Why Mary Anne Franks Is the Single Best First Amendment Scholar In the Country, But Why Feminism Also Needs A Huge Update From The Perspective of Game Theory, Math, and Physics

            Today's post is lengthy personal essay and book review and is about the First Amendment and feminism, and why feminist scholars like Mary Anne Franks put the entire scholarly community to shame for being simply outstanding in every conceivable way. But while I stand with Mary Anne Franks and the entirety of her new book, in my view feminism in the end should yield to other more important values, including curiosity, love, forgiveness, spirituality, and belonging, though I cannot speak for anyone other than myself, by definition, although I can call on the whole world to adopt my values, for the reasons I explain in this TLDR post below. Main point: Franks in my view should be able to go wherever she likes, but I also conclude feminism is insufficient and must be problematized from the perspective of game theory. 

A.    Frank’s Book:

I’m privileged to personally know many of the top First Amendment lawyers and scholars in the country even if I’m on my second career, and even if the biggest part of my research portfolio is now law and economics and law/math/physics. But while I was at Yale, I did the First Amendment and science, so I’ve evolved over time, though not in a Darwinian sense because to evolve in biology it takes generations. 

In my view, the top First Amendment scholar in the whole country isn’t me, which should be obvious, or any of the most established names, though she’s famous and highly well-regarded. But Professor Mary Anne Franks at GW puts the entire First Amendment community in its place, and rightly so, with her outstanding book “Fearless Speech: Breaking Free From the First Amendment.”

I’ve written love letters to Cornell, and now I’ll write one to Yale. Professor Franks, who I saw speak at Yale’s ISP to give a book talk promoting her book, shows the whole world that the First Amendment is not all that it’s cracked up to be. Why? Franks in the most original finding ever shows that the identity of the plaintiffs or parties who have been sued is hugely, that’s right, relevant, to the outcome of the case. Franks shows that people who speak truth to power are often wrongfully silenced, and in the case of women, sometimes executed at the stake like witches during the "burning period," or like Joan of Arc, who I previously discussed.

            Franks shows that throughout history many fearless women truthtellers have been slut shamed, defamed, harassed, doxxed, and terrible things have happened to them for simply speaking truth to power, or threatening powerful men. 

I’ll add my own original contribution on top of Franks and independently confirm what she says, which is that another way to silence women is to defame them, and falsely label them as crazy, or troubled, or alcoholics, or drug addicts, or suicidal, when they are not, and that’s been a power move used throughout history to silence fearless women truthtellers, even celebrities like Britney Spears. In Spears’ case, her own family wrongfully monetized Spears’ gifts after Spears acted in not-at-all crazy ways like getting naturally upset and visibly distressed after being abusively separated by her ex-husband who called the cops on Spears to prevent Spears seeing her own children, and this televised event led to an illegal guardianship that turned Spears into a mediocre performer. Spears was just better when she had total creative control over her own life because, by definition, artists and creators do better when they make their own content, and other people who second guess them do not know what’s best for them. 

Franks shows women truthtellers have also been threatened or blackmailed or had revenge porn posted to discredit them and silence them throughout history. For another great feminist First Amendment scholar and icon, I commend the scholarship of Danielle Citron at UVA to the entire universe. She’s also amazing and outstanding and writes about cyberbullying. These two scholars embody the definition of excellence, and feminism, even if I’m essentialist and they might not be, and even if they might believe in punishment and I believe in restorative justice, or they might not believe in total and complete forgiveness and redemption, and I do. Who knows? I haven’t had this discussion with either of them. 

            Franks’ book also shows that Black persons have also been silenced by and notwithstanding the First Amendment throughout history. Hopefully, the whole universe should also know that MLK was wrongfully sued for tax evasion by the IRS, and that in a little-known companion case to NYT v. Sullivan, Black ministers who were involved with the famous advertisement at issue were also wrongfully sued for defamation. Why? These Black ministers had the gall to actually do the right thing and apologize, which just shows defamation law is out of alignment if it discourages victims from getting apologies, which is partly what my article Defamation 2.0 was originally designed to facilitate. The case of the Black ministers, when consolidated with the case against the Times, was not even discussed by the Supreme Court for lack of evidence that the ministers knew what the advertisements even contained. 

Franks’ book has incredible original research and recounts stories and anecdotes that are not widely-known and Franks does not rehash old events but does outstanding original research such as a powerful opener about how Black persons were lynched and tortured all because a Black woman had the gall to say white women slept with Black men voluntarily, not through rape, and this upsetting story told by a Black woman journalist truly threatened white men in the South. I cannot summarize this anecdote well enough to do Franks justice, merely say “Buy her book!”

I’m not done with Franks’ book yet, but it’s a gripping read, and it’s powerfully and masterfully told. Though I object on principle to the word “masterful” and say it should be deleted from the dictionary as a gendered word that suggests men are rulers. Women can be masters, but the word has a gendered history, and I think to truly reflect feminism, words need to be changed, including this one. Good writing matters and in my view, Professor Franks deserves some kind of award for Fearless Speech and shout out to the entire ISP for standing up for feminists, even if I’m also an essentialist at the exact same time. 

B.    Why Even As I Fully Agree, I Respectfully Also Strongly Disagree Because Feminism Writ Large Needs to Be Problematized from the Angle of Math, Physics, and Spirituality

As should be obvious, I am a feminist, but I am also uniquely also qualified to critique Franks’s work based on my own life history and my scholarship as a game theorist and aspiring mathematician and physicist. Based on my game theory and personal life history, I can say there are other more important values than feminism and that, in my view, feminism writ large needs an “update.”  Game theory is the study of irony and paradoxes, and my entire life seem to be the study of paradoxes and moral dilemmas. And that’s why I am can say that feminism needs paradoxes and irony, and feminism needs to be problematized and updated, and new values must be added. And those values include love, mercy, redemption, and forgiveness for all involved, even Britney’s ex, and her family.  

Despite my flirtation with the First Amendment, it turns out I was put on earth to be a game theorist and destined to be a game theorist well before I even knew who John Nash was. And I personally can speak to other more important values because I was kicked out as a subject of a neuroscience research study at Dartmouth on moral dilemmas as an actual outlier, and I refer readers back to the "trolley problem" because I literally broke the bell curve for being too moral. This neuroscience study might have had issues, and I am not sure removing “outliers” from a research study to get a better result is ethical, but I am not a neuroscientist even though I had a close call with neuroscience and would have gone into neuroscience had I not been sexually harassed. But physics and game theory are simply better “fits” and I prefer hard science, which is simply “harder” to mess up.

My true calling is game theory, math, and physics, and I had to go through a through a spiritual awakening to discover this. But a person I once cared about a whole lot a lot told me his favorite movie for me was the "Wizard of Oz." And sometimes other people know us better than we know ourselves, and all one has to do is click one's magic "red ruby slippers" to understand you have everything you need all along, and always had it. "The Wizard of Oz" is also Oprah's favorite movie, and is considered by other people to be one of the best spiritual teachings of all times.   

And it turns out I've been incredibly moral all along, not simply since my spiritual awakening. I told on myself to my amazing Black woman teacher Mrs. Richardson in fourth grade when I cheated on the one and only test in my entire life I've actually cheated on because I did not know how to spell the word "believe" and looked it up in the dictionary at recess, and felt a deep sense of Catholic guilt. And while I’m not a Catholic, I believe Catholicism, which is known for guilt, has a lot to teach the world, because beneficial regret makes humans into better humans, including me, and if anyone lives a life without regrets they are either enlightened or a sociopath, and it's really important and necessary to have regrets even if humans should be able to forgive themselves and others.

And that’s why my game theory and entire life history teaches all humans can be redeemed if they want to be, including sociopaths, and there’s no person on the planet I would say is beyond redemption or forgiveness, even if guilt, grief, and regret are also healthy and highly desirable qualities to help humans learn spiritual lessons, and many great spiritual teachers believe earth is a school where all humans go to learn life lessons. 

And that’s why curiosity is so important, and perhaps my most important value of all, even above truth, justice, and fairness, and humans would never have created civilization or explored space without curiosity, and why Frank’s feminism, if it’s at the cost of female curiosity, is insufficient, and my ultimate feminist heroes, Black women mathematicians and physicists who put Neil Armstrong on the moon, the single biggest scientific accomplishment in the history of humanity, had to make some really hard judgment calls, and that probably other feminists might disagree with them, though I haven’t had a heart-to-heart with Franks so I don’t know her views on these thorny questions and they aren’t reflected in her book, which is doctrinal and is based on storytelling.   

I can say almost no woman who wants to explore space can do so without making the requisite sacrifices, and how can we (any feminist) judge female aspiring scientists who seek knowledge above absolutely all else? In my view, the parable of Adam and Eve needs to be problematized, and I call on all feminists to do so. Knowledge is priceless, and Eve herself is singlehandedly responsible for all human innovation and science, if this parable is true, and humanity could not have invented anything at all had Eve not eaten the proverbial apple she was allegedly given by the devil.

My scholarship on game theory is about spirituality above all else. And I believe God has a fantastic sense of humor, maybe existential humor, like mine. Or maybe God simply loves irony and specializes in irony. And it was ironic that Einstein, the ultimate anti-authoritarian who would never ever comply, was cursed with becoming an authority late in life. But as I explained, God is physics, and is also poetry, and is also creative writing. And some of my favorite writers of all time have been examples of irony, like Jorge Luis Borges, who was more of a philosopher than a writer. Borges’ story is ironic because he was a famous librarian and author who went blind later in life, and he's my all-time favorite writer, even if I think the author Junot Diaz who is an alleged #MeToo perpetrator is more talented with prose. 

And even if in another example of irony, I actually told Harvard Law that Borges had a famous quote about how he wished to lick more ice cream cones on his death bed and regretted his fame and success while he lay dying, and Harvard Law didn't take me off the waitlist after suggesting it would, likely because I came across as lacking in ambition. 

But I'm epically glad I went to UC Berkeley for law school because my law school classmates are salt of the earth and some of them also have degrees from Harvard University, and I think are smarter and less pretentious than some of the people I know from Harvard Law, even if I also clap for joy that Harvard in general is speaking truth to power. I hope to be salt of the earth too, even if I'm also ambitious now, and probably would not have been salt of the earth had I attended either Harvard University or Harvard Law, and it’s ironic that I’m now the most ambitious person I know, but would have been happy to be a simple, content, clinician my entire life and would never ever would have asked for more if I hadn’t been forced to by a major life event.  “Both/and.”  

In the end, my incredibly wise past self speaks, and says: “do not fight your true nature,” another personal motto of mine. And the process of leaving Cornell after being epically dumped like Junot Diaz, an incredibly complicated person who absolutely belongs, ironically forced me to be true to myself even though I fought and fought this process like “hell” and simply refused to let go. But, in the end, this process, has taught me that all humans belong, and returned me to my wise childhood self who loved roses, gardening, flowers, and yes wanted to be a physicist, and whose first memory as a toddler was about a wading pool, and trying to understand the nature of light in water. And water has super special, spiritual properties, even if it’s not my problem, meaning life’s work, and my problem instead is John Nash, and even if papers on wetness have made me shed actual tears, and learning the wave equation literally caused me to weep. 

****

And anyone who can make anyone else cry deserves forgiveness, making Franks' feminism while excellent also simultaneously not enough if it leaves anyone behind, because in my view and in the view of game theorists whose work I popularize, and in the view of MLK, no human should be left behind. And even if Franks is absolutely right on the merits of her argument and right now I rate her as the single best First Amendment scholar in the entire country and if there were justice Franks should be able to go to whatever institution and whenever she likes after this pathbreaking book, and any school, including Harvard, Columbia, Yale, Chicago, Cornell, UCLA, or wherever Franks sees fit would be lucky to say “she’s one of us, and we bagged the best deal ever.” Hiring freezes be “damned” because when a scholar this good comes along, they just don’t matter, and Franks is simply that much better than all other First Amendment scholars combined in the whole country, except for possibly Danielle Citrone, whose work also needs to be problematized, for the same reasons I explained above. 

-Cortelyou C. Kenney (9/9/25, 7:27 AM PT)

[Correction: This post earlier mistakenly said witches were burned during the Enlightenment. While that's true, it's also true that more witches were burned during the Early Modern period, and they were stoned during the Salem Witch trials, and Arthur Miller, referenced in a previous post, wrote a famous play called the Crucible about these trials. This update was made on June 9, 2025 at 11:54 am PT.]