L.A. TIMES, METRO, B1, 2/13/98:
College District Won’t Allow Offensive Views at Meetings
Education: New measures, including more security, come after anti-Semitic comments.
By LORENZA MUNOZ TIMES STAFF WRITER
MISSION VIEJO -- Under criticism from Jewish organizations, the South Orange County Community College District is taking steps to curb offensive and derogatory remarks by speakers at public meetings.
Last week, the Anti-Defamation League and other groups asked the district’s board of trustees to control its meetings, which recently have been marked by angry disputes and vitriolic comments about Jews and the Holocaust.
“Some people have said some hurtful things, and it’s gotten kind of ugly,” said board President John S. Williams. “If people are going to start making comments like ‘The Holocaust didn’t occur,’ I’m going to stop them. I’m certainly not trying to restrict free speech, but certainly people have to understand that there is decorum.”
The district is increasing uniformed and plain-clothes security at trustee meetings and adopting a zero-tolerance policy on threats of physical confrontation. In addition, trustees will not allow “vitriolic, racial or ethnic remarks, slurs or insulting, demeaning or foul language.”
The measures were drafted by college administrators and campus security and were reviewed by Williams.
At one meeting, a speaker said that the Holocaust, in which 6 million Jews died, was “nothing but 6 million lies.” Another speaker rose to say, “It’s become a racket. Everywhere you go, every time you pick up the paper, turn on the radio, the TV, here’s some Jew screaming about this and that and everything else.”
“There needs to be an ability for people to express their opinions, [and] it needs to be safe and done in a respectful way,” Greenspan said. “But it’s a Band-Aid approach [rather than] really looking at what the problem on that board really is.”
The problem, Greenspan said, is controversial Trustee Stephen J. Frogue. Frogue is the target of a recall effort, partly because he advocated a seminar featuring a speaker who argued that Israel played a role in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Another intended speaker questioned the historical accuracy of the Holocaust.
Plans for the seminar to take place on campus were dropped after the district received hundreds of phone calls in protest.
District officials say they have heard reports that some students are not willing to come to trustee meetings for fear there may be violence. Williams and acting Chancellor Kathleen O’Connell Hodge said they want to assure the public that the meetings are safe.
“We will have officers in attendance at the meetings,” Hodge said. “We will be aware of public safety.”
THE DISTRICT ATTEMPTS TO SPIN THE “ANTI-SEMITISM AT SOCCCD BOARD MEETINGS” STORY
by Chunk Wheeler
The ‘Vine: 2/27/98
Williams’ “concern,” of course, arose at some point after January 20, for, in fact, during the public remarks portion of the January board meeting, he did nothing as a series of Frogueophiles offered foolish and bigoted views. (Read the transcripts.) Even when the last speaker--a raving Holocaust-denying anti-Semite--nearly got into a fight with a frustrated Jewish student, Williams did virtually nothing. (Listen to the tape.) Nor was this the first time that a board president sat silently in the face of bigoted remarks. Frogue himself set that standard during the summer and fall. Are you surprised?
The new “public remarks” policy: it’s called “censorship”
Williams has responded to the many complaints about his handling of bigoted and provocative remarks by adopting a policy of censorship. According to the new policy, “Speakers making public comments...will not be allowed to use vitriolic, racial or ethnic remarks, slurs or insulting, demeaning, or foul language.” I guess this means, among other things, that no one will be allowed to insult bigots by calling them “bigots.” Thank you, Mr. Williams.
In the past, Williams has expressed his fidelity to the value of free speech. (For instance, he did so at a “forum” in early July--just days before he sacked the IVC chairs for exposing the board majority to harsh and unworshipful criticism.) And it seems that he views the new public remarks policy as compatible with that value, for he told the Times reporter, “I’m certainly not trying to restrict free speech....”
Apparently, Williams is among that army of Americans who believe that free speech only applies to remarks that are “true and decent”or that don’t upset anyone. As usual, he just doesn’t get it.
An alternative policy (that, alas, we’ll never see)
Is there an alternative policy that avoids censorship? Of course, but it can work only if the board president is not clueless. But let me explain it anyway.
First, the board should adopt a policy of prohibiting disruptive and dangerously provocative remarks, not because they are racist or “hurtful” or “incorrect,” but because they are threatening or provocative to a degree that the safety of the audience is at risk. (There is, of course, no clear line between dangerously provocative and non-dangerously provocative remarks; but this difficulty is ineliminable.)
Second, the board should permit any remarks concerning board-related issues, including racist/hurtful/idiotic remarks, that do not threaten to (significantly) disrupt the meeting or inspire violence. (Listen carefully to “Adolf” Kadar’s performance on January 20. Because of his mild conduct, his remarks, though idiotic and highly offensive, failed to inspire any open hostility.)
Third, at the first opportunity, the board president (and other trustees) should effectively respond to racist/hurtful/idiotic remarks, clearly explaining their failings. For instance, the following comments would go a long way to uphold the values threatened by a Holocaust denier such as
“Mr. X”: “Mr. X has expressed his view--which is his right--and now I will express mine. As a trustee of this college district, I am obliged to uphold the intellectual values at the heart of higher education--values evidently rejected by Mr. X. And so I must tell you that his view--Holocaust denial-- is condemned by the major professional and academic historical associations in the US, not because it is ‘incorrect,’ but because deniers ignore and reject the intellectual and methodological standards that make reliable historical research possible. Quite simply, the ‘research’ and positions of Holocaust deniers are intellectually incompetent and should be rejected on that basis alone.
“Further, a close look at those who promote Holocaust denial (Willis Carto, Mark Weber, et al.) reveals that their motives in promoting “research” are distinct from academic historians’ motives, for, more often than not, the former have a lurid history of base bigotry. This suggests that they are after, not the truth, but, rather, a ‘justification’ of a racist agenda that will help them to gain converts among the gullible and unwary....”
--And so on.
The problem, of course, is that Mr. Williams and his friends on the board are incapable of offering an effective response to the Holocaust denier. (I say this, in part, because they refuse to be educated. Some of us have tried to get them up to speed--sending them helpful articles, etc.--but to no avail. They don’t listen to the faculty.)
Thus they must resort to censorship.
Such are the perils of allowing under-educated and unqualified persons to run a college district.
According to the new procedures, “Public comments on agenda items only will be accepted at the beginning of the board meeting.” They go on to say, “Public comments on non-agenda items only will be accepted during the report and board comments portion of the meeting.” (Who writes this stuff, chimps?)
The upshot, then, of this little episode is a narrowing of the issues that faculty and others may raise during the only portion of board meetings in which the audience is still around.
Dorothy Fortune could not attend the 2/11/98 meeting, and so the board majority did not have the votes to do as they pleased. When the time came to vote on the organizational proposal (which, allegedly, is based on the recent organizational analyses), Teddi Lorch expressed profound reservations about voting, for she wanted to know exactly how much these changes would cost. (Funny, she had no such scruples on July 16, when she voted for more radical changes.) Observe that the board’s failure to pass the proposal on the 11th meant that it could not act on the renewal of administrative contracts as planned. Action on that item will have to wait until Tuesday, when, presumably, Fortune can attend and the majority will be intact.
I suppose you’ve all seen the proposed changes, and so I won’t bother to reproduce that section of the document. The appended section (“The Future”), however, is worth highlighting:
So we’re returning to (department) chairs. No word yet about reassigned time.
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