Campus Informer - February 16, 2006

Confederate protests, librarian obstruction, Vagina Monologues, and more news from schools across the country.

By Annika Carlson, Hope College
Thursday February 16, 2006

And you thought that Google thing was creepy…
National

As previously reported on Campus Progress, the Department of Defense recently released a document describing eight protests against military recruiters on college campuses as “suspicious incidents.” Even more troubling, the campuses listed—including New York University, the State University of New York at Albany, Southern Connecticut State University, the City College of New York, the University of California at Santa Cruz, the University of California at Berkeley, the University of Wisconsin , and an unspecified New Jersey school—were under Defense Department surveillance to discover if planned protests were “credible threats” or not. Only one—a protest at UC Santa Cruz that involved a “gay kiss-in”—earned the “credible threat” rating. According to Inside Higher Education, the ambiguity about how the Department determined threat levels “has led some academics to question how the Pentagon gathers information on American campuses.”

Last week, Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI), after pushing the DoD to evaluate the ridiculous investigation of peaceful college protests, received a letter from the Department which he said informed him “that a small percent of reports were submitted that inappropriately dealt with demonstrations and anti-war activity rather than foreign terrorist threats.” Hopefully, the on-going investigation will eliminate the whole unnecessary spying on peaceful college students thing and let the DoD get back to that whole War on Terror thing.

Rebel yells about Rebel Yell; gets yelled at
Louisiana State University

The LSU confederate flag controversy continues—last week, Collins Phillips, student leader of last semester’s protests against the confederate flag, was charged with five violations of the school’s Code of Student Conduct. Although little information was initially released about the situation, Phillips has his theory about the sanctions: “ I can’t help but think they’re trying to silence a student.” Not exactly the best way to quiet down a campus controversy—especially since Phillips said he won’t back down and shut up.

The administration came to its senses and dropped the charges against Phillips, but not before incitingstudents against the faculty member who brought the bogus charges in the first place.

Vaginas, beware.
Notre Dame, Providence College

Presidents of Notre Dame and Providence College recently let women know where they really stand on campus—it’s ok to be a woman, but not ok to talk about it candidly. Both schools recently put the kibosh on student-produced performances of Eve Ensler’s play “The Vagina Monologues.”

Student organizers at schools across the country put on “The Vagina Monologues” around Valentine’s Day as part of V-Day, a nationwide effort to raise money and awareness to stop violence against women and girls. Proceeds from performances go to support a V-Spot campaign and to local women’s shelters or other outreach efforts.

Despite these laudable goals, the administrations at Notre Dame and Providence view the play as contrary to their schools’ Catholic values,. Providence college will prohibit the production this year, despite the fundraiser’s success in the previous four years. Notre Dame’s ban will force the performance into a classroom, instead of allowing use of the theater as in previous performances—so in addition to the lack of healthy sexual dialogue on campus, both presidents’ decisions ultimately lead to lower revenue for the fundraisers.

As both schools struggle to reconcile Catholic administrations with the values of the student body, activist groups have sprung up all over on the “Monologues” issue. United for Free Speech ND, which formed largely in response to the “Monologues” ban, is circulating a petition which urges ND president Father Jenkins “to respect freedom of speech by allowing The Vagina Monologues…to be performed in an unrestricted fashion.” And, proving that all the nuts come out of the woodwork to oppose the proliferation of women’s sexual health discussion, the American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property’s statement on the “Monologue” debate refuses to even use the downright clinical term “vagina,” instead referring to the play as the “V***** Monologues.” Unluckily for them, ignoring the word won’t eradicate those offensive vaginas from Catholic schools or make these students stop fighting for their right to talk about sexuality on campuses.

Because Facebook isn’t stalker-friendly enough
Tufts University

Tufts students with too much time and ambition on their hands launched the nation’s first mobile campus social network this month called SocialMonkey.com. Now, Tufts students can figure out where their friends are at any given time, from sites on-campus to restaurants, bars and other hangouts within 30 miles of Boston . Just using text messages, students can activate commands that let them look up the location of other registered friends, check the top three places around campus with the most people and more.

Librarian Stands Up for Rights (Quietly)
Brandeis University

Don’t listen to anyone who tells you that librarians do nothing but reshelve books—they’re also guardians of our civil liberties. Don’t believe me? Check out what went down at Brandeis, where, much to the shock of FBI officials, a librarian insisted that officials follow the law and get a warrant before trying to remove thirty computers from the school’s library.

Earlier that day, Brandeis police got an email about a potential terrorist threat to the Heller School for Social Policy and Management, which was traced to a computer in the library. Library Director Kathy Glick-Weil reported that FBI officials “tried to convince us to let them have the computer,” even though the officials had no legal documentation giving them permission to do so. In a legal but gutsy move, Glick-Weil refused to release the computers until the officials got a warrant. One police official said he was “totally disgusted” by the librarian’s actions to protect student privacy rights. Now, if only Glick-Weil was somewhere between the president and the NSA about two years ago…

Promoting the Interests of White Men Everywhere
Southern Illinois University

After being threatened with a lawsuit by the Department of Justice, SIU accepted a settlement which requires the school to open three graduate fellowships that were previously reserved for minority students to all students.

The charges were initially raised by the Center for Equal Opportunity (CEO), a group dedicated to promoting “colorblind equal opportunity and racial harmony”—mainly by eliminating things intended to help minorities, like the SIU fellowships. According to its website, CEO also advocates its supposedly pro-diversity agenda by crusading against bilingual teaching and affirmative action.

Although SIU officials are “ confident the changes will not hurt the University’s minority recruitment efforts,” it seems unlikely that eliminating the fellowship will attract diverse students.