UO Public Relations has begun forwarding a revised statement from President Frohnmayer regarding the Student Insurgent. What follows is directly from a forwarded email:

Dave Frohnmayer has made an addition to his original statement (sent 4/26/06) and we want to make sure that all constituency groups receive the updated statement. You’ll see a double asterisk (**) at the beginning and end of the paragraph that was added.

The student publication, The Insurgent, recently published content of offensive nature in their publication. We have received numerous inquires about the publication and the offensive content. Below is the President’s response to these inquires and a copy of the letter to the editor the President submitted on April 12, to the daily student newspaper, the Oregon Daily Emerald.

Statement/response by President Frohnmayer

Thank you for your note about the student publication, The Insurgent. I share your concern about the offensive nature of the content contained within the publication.

I understand why it may seem as if the University should have prevented publication or should take some action against those responsible for the publication. The Student Insurgent is not owned, controlled or published by the University of Oregon and is funded with student fees. Therefore, the University cannot exercise editorial control over its content.

**Further, neither the University itself, nor the Associated Students of the University of Oregon, can exercise control over content by using a threat of removal of fee support. The U.S. Supreme Court has spoken on this matter. The Rosenberger and Southworth opinions restrict a public university’s ability to make decisions about incidental fee allocations on the basis of the content or viewpoint expressed by a recognized student group. Simply put, neither content nor viewpoint is a lawful basis for denying an allocation of incidental fees to a student group.**

The best response to offensive speech often is more speech. Wednesday, April 12, the daily student newspaper, the Oregon Daily Emerald, published the enclosed letter from me reminding the campus community of the need to engage in responsible civic dialogue. I am strongly opposed to speech that makes individuals feel that they or their beliefs are unwelcome or belittled, and I can assure you I will use all permissible means to respond to publications such as the recent Insurgent.

————

April 12, 2006

To the editor:

We are again called upon to explore the tension between the rights born from the constitutional protection of freedom of speech and the sometimes offensive content protected under this umbrella. I applaud the Emerald’s April 6 editorial calling on the campus media to strive for an educated, civil dialogue concerning significant ideas and current events.

While I am an ardent supporter of free speech, I also have strong beliefs that this freedom should be exercised with maturity and good judgment. Our campus community, including our media, must be part of a civil dialogue that respects the rights and beliefs of our entire campus community even while it questions and challenges some of those beliefs.

As stated thoughtfully in the Emerald’s own editorial, our media should not focus on creating controversy for controversy’s sake, but should instead seek to raise significant societal issues in ways that promote campus debate rather than making individuals feel that they or their beliefs are unwelcome and belittled.

Sincerely,

Dave
Frohnmayer

President

In my opinion Frohnmayer should have cited Southworth (and Rosenberger) when the outrage started to build, not now after it has reached a crescendo. Hell, he should have mentioned it last year when the Commentator faced defunding due to a penis joke.

This entry was posted on Friday, May 19th, 2006 at 17:06 by Ian and is filed under Insurgent, Law, Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.