The University of Wisconsin Board of Regents passed a resolution last week that requires expulsion of students if they repeatedly disrupted freedom of speech or expression on campus. The very loose wording of the resolution along with the severe penalties involved have caused concern at many of the campuses, particularly among students and faculty.
One response to this act happened last night at UW Stout, where a panel was held to debate this resolution. The panel included Chancellor Bob Meyer; Tim Higgins, a member of the UW System Board of Regents; and John Nichols, associate editor of the Capital Times newspaper in Madison. The event was moderated by Timothy Shiell, the director of the University of Wisconsin-Stout Center for the Study of Institutions and Innovation.
The following is a complete video of the panel. John Nichols took great exception to the resolution and it was, of course, heartily defended by Bob Meyer and Tim Higgins. Serious questions were raised by a number of faculty, students, and citizens in the audience.
I have to ask --- why is there a sudden need for this in a state school system that has withstood strong protest and divisiveness in the past? Why is the discipline involved so clearly spelled out while the acts deserving punishment are so ill-defined? The discussion was very lively and interesting and deserves a wider audience.
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Amitabh Pal speaks on Nonviolence in Menomonie
[img_assist|nid=3697|title=Amitabh Pal in Menomonie|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=300|height=225]Rather than join the throngs of conservatives at "grassroots" tea parties last night, I chose to have some good old left-wing liberal community by attending Amitab Pal's speech at the Menomonie Library. Amitab Pal is the managing editor of The Progressive. His speech last night on Nonviolence in Difficult Circumstances covered the history of nonviolent peace protests in situations where the odds were stacked against the protestors. Many of these protests have been remarkably successful, including protest moevemtns in 1943 in Berlin, nonviolent Pashtun protests in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and the Serbian resistance movement against Slobodan Milosevic.
Instead of belaboring my attempts to summarize his speech, I'll let him speak for himself.Thanks to the Red Cedar Peace Initiative,
UW-Stout Center for Applied Ethics, and STAND
(UW-Stout Students Against Genocide) with additional funding from
Music For Peace, a summer all day concert organized by musicians and
held in Menomonie
.
Steve is a member of LION Publishers , the Wisconsin Newspaper Association, the Menomonie Area Chamber of Commerce, the Online News Association, and the Local Media Consortium, and is active in Health Dunn Right.
He has been a computer guy most of his life but has published a political blog, a discussion website, and now Eye On Dunn County.
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