All of us have at some point read an extremely powerful op-ed piece or letter to the editor in response to a hot-button issue in the media. These pieces are sent to the letters inbox at various publications by outside writers, and are published with editorial discretion. Sometimes, the piece may change opinions about something and create conversation. Other times, the piece might be rooted in ignorance or lack of understanding. The only reason a publication would refuse to publish an outside op-ed or letter to the editor would be because it was obscene, defamatory or incoherent. Otherwise, it can run, no questions asked.
But the Wesleyan Student Assembly at Wesleyan University doesn’t seem to understand this convention. In September, the Argus, the student newspaper at the university, was chastised for publishing an op-ed that “criticized the Black Lives Matter movement,” Jezebel reported Monday. The WSA voted on Sunday to cut the newspaper’s annual funding from $30,000 to $13,000 in response to the publication of the piece. The WSA will also hold a vote to determine if the publication should be entirely defunded.
Jezebel writer Helen Holmes hit the nail on the head: “I can’t imagine what it must be like to see physical copies of writing you’ve labored over being burned by fellow students. It’s a free speech nightmare that seems to belong in a different century.”
What the WSA seems to overlook is that one single piece does not represented the whole of a newspaper staff’s beliefs. Even still, the WSA should be held to task here because it aims to place limits on people who want to bring their opinions forward in public forums. Perhaps the WSA believed that by publishing this op-ed, the Argus was advocating for the writer’s opinion on Black Lives Matter. Perhaps they believed that this would shed a negative light upon the newspaper and the school as a whole.
But what is the role of student journalism if not to give a platform to student voices? We need to understand that publishing an op-ed is different from approving the message conveyed in the op-ed. If a paper publishes an op-ed, by no means is it necessarily condoning the message. If a student did in fact write this op-ed, regardless of whether or not he is a staff member at the paper, we can’t begrudge his opportunity to give his opinions where his fellow students will hear him.
This reaction from the WSA raises questions about what the organization was getting out of funding the paper in the first place. A university-funded newspaper shouldn’t be a mouthpiece for marketing or PR — it should be a newspaper just like any other that aims to bring as much truth as possible to the readers of the publication. Because this country guarantees a free press, the newspaper would also have the right to pen an editorial — representing the opinion of their staff — saying the exact same thing as this op-ed.
This also relates to the common trend of colleges disinviting speakers who are originally scheduled to present at their schools. Even if we may not agree with a certain speaker’s opinion, we shouldn’t discriminate against them based on our own countering beliefs. No matter what side we are on, an open exchange of ideas can always be enriching. As students and, more generally, as human beings, we have a responsibility to hear to each others’ opinions — we don’t have to agree with them or promote them, but we do need to recognize them.
Realistically, what the author said in the op-ed is irrelevant. Rather, the fact that this newspaper’s funding was cut by over half because of a community-contributed op-ed is the important takeaway here. The whole incident illustrates how important it is to have an independent student press on campus that doesn’t have to cater to any particular viewpoint. We as a student body have a wide variety of opinions, and we should be allowed to share them.
Of course, many publications have to make decisions about what ideas are and aren’t worth publishing. What if this op-ed was written about something that was progressive and important for the student body to learn about?
Imagine, for example, that The Daily Free Press were an official, Boston University-sponsored publication. The widely circulated and important letter to the editor we received this April, in which a female student came forward about her sexual assault and her highly negative experience with the BU administration’s handling of the assault, maybe wouldn’t have been published. And what if we hadn’t published it, or hadn’t been allowed to publish it because of the negative light it shed on the administration at BU? All of the meaningful conversations we had and continue to have about the piece could never have happened. This is to say that op-eds and letters alike, no matter the subject matter, may be valuable learning experiences for everyone.
We disagree with what was said in this op-ed, and the author of the op-ed clearly didn’t understand the movement in itself. But there is no reason to stifle an opinion that can create conversation. Free speech is the most significant aspect of journalism and it shouldn’t be stifled, for any reason.
