Call it what you will ‘mdash; ironic, irresponsible or just baselessly authoritarian ‘mdash; the bottom line is that committee members appointed to redraft UCSD’s speech policy are clueless as to why our campus even needs the policy overhaul, and are ignorant to the methodology of the committee itself.
Inspiring confidence in her commitment to free speech and transparency, committee chair Sally Brainerd forbade the Guardian editorial board from observing the committee’s Wednesday meeting ‘mdash; despite requests from the three student representatives and Associate Vice Chancellor of Student Life Gary R. Ratcliff to the contrary. When faced with the Brown Act ‘mdash; which demands transparency for public boards ‘mdash; Brainerd and committee member Harvey Goldman insisted that the committee was ‘closed’ and thus exempt from the law. However, according to campus counsel Daniel Park, ‘There is no campus policy regarding the attendance of public observers at advisory committee meetings. Whether public observers are permitted or not is up to the discretion of the committee.’
Brainerd’s choice was clear.
More importantly, committee members don’t seem to know why they’re revising the policy in the first place. As of yet, no one on the committee has provided a legitimate reason for the university’s two-year push to change the on-campus speech policy (the most common answer being ‘I don’t know’).
While it’s true that current guidelines, which have been in place for nearly 30 years, are muddy and confusing, the answer is not to draft another draconian and ultimately superfluous document. Rather, administrators need to drop the paternal pretense and stop trying to craft their own meaning of free speech ‘mdash; because, frankly, the Constitution has sufficed for centuries.
Administrators are concerned that overzealous students will disturb UCSD’s comfortably bland climate. They’d rather seize our loudspeakers and camping gear, encouraging protest in the form of written requests and endless meetings ‘mdash; but that shouldn’t fly in a learning environment, where ideas are supposed to be freely exchanged.
The policy is arbitrary. The ability to express our ideas ‘mdash; whether through a loudspeaker or in the form of a three-day sit-in ‘mdash; should be preserved both for the sake of protecting our constitutional rights and our campus’ intellectual growth.
The definition of free speech is pretty simple. Alterations, be they in the form of restricting amplifiers, banning campouts or creating decibel limits, undermine the principles of free expression on which higher education should be founded. Over the two years that have been spent on policy revision, only one point remains clear: The university is using this opportunity to pick and choose what and whom they’d like to regulate.
And evidently, the committee’s student representatives are being bulldozed by malevolent administrators like Brainerd.
Undergraduate representative Erin Brodwin and graduate representative Benjamin Balthaser explained the process: Administrators and students are coming together with two very different ideas of what the policy should be, and are forced to compromise. But how can the resulting policy protect free speech when it’s so saturated with polarized interests?
Freedom of speech is our indispensable right, and unfortunately, we can’t trust this haphazard committee to preserve it. Students must keep a close watch on the committee’s actions and attend the public meetings until administrators realize they don’t supercede the law ‘mdash; or the Constitution.