If any of you attended the University of Illinois Homecoming Parade this past weekend, you might have noticed something: Chief Illiniwek wasn't only there is spirit.... school officials overturned a ban on any likeness of Illiniwek, an American Indian in a feathered headdress, in floats; the decision allows pictures to be used(1). Considering The Chief had his last dance the February and Illiniwek merchandise, which generates hundreds of thousands of dollars each year, is gradually being fazed out, it is surprising that the school would allow images of the Chief at a public school event(2).Preventing his image, the school decided, would be restricting free speech. "It's a freedom of speech, freedom of expression issue," university spokeswoman Robin Kaler said Sunday. "The university places great value on those two things"(1).
Chief Illiniwek has been under attack for years; many people, especially Native Americans, find our recently deceased mascot racist and offensive. Many schools face the same situation. The University of Mississippi has lost their age-old mascot too; Colonel Reb was stripped of his official mascot status and was ban from the football field. Col. Reb was deemed a relic of a racist past and the Colonel's demotion caused a controversy similar to ours(3). So are these mascots honorable and historic or racist and offensive?
This question has provoked a lot of controversy and a great deal of expressed opinions. Dan Maloney and Logan Ponce, two students who portrayed the Chief as part of the Marching Illini's halftime performance at football and basketball games, filed a law suit against the National Collegiate Athletic Association (N.C.A.A.). The N.C.A.A. was preventing our university from hosting any postseason N.C.A.A. sporting events until we got rid of The Chief. For a while, our officials stood by our Chief and this stand prevented us from hosting two low-profile postseason events. But due to mounting political pressure, the university retired the 81 year-old mascot(3) and the students lost their job. Maloney and Ponce felt that being forced to abandon their positions as chief violated, among other things, their freedom of speech and freedom of expression(2). The students filed this lawsuit in February 2007, so I don't know the outcome, but it should be interesting to see how it turns out.
The N.C.A.A. is a voluntary organization through which the nation's colleges and universities govern their athletics program, but it is not run by the government(6). If they aren't happy with us then we miss out on a lot of opportunities and potentially a lot of money, and lets face, it since we are not a private school we want that money therefore the Chief goes.
Many students were infuriated with the decision to get rid of the chief and they used good-old Facebook as their safety valve, so they created a group called "If They Get Rid of the Chief I’m Becoming a Racist”(3). As in any Facebook group people post comments for everyone to see, and don't always realize how public their comment really is. In once specific case a student wrote that “apparently the leader of this movement is of Sioux decent... the Sioux are the ones that killed off the Illini Indians [sic], so she’s just trying to finish what her ancestors started. I say we throw a tomahawk [sic] into her face” (3). Obviously this student was letting some steam off, but in the process the American Indian Studies Program faculty and staff at the Native American House took notice and publicly asked the university to ‘initiate disciplinary proceedings’ against the student who posted the comments. So in response to that, Richard Herman, our chancellor, sent an email stating he “can not and will not tolerate such violent threats. The University will take all legal and disciplinary actions available in response to the threatening messages"(3). Since the student's comments were directed at the leader of the movement but didn't automatically start a riot, it is debatable if this is fighting words or just hate speech. According to Greg Lukianoff, president of FIRE (the Philadelphia-based Foundation for Individual Rights in Education) the university was exploiting the Illiniwek situation to potentially punish speech that is protected by the First Amendment and that “this is an attempt to punish students for speech that some people found offensive under the guise of protecting students from threats"(3).
A few years before this issue went public U of I school officials had a freedom of speech issue themselves when they were told they couldn't stop faculty and students from contacting athletic recruits to discourage them from attending the school because of its American Indian mascot(5). As you can see the Chief is a hot topic, inciting all kinds of interesting 1st Amendment debates. But even through all of the debates, it's doubtful if the Chief will ever come back, so I guess we should just transform all of our frustration into energy spent creating a new mascot. We could have the Chef (the easy way out- just drop the "i"), we could be the rail splitters, or, my all time favorite, the FARM BOT.......you decide.
*Check out "An Argument for FARM BOT" on YouTube, its
hilarious --->http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUvOSwiliBg*
Sources:
1.) http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/illinois/chi-ap-il-chiefilliniwek-ho,0,7671633.story
2.)http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/tag/education/2007/02/16/
3.)http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/7759.html?PHPSESSID=.
4.)http://www.news-gazette.com/news/local/2007/02/15/ui_students_file_suit_to_save_chief
5.)http://www.freedomforum.org/templates/document.asp?documentID=13619
6.)http://www.ncaa.org/wps/portal/!ut/p/kcxml/04_Sj9SPykssy0xPLMnMz0vM0Y_QjzKLN4j3CQHJgFjGpvqRqCKOcAFvfV-P_NxU_QD9gtzQiHJHRUUAbGvNAw!!/delta/base64xml/L3dJdyEvUUd3QndNQSEvNElVRS82XzBfTFU!?CONTENT_URL=http://www2.ncaa.org/portal/about_ncaa/
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
I was reading an article online about the Chief the other day. We made the front cover of the National Report in the New York Times with all the controversy it caused. However, it seems it causes more controversy out in the world than it does on campus. I didn't hear anything on campus about what was happening with the Chief. It is very interesting to see that the school officials lifted the ban on the Chief. It almost seems like the officials did not want to get rid of the mascot and are finding an excuse to bring him back. If they think that it would prevent the students' freedom of speech then the same can be argued when they removed the mascot. It could be said that people will not be able to express their school spirit or freedom of speech if they cannot portray the Chief as mascot. I did not know about the students filing the lawsuit. I personally don't see them winning because it is not just their freedom of speech that was taken away. Also, if they argue that they took away their income or job or something along those lines, I don't think that would stand in court either since they are still young and it won't impact their future job ventures. It is hard to advocate getting rid of the Chief when there are NFL teams like the Redskins still out there. The NFL should be setting a standard by getting rid of their mascot before telling universities what to do with ours.
The New York Times article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/education/28mascot.html?_r=2&ref=us&oref=slogin&oref=slogin
I am glad you also support Farmbot. Unfortunately, I think Farmbot only has major support in Urbana. Farmbot is a great example of the positive effects of the marketplace of ideas. So many Illinois students publicly support the chief, so in response, the brilliance of Allen Hall found a solution, Farmbot. If students weren't allowed to publicly voice their opinions on the chief, Farmbot may have never been created as a rebuttal, and who could live in a world without Farmbot?
PS Let's use our First Amendment rights and rally for Farmbot for Illinois mascot!
Kelly, I really enjoyed your blog. Then second half and the ending got me riled up to say the least.
In this case, the University of Illinois seems to be contradicting itself. As you said, it allowed the Chief to be displayed in the homecoming parade- something that constitutes, in the University’s eyes, a freedom of speech issue that it “…placed great value on.” If freedom of speech was so important to the University, then why would the Chancellor issue a letter to a student expressing herself- using the first amendment and speech protected under it, albeit in a somewhat crass way- to let off steam in a public forum? It would seem that the Chancellor is only trying to save face in this situation- especially because I cannot see, and I am quite confident that no court would see, any speech here unprotected by the first amendment. Even the concept of the Chief as our mascot is protected under the first amendment, and his demise is only related, as you alluded, to an issue of self censorship resting on funding and monetary intake. I find the Chancellor’s threat of “…legal and disciplinary actions…” to be empty- toothless you might say- for there would be no legal action to take in the issue of the student’s expression on Facebook.
It is interesting that you bring up the idea of hate speech versus that of fighting words. If this student’s speech on Facebook- an online public forum for discourse- is hate speech instead of a manifestation of fighting words, as I believe it is- you stated it did not directly insight a riot or physical action of any kind- there are numerous court cases that can be used to predict the outcome of any legal action taken against her. Hate speech, whether the Chancellor or the Native American House at the University of Illinois likes it or not, is protected under the first amendment.
There is a rich history of hate speech in the United States ranging from simple verbal vulgarities, to profound symbolic action, such as the Ku Klux Klan placing a burning cross on the lawn of an African American family. The case of the R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul (1) comes to mind. In this case, the city of St. Paul, Minnesota “…enacted an ordinance that banned the placing on public or private property ‘a symbol, object, appellation, characterization or graffiti, including…a burning cross or Nazi swastika… which arouses anger, alarm or resentment in others on the basis of race, color, creed, religion, or gender” (2). The city was obviously enacting this ordinance for the good of the public (neoliberal), however, interpretations for what are good for the public are somewhat vague and fluid. Needless to say, when the plaintiff in this case was arrested for placing a burning cross on the front lawn of an African-American family’s house, the court held that the ordinance was invalid because it was “…both overbroad and inderinclusive… even so far as [constituting] viewpoint discrimination” (2). “…‘the First Amendment does not permit a government to impose special prohibitions on those speakers who express views on disfavored subjects’…” (2). Even in situations more akin to ours in college, and those of this case, have a rich history of the first amendment triumphing over hate speech regulation.
During the 80’s and 90’s many public colleges sought to combat discrimination and harassment through the use of speech codes some of which worked to end hate speech (3). The codes that have been challenged in court, however, “…have not fared well”; “Courts have struck these policies down as being either overbroad or vague” (3). Take the case of Doe v. University of Michigan (4)- one of our Big Ten brothers. In this case, the University’s attempt to institute a student speech code- one aimed only to better the student body by, among other things, eliminating hate speech- was shot down in court although with some sentiment. “’While the Court is sympathetic to the University’s obligation to ensure equal educational opportunities for all of its students, such efforts must not be at the expense of free speech” (3). The First wins again.
If anything can be seen from the cases mentioned when it comes to hate speech, the burden of proof lies heavy with those who try to combat the first amendment, as it would with the Chancellor in an effort to legally punish the speech of a student in a public forum such as Facebook. In our I would put my money on her winning out against any legal action.
Sources:
(1) http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-bin/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=505&invol=377
(2) http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/speech/internet/topic.aspx?topic=internet_hate_speech
(3) http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/speech/pubcollege/topic.aspx?topic=campus_speech_codes
(4)http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/cas/comm/free_speech/doe.html
Post a Comment