Campus press pressed

On this page -- whether writing as columnists, or on the IDS's behalf -- we're not afraid to hold the University administration's feet to the fire. In fact, it's our duty to act as critical observers to render judgment on the stories the news desks uncover, to help serve as a community watchdog. Yeah, I know that sounds pretentious -- yeah yeah yeah, "Indiana Daily Stupid," tra ra ra -- but someone has to do it. Especially since universities, like most organizations, don't care much for the public airing of problems and disagreements. The tendency is to try to solve things behind closed doors, where, without scrutiny's light or the heat of public reaction, they might never get solved (or are solved only to the benefit of narrow, entrenched interests). So, in short, you're practically guaranteed to see us tilt against the administration time and again in the future.\nBut, that said, I want to take a moment to give the administration due credit for its support of a free press on this campus. As frustrated as we might get with each other sometimes, IU remains a place where the press fulfills its role in promoting a marketplace of ideas, where disparate viewpoints are given their say, where wide-ranging debates serve both the University's educational mission and its long-term interest. Other places aren't as lucky.\nTake, for example, Virginia's Hampton University, which is building a notorious reputation for muzzling both the campus press and free speech in general. On Friday, The Daily Press in Newport News, Va. reported that Jack White, a 29-year veteran of Time Magazine before being hired to teach at HU, quit his post citing "HU's repressive attitude toward freedom of speech." This is after, to quote The Daily Press: \n• In 2003, HU "seized copies of the student-run newspaper ... when editors ran a letter by (the) acting President and Provost ... on the third page, rather than on the cover;" \n• In 2002, the university lost the director of its journalism school thanks to "differences with HU President William R. Harvey about whether students would be allowed to practice free speech and free press in their reporting;"\n• And in 2005, the administration threatened to expel a student for "handing out fliers about the Bush administration, genocide in Sudan, AIDS awareness and homophobia" and disciplined others who protested this decision.\nMeanwhile, Thursday's Chronicle of Higher Education noted that three student journalists have sued Ocean County College in Toms River, N.J. for infringing on their First Amendment rights. Allegedly, the college's trustees fired the student newspaper's faculty advisor in revenge for the paper's "criticizing the cost of the president's inauguration and his decision to change a college logo." Heh -- if they saw the flogging we gave IU's administration over the now-defunct $30 athletics fee, they'd each pop a blood vessel.\nSee, even with our stately buildings, green quads and fat squirrels, we can't take these rights for granted. So exercise your rights -- send us letters.