I found the Atlantic piece to be very well-written.

Um wow. I can understand a religious school doing that (Duquesne I'm looking at you) but for a public university, that's way too much interference.

According to "The Federalist" there is no photographic evidence of the poop swastika at Mizzou, only an anonymous report from a student who visited a Rez hall bathroom at 2am on a Saturday morning in October. I would link, but am on a mobile device.

I just read an article on USA Today's website about university employees - one of them a mass communications professor (!) - actively trying to interfere with student journalists, one of them named Tim Tai, trying to cover the protests on university (thus public) space. Unfortunately, this quote caught my eye:

"Another woman seen berating Tai in the video has been identified as the university’s director of Greek Life, Janna Basler."

And unfortunately (I think), the three Greek councils on campus are standing behind her. As someone with a background in communication, I disagree with that.

The article is here:
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2...atus/75536062/

A similar article can be found in "The Federalist", plus a link to a video of the media professor telling the student to leave, and to quit filming.

She asked for 'muscle' to remove him.

I saw the video #ConcernedStudent1950 vs the media on YouTube. A news site I was on linked to it. It's probably the same content as the other videos out there (which I'll also check out), but in this one the Greek Life advisor, named Janna Basler, is portrayed prominently. In fact, she identifies herself to the reporter as 'ConcernedStudent1950'. Her behavior towards the reporter is appalling, and she should be reprimanded if not outright fired.

The name of the assistant professor of communication (!) - I still can't believe that's what she is - at the end of the clip is Melissa Click.

Now, let's talk about calling for jobs. If there has ever been an example more warranted for losing your job, it would be the one set by Ms. Click. What outrageous, abhorrent, misguided behavior. It is appalling to me and should be to anyone who cares about First Amendment rights that an associate professor of COMMUNICATION at a publicly funded university has demonstrated this behavior. The university should fire her ass lickety-split, no questions asked. How can you ever have any credibility as a professional communicator when you attack the very systems you deem to call yourself an expert!?? It's absolutely unbelievable. Fortunately, the university has begun to distance itself from her, and an appointment she holds at the School of Journalism at that school is being "investigated immediately", or something like that.

I have no connection to this school whatsoever, but I am just itching to contact someone there to call for her immediate dismissal. If I was a student there, I would be disgusted and embarrassed to have her as a teacher. If I was a parent with a child there, I would be horrified and mad as hell that there's a whack job like that being paid by my tuition and tax dollars to educate my child about communication while displaying such reckless disregard and disrespect to journalists and other communicators. It's not about what and why she was protesting. I get that. But to call for "muscle over here" to remove a reporter from PUBLIC space at a PUBLIC demonstration at a PUBLIC university? Absolutely unforgivable.

This may be slightly off the track...from a little online digging I notice Melissa Click graduated James Madison University in 1993 with a B.B.A. degree in retail marketing and women's studies.

Back in that same time frame, Camille Paglia wrote scathing essays against then-current, university-taught women's studies classes based on what and how schools taught/didn't teach the subject.

Guess Melissa Click is an outcome of what she was taught.

No, I don't think she should be fired, and yes, my summary was EXTREMELY flippant. But to bring up her email without bringing up the one that preceded it (as was done in this thread) is equally misleading.

So she wants students to self-police instead of administrative policing? Well, that's a noble goal, but it ignores the reality of the situation, which is 1) The original email was a suggestion, not something with the force of the institution or potential consequences behind it, and 2) This "self-policing" is not happening and it is having a negative effect on students of color.

The bottom line, in my mind, is that institutions cannot relieve themselves of the responsibility to provide campus experiences that are free from racism, and to brush things off as free speech or not the institution's responsibility is to avoid conflict at the expense of students of color.

So the Student Body President has claimed the KKK is on campus, but then deleted his post? Can he be believed regarding anything at this point? If he's using his position just to stir the pot, he shouldn't have that position.

So you disagree (largely) with her. I partially disagree with her and if anybody is truly interested I can get into why, but I doubt people are. I don't think it's a big deal when people disagree with each other. I do think the nature of our cultural climate at the moment is to immediately attempt to violently destroy and negate the opinions that are different than ours. People are literally calling for this woman's resignation in a frenzy over a well articulated opinion. If somebody disagrees with her, then it should be time for dialogue between the two sides, not a frenzied attempt to destroy somebody's livelihood over saying such a thing.

Universities should be a place for debate of ideas, of viewpoints. Too long have marginalized viewpoints been violently silenced, but now I wonder if other viewpoints are being violently silenced as well, even if the intentions are good (to make a safer space for said marginalized viewpoints). This woman certainly said things that not everybody may agree with, but her thoughts are hardly extreme, nor bigoted, nor crudely or aggressively stated. Is a person's opinion on Halloween costumes (and yes I understand that this fits into a larger narrative, but still) now to be the deciding factor on whether or not said person is a hero or a villain?

Again, I don't think she should be fired for her opinion.

I think the intensity of the reaction stems from the fact that her opinion was totally unnecessary in this case. What did she hope to accomplish by responding to that email? What pre-existing relationship did she have with those students? What would have been the harm in just letting the first email stand?

My understanding is that the students were only those in her residence hall, where she lived as the faculty adviser. I assume she was trying to open a dialogue with the students that lived in the building she advised. Somebody more familiar with Yale can comment on how that relationship works.

I also think this article from The Atlantic summarizes my concerns quite effectively. It is quite long but I think well worth the read, regardless of what side of the argument you find yourself falling on.

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/...t-yale/414810/

I thought she was married to the faculty adviser, so lived there incidentally, not as a result of her role with the university, but I don't know exactly how residential colleges at Yale work.

Regardless, I don't think that anyone needs to come out and disagree with an email that says "don't wear a racist Halloween costume." If she thought that costumes were a topic worthy of discussion, she could have raised the issue at any time.