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| A “McCarthyite Backlash” Against Pro-Palestine Speech: From university disciplinary hearings to death threats, supporters of Palestinian rights are facing a wave of reprisals. —Jewish Currents, October 20, 2023. Rick Friedman / Alamy Stock Photo: Students rally for Palestine at Harvard University on October 14th, 2023. |
First, Fourteenth, speech freedom laws—a speaker’s
Right to let words fly like leaves from trees, and now new
Edited 19th century pro- anti- Protestant, Catholic is back
Excoriating religions, their people, morphed to
Swarms of crowds, anti- pro- Palestine, Israel, a revived
Partisan diatribe, a pugnacious polemic
Energized by freedom of speech, guns, flags, politicians
Elected to lance wise trees, plant dissent, grow weeds of disquiet,
Champion division and decomposition—while vultures
Hover over words, freedoms, human rights, and
Instantly Wall Street funders plunge down to scarf
Numerous dollars, from universities, they gave, yes,
Donated, but today want to scavenge back, yes
Adamantly against “free” speech they don’t approve…
Names spattered, posted, across media, a strings-attached
Generosity, employment conditional on proscribed screed
Engineered, implanted, into young minds, those abundant in
Rallies on world streets, for freedom. For truly free speech.
Lavinia Kumar’s recent poems appear (or will soon) in Poets Choice, Kelsey Review, Schuylkill Valley Journal, MacQueen’s Quinterly, New Jersey Journal of Poetry, Tiny Seed.