At Johns Hopkins University, around 600 copies of The Carrollton Record, the school's conservative student paper, "went missing", reports the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE). Shortly thereafter, school administrators confiscated hundreds more copies of the conservative paper:
[The Carrollton Record's] May issue contained an article objecting to a recent campus appearance by pornographic film director Chi Chi LaRue. The cover photo pictured LaRue along with members of JHU's Diverse Sexuality and Gender Alliance (DSAGA) student group, which hosted the event. The pictured DSAGA members were apparently displeased to see their pictures on the newspaper's front page, and some have filed harassment charges against TCR staffers.
On May 14, approximately 600 copies of TCR that had been distributed to the library the previous day went missing. TCR editor Jered Ede attempted to report the theft, but told FIRE that a security officer and the Dean of Student Life both said that the missing papers did not constitute theft. Ede then learned that TCR would no longer be allowed to distribute in dorms and that administrators had confiscated 300 copies. Previously, TCR and numerous other publications--including the liberal Hopkins Donkey--had regularly been distributed in JHU dorms, some of which even have distribution racks expressly for this purpose.
TCR staffers contacted FIRE, which wrote in protest to JHU president William Brody on May 19. JHU counsel Frederick Savage defended JHU's actions by saying that student publications are subject to the posting policy, which demands that posters and fliers be approved by the Office of Residential Life before being posted in dorms. Savage wrote to FIRE, "Although it is not explicitly stated in the policy, by long standing practice the Office of Residential Life has applied the [posting] policy to student publications."
"This is a shocking and disturbing admission, if true," commented Lukianoff. "Not only would such a policy subject student newspapers to prior official review, but it appears to have been selectively enforced to silence unpopular opinions. By granting its officials the unfettered power to 'approve' newspapers, JHU is giving them the power to arbitrarily censor."
This sort of thing is all too common, unfortunately. We'll be covering more about campus newspaper thefts in our upcoming film, Indoctrinate U.
13 Jun 2006 @ 11:32pm