In light of racial events on campus this semester, a handful of MSU groups put on a Hate Speech vs. Free Speech town hall meeting on Thursday evening in the Wilson Hall auditorium to discuss First Amendment issues.
The event was put on by the James Madison College Student Senate, Du Bois Society, PRISM and the James Madison College Office of Diversity and was set up as a panel discussion including three students and three professors. About 30 students attended.
“James Madison (College) really wanted to do something to address the recent issues on campus,” said Amy Bratzel, president of the James Madison College Student Senate. “We wanted something to appeal directly to Madison students, and I think this event does that because a lot of these issues are constitutional issues.”
A campus-wide email sent by MSU President Lou Anna K. Simon on Oct. 4 addressed free speech in regards to the racial incidents, Bratzel said. In the email, Simon said, “It should go without saying that the University supports free speech including the use of words that are offensive to most in our community,” although she condemned the derogatory actions.
“There have been a lot of different precedents set regarding this issue that Madison students often learn about,” Bratzel said. “We thought that this would be a good way to really put the issues on campus in context.”
Social relations and policy junior Christie Teske said she thinks students need to be informed of the limits of what is acceptable speech. She said hate speech involves making people feel unsafe in their environment. Although free speech can be disrespectful at times, if it crosses the line into hate speech, it is wrong to make those statements, Teske said.
“Especially within the community that is MSU we need to be respectful of one another even if we don’t fully agree with other people’s beliefs,” she said.
Jasmine Lee, coordinator of diversity programming at James Madison College , said she believes some people do misuse their speech rights on campus at times.
“Being at a university is really a unique context,” Lee said. “It’s a little bit different than walking up and down the street and people having the right to say what they want.”
Lee said she hopes students walked away from the event with a better understanding of what free speech is so they can be more informed.
“We have a lot of different types of people on the panel hoping to provide a definition to what free speech is,” she said. “The purpose of the program is not to pick a side. … It’s really to give people a forum to speak up about how they feel and to get answers.”
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