bobbyw24
12-26-2011, 12:56 PM
Who cares? This school has a great football program and ain't that wut college is all about?
When someone complained about a student’s Ron Paul poster in his dorm room window this fall, Auburn University in Alabama had the opportunity to take a principled stand for free speech. Of course, since we’re dealing with a university, you can probably guess that it instead chose to double down on an unwise, needlessly restrictive, and unfairly enforced policy at odds with the spirit of the First Amendment.
Auburn undergrad Eric Philips probably thought he wasn’t doing anything particularly noteworthy when he hung a banner supporting Representative Ron Paul’s presidential candidacy in his residence hall window. ’Tis the eve of election season, after all. On November 7, however, Philips’s hall director ordered him to remove the banner from his window — an order with which Philips complied. A housing administrator explained to Philips Auburn’s policy (new this year) on window postings, which states that “Hanging or displaying items such as flags, banners, decals, or signs out of or obstructing residence hall windows is prohibited.”
Yet Auburn was not swayed. Instead, Assistant Vice President for Student Affairs Amy Hecht’s reply to FIRE failed to acknowledge its selective policy enforcement, while maintaining that Auburn was “committed to the consistent and nondiscriminatory enforcement of this policy.” This represents a missed opportunity for Auburn, and one which puts it out of step with America’s understanding of free speech. As the Supreme Court famously wrote in Healy v. James (1972), “the vigilant protection of constitutional freedoms is nowhere more vital than in the community of American schools.”
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2011/12/22/whos-afraid-of-ron-paul-apparently-auburn-university/#ixzz1hfWJ3vLX
When someone complained about a student’s Ron Paul poster in his dorm room window this fall, Auburn University in Alabama had the opportunity to take a principled stand for free speech. Of course, since we’re dealing with a university, you can probably guess that it instead chose to double down on an unwise, needlessly restrictive, and unfairly enforced policy at odds with the spirit of the First Amendment.
Auburn undergrad Eric Philips probably thought he wasn’t doing anything particularly noteworthy when he hung a banner supporting Representative Ron Paul’s presidential candidacy in his residence hall window. ’Tis the eve of election season, after all. On November 7, however, Philips’s hall director ordered him to remove the banner from his window — an order with which Philips complied. A housing administrator explained to Philips Auburn’s policy (new this year) on window postings, which states that “Hanging or displaying items such as flags, banners, decals, or signs out of or obstructing residence hall windows is prohibited.”
Yet Auburn was not swayed. Instead, Assistant Vice President for Student Affairs Amy Hecht’s reply to FIRE failed to acknowledge its selective policy enforcement, while maintaining that Auburn was “committed to the consistent and nondiscriminatory enforcement of this policy.” This represents a missed opportunity for Auburn, and one which puts it out of step with America’s understanding of free speech. As the Supreme Court famously wrote in Healy v. James (1972), “the vigilant protection of constitutional freedoms is nowhere more vital than in the community of American schools.”
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2011/12/22/whos-afraid-of-ron-paul-apparently-auburn-university/#ixzz1hfWJ3vLX