This is the poster in question:

More on the police chief’s rationale and how censorship was defeated after the jump.

According to FIRE, The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, Miller approached their organization for assistance after the following sequence of events:

On September 16, 2011, Stout’s police chief removed a poster with a picture of Firefly actor Nathan Fillion and a quotation from the show from outside the office door of Professor James Miller. The police officer stated that the poster was unacceptable because it “refer[red] to killing” and “can be interpreted as a threat by others.” Days later, the same officer removed another posting outside Miller’s door that read “Warning: Fascism” and mockingly stated that “Fascism can cause blunt head trauma and/or violent death.” The university’s threat assessment team was activated by the posters despite their obviously satirical content, and Miller’s academic dean called him in to discuss the threat assessment team’s “concerns.”

FIRE’s advocacy campaign led Neil Gaiman, Nathan Fillion and Adam Baldwin to take to Twitter on behalf of Professor Miller. FIRE has documented the success of their advocacy efforts in this short video:

Certainly, no one wants to feel unsafe on their college campus, but free speech and the free exchange of ideas are the cornerstone of education. Also, in the service of pointing out where that police chief clearly abused her authority, I refer you to the words of Ben Franklin:

They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.

Lady, if you’re scared of words on a sci-fi poster, you’ve got bigger issues than supposedly “securing” your college campus. And, if you can’t get that freedom of speech is something that needs to be protected rather than made a criminal offense, then I’ll refer you to the words of one Jayne Cobb, of the crew of the Firefly class ship Serenity:

Shiny. Let’s be bad guys.