MSU officials violate the anti-discrimination policy
You belong to an anti-war group that has invited a speaker to campus. The speaker’s presentation is disrupted by members of a conservative student group to the point where police have to be called and arrests made.
But some months later, the university’s Office for Inclusion and Intercultural Initiatives sends you a summons listing charges by unnamed students that you and other members of your group have violated the university’s anti-discrimination policy. You are summoned to a meeting that constitutes “official university business” to answer these charges.
The letter informing you of these charges states that you have violated the policy “in some way.” The office refuses repeatedly to list any facts of time, place or circumstance of such violations or how you were involved in any discriminatory acts. They do catalog, however, that you have discriminated against people based on national origin, political persuasion, gender orientation, gender identity, race, religion and … weight.
Finally, the letter also is sent to four other named individuals, two organizations and who knows how many assorted university officials.
If this seems troubling, let’s add one more detail and one correction: the incident is true, but it happened Oct. 4 to two conservative groups who invited a speaker to talk about illegal immigration the previous spring.
The faculty advisers to the two groups, the MSU College Republicans and Young Americans for Freedom, were easily swept up in the allegations. But neither is prone to faint in the face of the hypocrisy of liberals or the violation of due process rights that liberals often seem to care about only when they involve people with whom they agree.
The failure in this matter to include even the most basic safeguards against casual or malicious defamation can be laid at the feet of the Office for Inclusion and Intercultural Initiatives.
The further failure to honor the privacy of people subject to such malicious and defamatory accusations is something the university attorneys need to look at and correct. Speaking among friends, isn’t it worthwhile to avoid the inevitable multimillion-dollar defamation suits that the university will just have to swallow hard and pay up on? (Students, of course, will pay the bill later in higher tuition and fees.)
In the meantime, write or call your favorite media outlet, your most trusted legal eagles, or your closest university official, president or trustee to express your opinion. We really, really are about free speech!
And if you have still more time on your hands, ask the university Office for Inclusion and Intercultural Initiatives how to file a complaint alleging that someone you don’t like or don’t agree with has violated the university’s anti-discrimination policy.
William Allen
Young Americans for Freedom adviser
Frederick Fico
MSU College Republicans
Published on Thursday, October 18, 2007
Comments
J. Edward Tremlett
10/18/07 @ 9:49pm
Woot! Go Office for Inclusion and Intercultural Initiatives!
Right Wing Scum doesn’t smash itself!
Steve
10/18/07 @ 11:39pm
The second-person approach this letter starts with really makes it tough to follow. If it was written better then I’d care. Wait no I wouldn’t, it’s about YAF.
J. Edward Tremlett
10/18/07 @ 11:57pm
Well, in all seriousness, they’re trying to point out that if it could happen to them, it could happen to anyone. And that IS a good point. Pity it wasn’t a well-written letter – its point’s probably been obscured to most readers by dint of confusion.
Mike
10/19/07 @ 1:30am
Our conflicting ideologies aside, it doesn’t seem that many MSU students or faculty would care much about this issue. Might have been helpful to actually enumerate what rules/precedents were violated by the OIII.
It may also be helpful to appeal to an emotional response from the readers. Mr. Bristow seems to be an expert on this.
Ben
10/19/07 @ 7:54am
YAF are heroes. Don’t give up the fight!
Bill S Preston, Esq
10/19/07 @ 9:53am
Seriously, do the headline writers for this newspaper even read any of the content they’re headlining? Incorrectly headlined articles and letters have become commonplace.
On another note:
You belong to a psychotic right wing group on campus. You invite a racist who promotes violence against Mexicans to campus. You bill him as a hero. Then you wonder why you get in trouble with the anti-discrimination police. Then you realize you are a jackass. Then you make up some weird argument about how it wouldn’t happen to “the other side” in your fucked up bifurcated world. Then you feel better, having convinced yourself that you are not a jackass and no longer need to reevaluate your world view.
Right wing scum doesn’t trip itself! Or does it?
Tom T
10/19/07 @ 9:56am
Just because I am a racist, it doesn’t make my racist views invalid, does it? Oh my gosh! It does! What am I doing with my life?
Jason Van Dyke
10/19/07 @ 11:23am
I am going to enjoy every minute of MSU being taken to the cleaners in what will likely be a massive federal lawsuit. They messed with the wrong conservatives. But I think that YAF and the CRs step this up a notch because this is tantamount to a declaration of war. As well as the university as a whole, YAF and the MSU CRs should band together and sue every student and faculty member that filed a complaint and individually sue all of the university officials involved in this so-called “investigation.” Then, as a grand finale, go through the video footage of the Simcox event and sue the students who committed tortious acts to disrupt that event – as well as the faculty advisers of the organizations involved. Forget about MSU’s internal kangaroo court. Its a joke! Now is the time for YAF and the CRs to take these Stalinists to real court.
KKKyle Bristow
10/19/07 @ 11:33am
Jason,
Soldier On. Zieg Heil, crap I mean SLWS!
Conrad
10/19/07 @ 11:54am
What is it that MSU did wrong? I’m having trouble following along…if they received reports of wrong doing…they are supposed to follow up. They summon these people to a meeting to discuss it…providing a time and place to respond to the charges. Seems fair…seems like due process.
If this is in fact different from the way that they treat “liberal” groups on campus…then there is grounds for a complaint…but just because they investigated a situation that was brought to their attention doesn’t necessarily mean they were wrong.
If MSU did something wrong, they deserve to get punished, and i hope someone does.
Alex
10/19/07 @ 12:48pm
Well I completely agreed with you in the article… until you made the unsupported, ignorant, insulting, hypocritical, and incorrect statement about liberals not caring about the due process of those they disagree with (see ACLU supporting the NAZIs in Skokie among other things). After I read that statement, for some reason I stopped caring about their situation as much.
In the future, if you want to raise public outcry about an issue, try not to alienate over half of campus.
TM
10/19/07 @ 1:21pm
First, Nate Sherman proves he can’t string two thoughts into a coherent sentence. Now we have two other conservative dolts who produce one of the most convoluted letters to the editor I have seen in a long time. My God are there no ultra-conservative, fascist English majors, with a victim-complex and a stick up their ???
Joe
10/19/07 @ 1:36pm
Yeah I’m sure the huge institution is really scared about a long and drawn out litigation battle with YAF. I know YAF members (correction: their parents) must have money since they’re a Republican group and everything, but I’m pretty sure MSU has more and a stronger legal team. One question for YAF members, if you don’t like how “liberal’ MSU is, why don’t you go somewhere else like Bob Jones University?
RDW
10/19/07 @ 1:40pm
First, I would like to point out that from a legal standpoint the University has been cracking down on several things recently.
Secondly, I find it highly suspect that no details of the alleged transgressions were given. Maybe not in the letter, but I think even YAF is aware of how a phone works. They have people in these offices to answer questions like that.
Mike
10/19/07 @ 3:01pm
Jason, does this mean MSU is a hate group now?
Jason Van Dyke
10/19/07 @ 3:14pm
MSU has been beaten before. So has U of M. There is quite a bit of precedent, in Michigan, for this type of thing. I think it would be rather easy to prove that MSU’s Anti-Discrimination Policy is blatantly unconstitutional. The fact that they have launched an investigation of two conservative groups while taking no action against a number of students arrested on some very serious charges shows their bias. What they did wrong is simple: they launched an investigation of activities that are clearly protected under the 1st Amendment. Since they cannot legally punish such activity, the only plausible reason for the investigation is to harass.
I do find it rather interesting that not many people who have responded have picked up on the fact that those who wrote the letter to the editor are MSU Faculty – one of them a dean emeritus.
Jason Van Dyke
10/19/07 @ 3:18pm
As for Joe’s comment, nothing could be further from the truth. A lawsuit like this would likely be handled by experienced attorneys working for a non-profit organization dedicated to fighting just this kind of behavior by far left institutions like MSU. A very similar case regarding anti-discrimination policies was decided in 1989 – in Michigan. Take a look at this link:
http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/cas/comm/free_speech/doe.html
V.I. Lenin
10/19/07 @ 4:18pm
Viva Left Wingers, SMASH RIGHT WING SCUM!
also, YAF is bringing Nick Griffin of the British National Party, a neo-fascist party in the UK. Griffin is also a holocaust denier.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_Griffin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_National_Party
from the spartan spectator:
Nick Griffin to Speak at MSU!For Immediate Release:
October 16, 2007
For More Information:
Kyle Bristow
Chairman,
MSU Young Americans for Freedom
(xxx) xxx-xxxx
yaf@msu.edu
MSU-YAF to Host Nick Griffin of the British Nationalist Party
Griffin will Speak about how Islam is Taking Over Europe
East Lansing, Mich. – Nick Griffin, the chairman of the British Nationalist Party, will give speech at Michigan State University on the issue of how Europe is rapidly becoming Eurabia. He will be speaking on October 26, from 7 to 9 p.m. The university has not yet assigned the lecture hall where he will give his speech.
Ryan
10/19/07 @ 5:06pm
What do you expect? MSU is a low-quality state school anyways.
By the way, why does this Jason Van Dyke keep posting stuff? Didn’t he already graduate and go to some bottom-ranked law school? Jason…get a life. You’re like the loser who goes to high-school parties while in college. If you were even doing well as an attorney, you wouldn’t have the time or interest to spend on stupid college activism in Michigan. Grow up dude.
Mike
10/19/07 @ 6:23pm
“I do find it rather interesting that not many people who have responded have picked up on the fact that those who wrote the letter to the editor are MSU Faculty – one of them a dean emeritus.” —Jason Van Dyke
I did pick that up – it’s quite obvious that the letter-writers are not YAF students, considering that they did not call for for illegal immigrants to be hung. But more to the point: why should it matter what rank they hold or have held?
MSUinFLA
10/19/07 @ 8:35pm
Well, I hope the MSU Police Department has their Tasers charged up…
J. Edward Tremlett
10/20/07 @ 7:52am
“I do find it rather interesting that not many people who have responded have picked up on the fact that those who wrote the letter to the editor are MSU Faculty – one of them a dean emeritus.”
This letter speaks rather poorly of their communication skills.
Anyway, what are you doing here, Jason? I thought you were recuperating from an infection that was so bad you had to take down all your websites for “security purposes” before going into the hospital, and wouldn’t get around to putting them back up until mid-2008?
But here you are…
Xavier
10/20/07 @ 7:14pm
God bless YAF for bringing Nick Griffin to campus. It is time the people hear the truth about Islam.
Sarah
10/20/07 @ 8:33pm
The YAF is bringing Griffin to our campus? He is a fascist. MSU obviously supports hate speech.
Why didn’t the State News report that YAF is bringing Griffin to campus?
Christopher W. Chase
10/21/07 @ 2:42am
Not the best writing for their cause, for sure. One would think that all allegations from University offices would require substantiation, regardless of the group being targeted. Is YAF a hate group? Most certainly. But as the courts have held time and again, speech enjoys much more protection in a university than in society at large, since the point of a university is education and reasoned learning. If anyone’s due process rights are being violated, then it needs to be investigated. It is too bad the author’s own screed against “liberals” reveals their own biases—otherwise some progressives might join them in this particular fight.
Jake
10/21/07 @ 11:17am
We are going to protest YAF at their Griffin event. People like Griffin shouldn’t be allowed to speak on campus.
J. Edward Tremlett
10/21/07 @ 12:35pm
Uh, hold up – that last post was NOT me. I wonder who posted that?
Anyway, if you didn’t feel like going to wikipedia, here’s what they had to say about Nick Griffin:
Griffin has made statements that deny the existence of the Holocaust and has made anti-Semitic remarks.
In issue 12 of the BNP publication The Rune (see above) he called the Holocaust “the Holohoax” and criticized the Holocaust denier David Irving for admitting in an interview that up to four million Jews might have died in the Holocaust. Griffin wrote: “True Revisionists will not be fooled by this new twist to the sorry tale of the Hoax of the Twentieth Century.” [3][4][5] Griffin was eventually prosecuted for his articles in The Rune (see below).
In 1997 he told an undercover journalist that he had updated Richard Verrall’s Holocaust denial book Did Six Million Really Die?. He also described his former MP, Alex Carlile, QC, who had reported The Rune to the police, as “this bloody Jew… whose only claim is that his grandparents died in the Holocaust.”[5]
In the same year he wrote a pamphlet, “Who Are The Mindbenders”, which alleged that a cabal of Jews controlled the British media, “providing us with an endless diet of pro-multiracial, pro-homosexual, anti-British trash.” [6]
In his defence during his 1998 prosecution (see below), Griffin said: “I am well aware that the orthodox opinion is that six million Jews were gassed and cremated and turned into lampshades. Orthodox opinion also once held that the world is flat … I have reached the conclusion that the ‘extermination’ tale is a mixture of Allied wartime propaganda, extremely profitable lie, and latter witch-hysteria.”[7]
His more recent public stance in this area is illustrated by the section “It’s all a Zionist scam” in his 2005 article “Dealing with Peak Oil Criticisms”. The BNP currently has a Jewish councillor, Patricia Richardson, and has stated that it has Jewish members.[8]
——
Charming fellow – anti-Islam AND anti-Jew.
YAF members trolling this thread (and possibly pretending to be other posters) do you stand by your speaker?
Jesus
10/21/07 @ 2:13pm
Nick Griffin will smash left-wing scum when he comes to MSU.
Mary and Joseph
10/21/07 @ 2:25pm
Jesus…We’re ashamed of you. LOVE THY NEIGHBOR!!!!
God
10/21/07 @ 3:14pm
Son, you are so grounded. Go to you room and think about what you did!
Satan
10/21/07 @ 3:54pm
Vote Democrat.
Santiago Rolento
10/21/07 @ 5:01pm
Antifascism forever!
Come to the anti-BNP rally:
http://msu.facebook.com/event.php?eid=5652788601
We will hold an event on the nature of the BNP and how it relates to the increasing ultranationalism and xenophobia that affects both America and Europe.
J. Edward Tremlett
10/22/07 @ 7:57am
(okay, someone removed the poster who was pretending to be me. Thank you, moderator)
Erin
10/22/07 @ 10:47pm
Finally! It’s about damn time the university starts taking steps to protect oppressed students from hate on campus!
Chris
10/23/07 @ 1:47pm
“You invite a racist who promotes violence against Mexicans to campus.”
No one has been brought to speak on this campus by any group that I have been affiliated with that has advocated illegal and unjust violence towards any individual based on race, nationality, sex, or sociopolitical religious viewpoint.
With the exception of a US Army Colonel who wasn’t advocating, just recounting.
david
10/25/07 @ 4:06pm
for a complete look at what white-supremacist, racist thugs Nick Griffin and the British National Party are, go to: www.maws.wordpress.com and click on “who are nick griffin and the British National Party”. That is sure to clear up any confusion as to whether YAF has brought straight up fascists to campus. in case you were wondering but didn’t want to visit the blog, they did and they are:)
erin
10/25/07 @ 6:52pm
Word to the “wise” YAF and CR groups. As a member of an antiwar group we have been silenced and even watched inside the group. We protested in peace, never broke any laws and yet we were considered a threat to society not even a couple of years ago. Members were arrested at a peaceful protest and charged with inciting a riot (video evidence showed otherwise). Undercover agents came in and kept files on all our members. Perhaps you guys should start watching out cause in all reality neither the right or left are correct. Even more so since your beloved group is listed as a hate group. Plus anything you put on the internet will be saved and used against you at a later date…I’m sure you guys know that by now though.
vote ron paul