AWW21 The Price of Free Speech - Malcolm Knox and Patrick Mullins

Do Australians extend the right of free speech only to those we
agree with, saying things we approve of? In Truth is Trouble: The
Strange Case of Israel Folau, or How Free Speech Became So
Complicated, Malcolm Knox documents the curious case of how
footballer Israel Folau became the centre of our free speech
debate. Patrick Mullins’ The Trials of Portnoy: How Penguin
Brought Down Australia’s Censorship System, recounts the
pervasive literary censorship of our puritanical past, brought to
an abrupt end with Portnoy’s Complaint and Penguin’s brave
decision to publish and be damned. Malcolm and Patrick discuss
our history of censorship and today’s fraught debate around
bigotry and cancel culture.


Chaired by David Marr