Anti-Israel Group at UConn Complains About New Policies on Protesting
“The majority of people, the UConn community, doesn’t want students to be violently arrested for disagreeing with something the university does”
Here’s a crazy idea. How about going to classes and studying instead of protesting? Have they even considered that?
NBC News in Connecticut reports:
UConn student group calls on university officials to meet after updating protest policies
Dozens of UConn students had a clear message for school leaders on Monday.
“Meet with us, meet with us,” students chanted outside of Gulley Hall.
The student organization, UConnDivest, is asking the president’s office to meet in-person to discuss the new updates to the university’s protesting policies. Some of the changes include limiting amplified sound.
“We are doing our best to stay within the rules, but we are not exactly sure because these rules seem to apply differently to different groups,” Josie Raza, of UConnDivest, said.
The changes came after there were several pro-Palestinian protests on campus last year. In one case, several students were arrested following an encampment.
“The majority of people, the UConn community, doesn’t want students to be violently arrested for disagreeing with something the university does,” Raza said.
For months, the student group has called on UConn to disclose and divest certain school-related investments.
The group believes the new protesting policies aren’t clear. Raza said she is frustrated by the lack of communication between school leaders and students.
“It’s really disheartening to just see the lack of care that the university seems to have in its students’ ability to speak on campus,” Raza said.
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Comments
You are not entitled to protest anywhere you wish.
Limiting sound volume so you don’t disrupt class or other students lives?
Common sense.
Universities saying we are here for education not for you to bully people is not stifling speech. If you can’t protest in an actual public place there is something about that protest you shouldn’t be doing.
These student brats are making a similar mistake to what many on the right make in thinking the public square means anything whatsoever, and that no regulation is permitted.
Generally, it’s not what they say, but how they say it that creates the problem. If they want to insist that a school engage in BDS or other flagrant antisemitism, that’s their right. It’s the right of others insist just the opposite. Both need to happen away from actual students, i.e., those there to learn. There’s no guaranteed right to be heard, only to speak. Hence time and place restrictions.
https://xkcd.com/1357/
Another word for “encampment” is “squatting.” If a student squatted in this public space to save on housing costs, UConn would properly have that student evicted from that space. If squatting is not permissible to avoid housing costs, it is also not permissible as a free speech. Speech does not make the squatting legal.
Other forms of free speech, such as protesting, in that same public space may be permissible.
She can always leave