When sparks turn into firestorms

The police in riot gear, complete with shields and helmets, stood guard around IU President Myles Brand's house.\nTheir dogs were nipping at the feet of the crowd, composed of people chanting "Hey hey! Ho ho! Myles Brand has got to go!" and of those just trying to get a glimpse of the action. \nThe protesters only became more destructive and violent as night fell. \nFlames from small fires shot into the sky around Brand's house, Woodburn Hall and Assembly Hall. The bronze fish in Showalter Fountain were removed and carried around campus. Brand and freshman Kent Harvey were burned in effigy. A few arrests were made, and several people reported police sprayed them with a chemical deterrent.\nCampus usually would have been quiet on a Sunday, but by the end of the day, it was a different place. \nAs the sun came up the morning of Sept. 11, the day after former men's basketball coach Bob Knight was fired, the University community started to clean up the aftermath of his termination. \nThe Knight firing was not the first event to trigger a wave of student activism. Whether the issue is one close to Hoosiers, such as tuition increases, or one weighing on the national conscience, like racism, the Bloomington campus has always become a hotbed for protesting.\nA different kind of cause\nSome in the University community questioned whether the protests after Knight's firing were a productive means for expressing student feelings.\nPatrick Brantlinger, an English professor who came to IU in 1968, said he thinks the Knight protests do not compare with the passion and scale of the Vietnam War protests of the '60s and '70s.\n"I don't think the Knight riots are political anything. I don't think they involved any kind of student activism," Brantlinger said. "The kind of idealism and activism I am talking about is present, and that's very different from students just having a good time because Coach Knight's been fired."\nBrantlinger cited student groups such as Indiana Public Interest Research Group and the anti-sweatshop movement as current examples of positive activism. He also said these groups would be the ones to define this IU generation, not the destructiveness of the Knight protests. \nDean of Students Richard McKaig said a possible cause for the change in protesting style is the types of issues addressed today.\n"We're not at war, therefore an anti-war protest probably isn't likely to be the sort of thing that will come along," he said. "After the late 1960s, there was more of an orientation or a suggestion that students had ways to work through the system, and therefore protest activities weren't necessary to dramatize the cause."\nVietnam takes center stage\nFor IU students in the '60s and '70s, a national political issue rose to the forefront. The Vietnam War aroused a great deal of passion and led to many campus demonstrations. \nBrantlinger said he witnessed many acts of anti-war protesting during that time period.\n"Many of us were very moved and encouraged by student idealism," Brantlinger said. "It was inspiring to be even on the fringes of both the anti-war movement and the Civil Rights movement." \nApril 30, 1970, about 1,000 students protested a speech by former president Richard Nixon on Cambodia. Windows were broken in residence halls and a Bloomington bank. The demonstration lasted until the early morning hours.\nDuring that time, students were advised to carry a piece of cloth wet with vinegar, in case they got maced. People were also told to wear boots or shoes with socks, so if they came in contact with police boots, injury would be minimal.\nA leaflet circulated around campus at the time told students that, "The main thing is to cover as much skin areas as possible in case of MACE or tear gas. The first effect from these chemicals is fright and therefore, panic. That is your enemy, too. Don't rub the chemicals."\nBut members of the IU community took measures to prevent clashes between police and protesters.\n"I went as a faculty observer to a number of the demonstrations," Brantlinger said. "We were both anti-war and hoping by attending the demonstrations to keep them moderate, and I think we were fairly successful here at Indiana."\nTuition raises\nStudent fee increases also raised controversy, with raises for in-state undergraduate tuition per semester from $195 to $325, and out-of-state from $525 to $745. The fervor culminated in a lock-in of student, faculty and administrators May 8, 1969, in Ballantine Hall. \nA committee meeting was taking place in the Faculty Lounge when students blockaded the doors to the room. They demanded the board of trustees be brought to the meeting to discuss the fee increase.\nThree hours later, all hostages were released under a compromise agreement, but the climate at IU was once again tumultuous.\nDiversity recognition\nThe Student Coalition, a multicultural group of campus leaders formed in the mid-1990s, was involved in protesting both a Zeta Beta Tau fraternity hazing incident and implementing University changes in minority policies. These changes included the addition of Martin Luther King Jr. Day to the University calendar as an official holiday with canceled classes. \n"No individual dispossessed group could really leverage enough weight to really change the University in any significant way. That's the climate that we were organizing in," Ryan Pintado-Vertner, one of the Coalition organizers, said. "We came up with the whole list of demands generated by each sort of group and us collectively."\nThe list of proposed changes, sometimes referred to as the "King Day demands," included implementation of a Latino studies department and creation of an Asian Culture Center. The Coalition took these demands into the protesting arena Martin Luther King Jr. Day in 1997.\nRepresentatives of more than 33 student groups combined with students and faculty on the steps of Showalter Fountain to make their cause heard. The Coalition distributed flyers to ensure the demonstration remained peaceful.\n"The key thing is that they were organized. For the first time since I've been in office, students representing various organizations came together," Bloomington Chancellor Kenneth Gros Louis said in a 1997 Arbutus article. "In the past, black students, Latino students and students from the GLB community made separate requests."\nZBT incident\nAnother Student Coalition protest ignited when the Zeta Beta Tau fraternity sent its pledges on a controversial scavenger hunt in October 1997. The hunt included such items as a picture of "any funny-lookin' Mexican" and the "impression of a nipple (female) in a jar of peanut butter." The fraternity was subsequently expelled and reinstated in December 1999.\nThe Coalition took action before the expulsion to ensure ZBT was punished, this time organizing protests at the fraternity house. \n"Our mind set was already firmly opposed to that kind of racist absurdity," Pintado-Vertner said. "So their scavenger hunt list became an opportunity for us to help students of color on campus organize against something they already deeply despised and wanted to change anyways.\n"ZBT was just one manifestation among one thousand, and students of color knew that."\nWilliam Wiggins, acting chair of the Department for Afro-American Studies, said the Coalition's efforts brought much-needed attention to the issue of racism in the greek system.\n"Very clearly the demonstrations and the publicity that came from it played a major role in bringing the attention of the administration and also the national body of the fraternity to what was going on," Wiggins said. "It struck a nerve."\nLegacy of activism\nBoycotts, riots and police action have all been part of IU's protesting tradition. And while this tradition has moved into more recent times, there is some continuity.\n"The important thing about protests and demonstrations is there is an indication that students are active and concerned," McKaig said. "Protests are a healthy part of campus life and a good attempt to get other people concerned about issues you are concerned about."\nWiggins agreed, saying, "Somehow the idea, which is I guess is as old as the tea party, is the concept of a concerted public demonstration of one's beliefs or one's troubles can have an impact."\nClick here for photos of protests at IU through the years.