Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
If you’ve read about the various pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel protests across American campuses, one thing you’ll notice is a general reluctance to punish demonstrators when they violate university rules. Of course protests are usually fine if they conform to First Amendment principles (though some schools don’t hold those principles), but they’re never fine when they violate campus rules. These latter rules are usually called “TPM rules”, meaning that universities can regulate the “time, place, and manner” of demonstrations in a way that doesn’t impede the mission of the institution: teaching, learning, and research.
So at the University of Chicago, for example, we’ve laid out the rules for protests and demonstrations at this website, which gives information about noise levels permitted, building occupancy (not permitted at all) and the like. In 2024, I gave four examples of pro-Palestinian demonstrators violating University regulations without any punishments meted out. The only sanction levied was a tepid warning to Students for Justice in Palestine that they disrupted a Jewish gathering, a warning that they’d better not do it again or else. . . .
As I always say, rules that aren’t enforced are not rules at all. Even our encampment, which involved several hundred people—both students and outsiders—which was declared in violation of university rules, was dismantled by the university police, but none of the demonstrators faced any punishment.
Is it any wonder, then, that the anti-Israel demonstrators feel empowered to break any campus rules they want? And they did—two weeks ago when the pro-Pals, a consortium called “UCUP”, for “UChicago United for Palestine” held a week of demonstrations commemorating last year’s encampment, which, not coincidentally, also included Alumni Weekend. (One wonders what mindset thinks that these loud and obnoxious intrusions will change peoples’ opinions.)
At any rate, the Chicago Maroon, which loves nothing more than an anti-Israel demonstration, had an article about a week of protests that included several violations of University rules, all of which seem to have been unpunished. Oh, well, there’s one exception: the police confiscated one megaphone being used illegally. I suppose they arrested it for “excessive loudness.”
Click below to read the article. I’ve bolded the bits where illegal actions went unpunished. The cops and deans-on-call showed up, but the former are constrained by the administration and can’t take action without permission from above, and deans-on-call are, to me, a joke; mere observers who can’t enforce anything and barely want to report anything. In fact, some of the deans-on-call are blatantly pro-Palestinian, and so can’t be objective. Here’s a photo of the “watermelon” (Palestinian colors) fingernails of one of those deans-on-call taken by a student during the encampment last year:
I’ll give some excerpts showing how the U of C ignores violations, as well as giving the article’s introduction. Click headline below to read; unpunished violations are in bold.
Marking the one-year anniversary of the 2024 pro-Palestine encampment, UChicago students and community members launched a week-long protest and installation outside Swift Hall. The students, organized as the “Popular University for Gaza,” called for solidarity with Palestine and the divestment of University funds from institutions tied to Israel.
Between Monday, April 28, and Friday, May 2, the group held teach-ins, workshops, and demonstrations—some resulting in confrontations with the University of Chicago Police Department (UCPD) and deans-on-call—as they sought to maintain public pressure on University leadership.
Shortly after 1 p.m. on April 28, protesters gathered on the quad outside of Swift Hall, raising a banner reading “Free Palestine, Bring the Intifada Home.” UCPD officers and deans-on-call observed from a distance as the group began a series of chants over a megaphone. Deans repeatedly informed the protesters that they were in violation of University policies regulating the use of amplified sound on campus.
Did anybody stop the violations? Are you kidding me?
Around an hour and a half into the demonstration, the UCPD officers and deans-on-call requested identification from those who had been using megaphones. The protesters initially locked arms to prevent possible arrests, with the crowd gradually dispersing as officers continued to ask for identifying information.
And again it seems as if the protestors, who are obliged to provide identification, did not do so; nor did the cops take any IDs.
Here’s a protestor waving a Houthi flag; photo by Grace Beatty. Love that AK-47! Note the covered faces of the protestors, indicating two things: they are cowards who don’t want to be identified, and they are not enacting civil disobedience, whereby you break a law considered immoral and voluntarily take the punishment.
On Thursday they arrested. . . .a megaphone:
Two UCPD officers, along with several deans-on-call, gathered to observe the protest.
As protesters continued to chant, UCPD officers chased after demonstrators and confiscated at least one megaphone. The demonstration, which took place after 1 p.m., was again in violation of University policy regarding amplified sound. An unidentified protester flew a flag identifying with the Houthi movement in Yemen; one UCPD officer was overheard saying “As long as they’re holding [the flag], it’s free speech.”
The cop is right about free speech; our campus police are well aware of what is a violation and what is not. But they cannot move against real violations without permission of the administration.
Finally, although again this is legal, they heckled the President and Provost. Not THAT is going to change their minds!
Here’s President Alivisatos being heckled as he walks to the alumni tent. He kept his cool and did not respond. And you have to hand it to the heckler that he didn’t cover his face. (This was published on the UC United Instagram page.)
So the week was a mixture of legal and illegal activities by the protestors, but the only thing arrested was a megaphone.
Below you see a poster in the Quad. If you know what “Intifada” means, it’s a term in Arabic for “shaking off” and has come to mean “shaking off the Jews”, i.e., killing them. These are really congenial sentiments.
I’m not sure whether the students had permission to post such a banner, but even if they did the sentiments surely create a hostile climate for Jewish students:
Photo by Nathaniel Rodwell-Simon
These demonstrations used to bother me more, especially their implicit calls for genocide of Jews (the poster above and the “From the river to the sea. . ” chants), but now that Hamas is losing, and the University of Chicago has made it clear that it will not divest from Israel, these demonstrators strike me as pathetic, cosplaying as Houthis and members of Hamas. Surely a large moiety of them are antisemitic, and it’s okay to do that so long as you don’t create a climate inimical to the participation of Jewish students at the University. Do we have such a climate? You’d have to ask the Jewish students, but some of them have, I’ve heard, said “yes.” I know some of them won’t wear their Stars of David necklaces in a way that make them visibly Jewish.
I wish only that my University would be serious about its demonstration rules. When students break those rules, they should be punished, bar none. If Columbia can do it, so can we.
This announcement came from our Provost’s office, but apparently hasn’t been sent to all parts of the University. Nevertheless, it surely applies to all job ads for the University of Chicago. What it shows is that the University has updated its Equal Employment Opportunity statement, a statement that must be included in all ads for academic jobs.
Here’s the old statement:
“All University departments and institutes are charged with building a faculty from a diversity of backgrounds and with diverse viewpoints; with cultivating an inclusive community that values freedom of expression; and with welcoming and supporting all their members.
We seek a diverse pool of applicants who wish to join an academic community that places the highest value on rigorous inquiry and encourages diverse perspectives, experiences, groups of individuals, and ideas to inform and stimulate intellectual challenge, engagement, and exchange. The University’s Statements on Diversity are at https://provost.uchicago.edu/statements-diversity.
The University of Chicago is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity/Disabled/Veterans Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national or ethnic origin, age, status as an individual with a disability, protected veteran status, genetic information, or other protected classes under the law. For additional information please see the University’s Notice of Nondiscrimination.”
The new statement:
“The University of Chicago is an Equal Opportunity/Disabled/Veterans Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, national or ethnic origin, age, status as an individual with a disability, military or veteran status, genetic information, or other protected classes under the law. For additional information please see the University’s Notice of Nondiscrimination. Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should call NUMBER REDACTED or email EMAIL ADDRESS REDACTED with their request.”
Note the “diversity” or “diverse” appear four times in the old statement, but not at all in the new one. I suspect the change reflects the government’s new anti-DEI stance. Regardless, I like the new one better as it’s succinct, does not encourage the applicant to add things about ethnic diversity to the application and, at any rate, the link given in the old statement goes to a page on the University’s stand on diversity which is still up.
Well, everything is a mess at the University of Chicago and all of us are confused. One thing that seems true is that the University, probably in an attempt to get rid of the Encampment without bringing in cops or promoting violence, has begun some kind of negotiations with the Encamping Protesters. But the nature of those negotiations is confused, as the administration and the Encampers say different things about what was agreed on—if anything.
Further, there are reports that the Encampers are preparing for a raid by agents of the University—a report at odds with the fact that there were negotiations. I’ll just put down what is public and we’ll have to wait to see what happens.
First, remember that in the last week both the President and Dean of Students issued statements (see here) saying that the Encampment, though allowed to remain up for a while, has violated numerous campus rules and “has reached the point of intervention” (i.e., being taken down). The Dean of Students said that “the encampment on the Quad cannot continue, and we have called on the organizers to end it.” All of us took that as a sign that the Encampment, against the will of its inhabitants, would shortly be dismantled.
But it’s still there. There were rumors, which I can’t verify, that the Mayor of Chicago doesn’t want the city cops to be involved in doing this, as there are many protestors and they are angry and apparently ready to fight back (they have shields). City cops were, however, involved this weekend in taking down a smaller protest at the Art Institute of Chicago. Dozens were arrested at that confrontation, but our encampment is different, as it’s large and fortified with barricades and fences.
Because we have too few campus cops to tackle the job of dismantling the encampment in the face of resistance, it’s not certain that there is even an official force capable and willing to dismantle the encampment. That, perhaps, is what spurred the administration to negotiate, especially because Alumni Weekend is coming and graduation is on June 1. It would look mighty bad if the encampment were still there at those events, and could even result in canceling graduation. The administration is between a rock and a hard place.
Meanwhile, the Chicago Maroon reports not only on the negotiations (see below) but on two facts of interest. First, the encampment has surrounded itself with barricades and wire fences; apparently nobody can get in unless you’re a protester. . Second, the administration apparently gave the Encampment a possible deadline for being dismantled, and the Encampers are preparing for an incursion to take down their tents and obstructions, as well as for arrests. I’ll quote the Maroon and show a couple of their photos (Maroon quotes indented):
May 5, 12:15 p.m.
The entire encampment is now encircled with barriers of various forms, including caution tape, plastic mesh barriers, wooden boards, and wire fencing. Parts of the fencing have been up since Friday night, but it appears that new fencing was added before Sunday morning.
On Wednesday night, encampment organizers put up fencing, then took it down on Thursday morning at the request of UCPD and Facility Services. The fencing was partially put back up again on Friday night following rumors of a second counterprotest against the encampment.
The negotiations mentioned here will be discussed below:
May 5, 4:20 p.m.
In a joint Instagram post published by UChicago United for Palestine (UCUP), Palestinian Youth Movement, and US Palestinian Community Network, UCUP announced that negotiators were successful in having the University establish a “Gaza Scholars at Risk Initiative, which will bring 8 at-risk Palestinian scholars to work and study at UChicago.”
Before negotiations began, UCUP demanded preconditions including reduced UCPD presence on the quad, a guarantee that for the 12 hours after negotiations ended the University would not order any raids on the encampment, and amnesty for negotiators.
UCUP wrote that “daytime talks with subordinate deans over our demands” were “emptied of all substance” after being brought to President Alivisatos.
UCUP also wrote that they remain steadfast “as the administration attempts to trick or intimidate our movement into dismantling the encampment in exchange for hollow promises.”
UCUP closed the post with a “Call To Action,” telling “supporters to be prepared to mobilize en masse to support the encampment within the next 24 hours.”
— Eva McCord and Kayla Rubenstein, Co-Editors-in-Chief; Zachary Leiter, Deputy Managing Editor
The barricades!
May 5, 8:50 p.m.
Protesters have begun placing barricades made out of wooden pallets and boards around the side of the encampment facing the center of the quad. The Maroon has observed individuals bringing the materials into the encampment over the past few days.
A photo from the Maroon. Clearly the residents have closed off the Encampment from the rest of the campus—a violation of University rules. I suspect nobody can walk though unless they’re a resident, but believe me, I’m not even going to try.
(From Maroon): Protesters have begun placing barricades made out of wooden pallets and boards around the side of the encampment. (Finn Hartnett)
May 5, 11:12 p.m.
Encampment participants are bringing wooden boards reinforced with metal, chain link fencing with green mesh, and sandbags to the encampment from behind the University bookstore on 58th Street and South Ellis Avenue.
The protesters are using the materials to form barricades around the encampment.
— Tiffany Li and Emma Janssen, Deputy News Editors
May 5, 11:35 p.m.
Protesters have placed more fencing around the encampment, supported by hay bales, and have lined tents up against the fencing.
Some protesters have put on helmets.
— Sabrina Chang and Tiffany Li, Deputy News Editors
A photo of the “reinforcement” is below, showing the fences being moved; that’s another violation of University regulations and further prevents people from entering this part of the Quad.
(From Maroon): Demonstrators brought more fencing from behind the UChicago Bookstore. (Nathaniel Rodwell-Simon)
Further, the protestors seem to be preparing for an invasion of police. I saw a ton of UC police and US security cars while walking to work this morning, but I see no indication of a raid. I have to go to the bank later, and so will walk around the encampment and report.
May 5, 11:43 p.m.
In a statement sent to the Maroon, UCUP said that “the raid is not certain, but remains likely.” They said that “the university has made clear to students that their ‘immunity’ from police raids would end at midnight tonight.” Throughout the night, encampment participants have expressed to the Maroon that they believed a raid was likely.
Faculty for Justice Palestine (FJP) at UChicago previously released a statement referring to a midnight deadline for protesters to leave the encampment. In a statement to the Maroon, FJP made a correction, saying that the deadline referred to the expiration of a 12-hour period during which police would not take actions to end the encampment. FJP now claims that this buffer expired at midnight and served as an implicit deadline for the encampment to end or face removal.
“It is accurate that they sent no such communication insofar as they never sent out an email to that effect,” the statement read. “However, this information was conveyed to the student negotiators as well as faculty present and was reconfirmed at the start of the talks in person this morning.”
FJP said that organizers were ready to resume negotiations.
“If [the University has] decided that this deadline no longer holds, the students would be ready to return to good faith negotiation,” FJP wrote. “This is yet another distressing sign that university administration continues to act in bad faith.”
— Peter Maheras, News Editor; Nikhil Jaiswal, Co-Editor-in-Chief Emeritus
This talk of a “deadline” is further confusing.
May 6, 12:52 a.m.
After a brief rally, the large group of protesters has split into the four color categories according to how prepared they are to be arrested. Faculty members have labeled themselves as faculty with signs taped on their backs. Approximately 15 faculty are in the red group, meaning they are most prepared to be arrested.
The groups have established formations and are undergoing training on avoiding a crowd crush. “Be familiar with who is in your line, because you are going down with them,” an organizer said.
Several groups of unidentified onlookers have arrived to watch encampment activities.
This surprises me, but wouldn’t have surprised me two days ago when the administration issued statements that the Encampment could not stand. But since then, as reported by the Maroon and put up on the protesters’ social media, the University has begun negotiations with the protestors. From the Maroon:
The University of Chicago has reduced the presence of the University of Chicago Police Department (UCPD) on the main quad as a part of preconditions for negotiations with encampment organizers, according to UChicago United for Palestine (UCUP).
In a statement to the Maroon this morning, the group wrote, “UCUP demanded UCPD off the quad as a precondition for negotiating. [The] administration has only partially complied with this agreement by an apparent reduction of UCPD on and around the quad at certain times.”
For most of Saturday evening, there was no consistent UCPD presence on the quad, 57th Street, or 58th Street, with at most one officer intermittently present. University safety ambassadors from Allied Security continued to maintain a robust presence in the area.
In a statement released late Sunday afternoon, the University said it had not agreed to reduce UCPD’s presence on the quad.
Note that if the cops really were taken off the quad, which would be a bad move (the University denies it), and as a precondition for negotiations, it would be bizarre. It would represent the University de-escalating its presence merely to allow negotiations with the Encampers to begin. I’ll give the University’s denial below.
The main report that has upset many of us is the UChicago United for Palestine group’s announcement that they are seriously negotiating with the University about meeting the UCUP’s demands (Students for Justice in Palestine is part of the UCUP’s consortium). We learned this from UCUP’s Instagram post below (I’ve used screenshots in case this is removed; clicking on first one will take you to the site). The Instagram post used to have six parts; this morning it has only five, but I’ve added a screenshot of the missing bit:
Here’s the protester’s report that the University had agreed to a “Gaza Scholars at Risk” program, bringing 8 Palestinian scholars to “work and study” here. This is similar to what Northwestern University did in its bargaining with protesters. I do object to this kind of bargaining. The University of Chicago, as it notes below, already has a “Scholars at Risk Committee”, but aiming the positions at people of a given nationality may well be illegal. Note again that the protesters say that establishing this program WAS merely a “precondition” for negotiations, which is bizarre. Again, the University denies this.
This part of the UCUP post was there yesterday. but apparently has been taken down. It shows communication between the protesters and Provost Katherine Baicker, and suggests that the administration did indeed agree to the Gaza Scholars at Risk program as a precondition for negotiations. (The protestors blacked out their email and the names of University faculty they wanted on the advisory committee for this program, and I have blacked out Baicker’s email address.) Baicker says “Confirmed!” to the protestors’ request for assurance that the Gaza Scholars at Risk Program is a University commitment for beginning negotiations. It is not a compromise worked out via negotiations.
I’m not sure why this bit of the post has been removed from the protester’s Instagram site.
Here the protesters crow that they achieved a victory over the administration while “the administration gained nothing over us.” They also say the Gazan Scholars at Risk program is only one of many demands that the University must meet to end the encampment.
Here we see a glitch: the University and protesters apparently did enter into negotiations, but President Alivisatos would not meet them. At the bottom we see the “preconditions” for negotiations, avers UCUP, were agreed upon by the University, including reduced presence of the UCPD (University of Chicago Police Department) on the quad. Again the University denies that this agreement was made.
And the final ringing statement, the protesters proclaim that they will not be moved, but also crow that they’re ready to “mobilize en masse to support the encampment”. Is a takedown attempt in the offing? Who knows? “Mobilization en masse” implies resistance and, perhaps, violence.
HOWEVER, yesterday this statement from the administration appeared in the UChicago News (click to go to the site). It confirms that there were discussions between the University and the protesters (none of us were informed that these discussions had even been contemplated), but also notes that “there are material inaccuracies and mischaracterizations in the information being shared on social media,” presumably including the UCUP Instagram posts above. The claim that there is an existing Scholars at Risk Committee is correct (see link above). The University also asserts that there was never an agreement to reduce the presence of University Police on the quad, a claim made by UCUP in the fifth Instagram section above.
Where do we stand? People are confused, and many questions remain. A new NYT article (archived here) says that talks have been suspended. The Encampment is still there, and I’m sure the University at one point wanted to remove it without further negotiations (a few days ago, as I reported, they met for one hour with the protesters). It may be too late to take down the encampment, especially if the Chicago city police won’t help remove the encampment. And if the protesters really won’t leave until all their demands are met, they’ll be there for a long time to come, for the U of C will never agree to demands for divestment from Israel (or anything else).
I believe the University’s assertions in their statement above, though Provost Baiker’s email (if it’s real) does seem to show that there was a Gaza Scholars initiative agreed on as a precondition for negotiations. Again, Baicker’s email may be fake, as the protesters are part of an organization that can’t be trusted, or it could be genuine but removed because it violated the confidentiality of negotiations agreed on by both sides. If that’s the case, the entire Instagram post also violated that confidentiality.
What will happen next? We don’t know, but I, for one, wish the administration would keep us more in the loop—not necessarily telling us the subjects of negotations, but at least telling us that negotiations with the Encampers were going on—something that none of us knew.
At any rate, today’s another day, albeit a confusing one.
Finally, our students have started a Change.org petition, addressed to President Alivisatos, to remove the encampment (click on headline to read). So far just 85 students have signed out of a goal of 100, which is not a lot given that we have over 18,000 graduate + undergraduate students. But the petition just got going.
UPDATE: Note that the open letter reproduced below, “An Open Letter to the University of Chicago’s Administration”, a letter that was taken down at first, is now back online, complete with fake signatures and slogans by rude pro-Palestinians who had to sign something.
____________
On October 19, a group of Jewish students, organized by Chabad, gathered at the University of Chicago’s central “quad” to peacefully protest the Hamas attack on Israel, to show their solidarity, and to listen to a series of talks by Jewish leaders on campus. Here’s a photo, which I think is of the group, shown at the Chicago Thinker , a conservative student newspaper (there’s also an article about what happened):
Pro-Israel student demonstrators on the Quad (photographed by Rachel Ostergren).
As noted below in the letter to the administration from two Jewish students—a letter that was co-signed by more than 450 others—the group had requested and reserved the Quad space for five hours. That time was dedicated to creating pro-Israel and Jewish solidarity on a campus where the aggressive groups Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and UChicago United for Palestine (UCUP) not only hold loud and aggressive anti-Israel demonstrations (yes, with “From the river to the sea. . “) that sometimes violate university regulations, but also conducted sit-ins that resulted in arrests of 26 protestors and two U. of C. faculty. As the letter relates, the Jewish group requested that SJP not disrupt their meeting, and SJP agreed. But as soon as the pro-Israel demonstration began, SJP broke their promise and began to loudly disrupt it. Here’s a bit of video (this incident was witnessed and related to me by a colleague).
🧵 I have now heard from multiple @UChicago students about something that happened on campus last week. Pro-Israel students followed the rules and reserved the quad for a rally. “Pro-Palestine” students showed up and did everything they could to drown out the event, an apparent… pic.twitter.com/u5BaETKb8v
The Jewish students, who were being shut down (a violation of University policy) called the relevant administrator, the Dean on Call (see the Thinker article for a photo), who apparently did nothing to stop SJP. (The students also claim that the Dean wore Palestinian colors, but of course that could be a coincidence). No other administrator did anything, and although the campus police were called, they did nothing to stop the distuption. (To be fair, campus cops can’t do anything without orders from the administration.)
Two of the Jewish students then wrote an open letter to the University administrators giving their view of what happened, and then got it signed by 45o+ other members of the University community. It was posted in public for a while, but then pro-Palestinian activists began defacing the letter by filling in the signature blanks with statements like “crocodile tears”, “may our martyrs haunt u”, “do you enjoy the sight of dead Palestinians?”, “why do u like killing children?”, “Israeli war criminal”, “proud supporter of the slaughter”, “go fuck yourself,” and, relevant to the noise, “you can’t hear anyways,” and “use noise cancelling ear pods”, and “genocide is deafening, huh?”
In light of the hate and obscenity, the pro-Israeli students had to take their letter offline, and it’s no longer publicly accessible. However, two of the students who wrote the letter (see below) gave me permission to reprint it in its entirety. I have to say that it’s a polite letter, but ends with a demand—absolutely proper in my view—that SJP and other groups be required to follow university policy on the conduct of demonstrations, and that deans be required to enforce that policy. This dean apparently did nothing, as detailed below.
Here’s that letter, and thanks to Ms. Ross and Ms. Elkin for allowing me to publish it:
An Open Letter to the University of Chicago’s Administration
On Thursday October 19th, we planned a gathering in support of Israel and the University’s Jewish and Israeli community members. With the ongoing war, we felt it was important to come together to stand with Israel. We planned to have several speakers, among them undergraduate and graduate students and our community’s spiritual leaders (Rabbi Yossi Brackman of Chabad, Hannah Auerbach of the Orthodox Union JLIC, and Rabbi Anna Levin-Rosen of Hillel). Our vision was to organize an event to bring all Jewish and pro-Israel students together, peacefully.
In preparation for the event, we booked the main quad circle through Student Centers from 10:00 am to 3:00 pm. Though SJP had been protesting daily in the quad circle for the entirety of the week, we had no intention of asking them to leave. Despite the fact that we had reserved the space, we did not care to make any issue of their continued presence. We spoke to one of their student leaders at 10:00 am to inform him of our planned gathering at 12:00 pm. In our conversation, he assured us that he would discourage anyone on the quad with SJP from interfering with our event. Additionally, we reached out to Chris Burpee, director of Student Centers, beforehand to ensure that our reservation would be enforced given the possibility of SJP trying to demonstrate in the same space.
Even after all of our preparation, including a civil discussion with members of SJP prior to the event and a reservation for the space, SJP and others protesting with them completely disrupted our event. They encroached on our gathering in the main quad circle and used their megaphone to lead chants, drowning out our student and faculty speakers. SJP created a hostile environment for our community, and obstructed our authorized use of a University space as well as our freedom of speech.
We were further shocked and disappointed by the University’s failure to uphold its own policies. We spoke to Dean-on-Call Shevy Booze as the rally was escalating, and she made clear that her presence at the event fulfilled her responsibilities in this capacity. Speaking as though she was reading from a script, she told us that University policy required her to inform members of SJP of their violation. She said she would do this, and nothing else, because she was not the one charged with enforcing the policies. According to the Protests and Demonstrations Policy, the role of Deans-on-Call is as follows: “In instances of disruptive behavior or violations of University policies, the Dean-on-Call will respond and provide direct instructions to stop disruption, if it is safe to do so.” Ms. Booze and the other Deans-on-Call failed to provide us or anyone with direct instructions to stop disruption.
Furthermore, many students thought that Ms. Booze was in fact protesting with SJP. She stood amongst members of SJP, dressed from head to toe in the colors of the Palestinian flag. Additionally, her name tag was hidden behind the lapel of her coat, making it nearly impossible to identify her as any member of University staff or Dean-on-Call. Taken together, all of this portrayed strong partisanship, which is impermissible from an on-duty University official. Ms. Booze not only showed a clear bias toward a specific RSO, but she actively turned a blind eye to SJP’s violation of University policy and turned her back on at least half of the students in attendance. This is completely unacceptable.
The other Deans-on-Call present informed us that UCPD [the University of Chicago Police Department] are the only ones authorized to enforce the policies. After some time, UCPD arrived. However, they did nothing to uphold the policies because they had not been authorized to do so. Chris Burpee, with whom we corresponded in order to book the space, was also in attendance but unable to intervene. It is unclear to us why none of the present members of University staff or administration enforced University policy to protect our group; the fact that this was allowed to happen at all is appalling.
SJP has violated the Chicago Principles and the Protests and Demonstrations Policy. According to University Statute 21, SJP’s actions qualified as disruptive conduct. Furthermore, SJP obstructed our freedom of speech, yet University officials have done nothing to address this misconduct.
Outside of our disrupted event, SJP has repeatedly violated the noise level policy in their demonstrations. From 10:00 am to 3:00 pm every weekday beginning on October 16th, SJP has been protesting in the main quad circle or “occupying the quad” (without booking the space for a demonstration) and chanting from a megaphone. Per the policy, loud noise is only permitted on the main quad between 12:00 pm and 1:00 pm and after 5:00 pm. SJP’s chants can be heard through classroom windows all day, in clear violation of the noise level policy. The University has done nothing to address this misconduct. [JAC: This appears to be a deliberate failure to enforce University regulations.]
According to the Chicago Principles, the University “has a solemn responsibility not only to promote a lively and fearless freedom of debate and deliberation, but also to protect that freedom when others attempt to restrict it.” Why hasn’t the University upheld its policies on free speech and disruptive conduct? Why hasn’t SJP been subject to disciplinary measures for breaking University policy?
We demand action to rectify the events of last week and to prevent this from happening in the future. We implore the administration to address SJP’s many violations of University policy and pursue disciplinary action, as per said policy. Lastly, we look to you, the leaders of our institution, to address the partisanship and inefficacy of University staff and administrators tasked with upholding UChicago’s own regulations.
I should add that a group of faculty, including me, signed a separate letter to the administration about the rule-violating disruptions. On my part, the most reprehensible act of SJP (but one which is absolutely in character with the aggressive nature of that organization) was the shouting-down of the Jewish leaders’ speeches that resulted in drowning out their words. Almost as problematic was the failure of the University, in my view, to prevent a violation of the University speech regulations. According to the students, they did nothing to make SJP stop their disruption. Is it any wonder that the Jewish students here feel that they are unsupported?
Eventually, after the letters were sent from the faculty and from the group of pro-Israel students headed by Talia Elkin and Eliza Ross, the President of the University responded with a public statement (below), underlining the importance of allowing people to speak. I’ve bolded the important bit of President Alivisatos’s response to the University below (to go to it, click on the headline)
Dear Members of the University Community,
The Chicago Principles protect the voice of each and every member of our community, inviting all to listen and to engage in a collective dialogue. The sum of this dialogue, noisy and fraught though it may sometimes be, is a kind of gift that we offer to each other through our considered participation. I write to remind you that the inheritance of our university’s environment of free expression comes with serious responsibilities.
This is particularly true during times marked by intense disagreement when individuals in our community are experiencing profound grief and struggle. In moments such as these, the ability to speak freely across difference is more important than ever. At the University of Chicago, your voice is protected.
Perhaps the greatest aspect of the gifts we are endowed is that we are called to approach even the most difficult conversations with humility, and to see the humanity in other persons with whom we may disagree very deeply. No human being is just a symbol, and I hope that you will be skeptical of any call to objectify persons as merely an expression of a concept. The University is a community dedicated to opening the door to seeing others with compassion and learning to reason together. The Chicago Principles keep the door open.
Ours is a culture built upon a fundamental commitment to place evidence, reason, logic, and rigor over authority, tradition, ideology, or dogma. The University can only achieve this vision when the questioning of ideas and opinions flourishes. As president, I honor the longstanding precedent that authority does not establish truth for the totality of the institution; rather, it is the imperative of individuals within the University to seek truth without being limited by authority. This institutional neutrality is essential to vesting freedom of speech in our faculty members and students.
In addition to the gifts of free inquiry and expression, together we have important responsibilities for practicing and protecting the University’s speech environment. In the classroom, faculty and instructors strive to develop in students the skills of reason, of learning how to know, not what to know, rather than seeking to impose an ideological view or limit the expression of student viewpoints. In this way, students become equipped with the intellectual resources to deconstruct and reject faulty ideas when exposed to them.
Protests and demonstrations are an essential part of our culture of free expression, and within the University are protected as essential venues for truth seeking. History is full of examples where protests have helped to shape new understanding in society, disrupting prior convention. Provided you are complying with the University policies on protest and demonstration, you may join in congress with others in protest and express your views.
In any venue, no member of our community may shout down or seek to prevent the protected expression of those with whom they disagree. You may not tear down a poster. You may not seek to intimidate or threaten another person, or prevent them from hearing an invited speaker. These are egregious offenses against our community. We have policies and processes for guiding community norms, reporting instances that require investigation, and disciplinary action when needed. Our Dean of Students in the University will share more about those policies and processes with students later today.
Our environment of free expression is a gift, and I urge each of you to honor and utilize our gifts responsibly so that we may all deepen our understanding.
Sincerely,
Paul
Paul Alivisatos
President
So that is indeed a response, and a good one, though it fails to explain why the University didn’t do anything to stop SJP’s disruption described above. The statement is also a promise to use disciplinary action against those who violate the speech regulations. Did that happen to the SJP members who disrupted this gathering? Not that I know.
While the pro-Palestinian demonstrators who violated the speech rules appear to have gotten off for a while, eventually the University took action about later protests, permitting University police to arrest 26 protesting students—and two faculty members—who occupied the admissions office. (These students were members of members of the group UChicago United for Palestine, or UCUP.) We won’t know their names, but that’s not important. What is important is that University policy seems to prevent us from learning what punishments, if any, were levied by the University. Were the students expelled, given temporary leave, or punished in some lesser way? It’s vital that the nature of the punishments handed out by the University become public, for you can preserve freedom of speech only by deterring those who would disrupt it.
One recent development: the UCUP group appears to have given up sit-ins for the nonce and are now following around groups of prospective students and their parents, disrupting the “prospie” (prospective student) tours of campus by telling them that the University of Chicago supports genocide. That tactic is legal, I suppose, but the administration, as well as the prospective students and their parents, can’t be happy about it. Who would want to send their kids to a school where they see such mishigass? And that, of course, is what UCUP wants—to put pressure on the administration. But it won’t work. Like out institutional neutrality policy, we also have a politically neutral investment policy.
While the administration did acknowledge receipt of the faculty letter we sent, what did the Jewish students get from the administration? Bupkes, I was told. There’s simply no reason that the administration couldn’t have responded to Elkin and Ross’s letter by saying at least, “We received your letter of XX. Thank you for your interest in our community and for contacting us.”
Of course we all got the President’s statement and pledge to enforce the speech regulations, but that leads to other questions, including “Will the students really be sanctioned by the University beyond their arrest, for is “criminal trespass to real property,” in Illinois a Class B misdemeanor? Why are the pro-Palestinian students so angry and aggressive compared to the pro-Israel students, most of whom are Jewish?
And a personal comment. For only the second time in my life have I felt distress about being Jewish (as I said, the only other time is when a group of kids beat me up in junior high because I was a “dirty Jew”). I’m not scared, but I’m concerned, and especially concerned for the Jewish students, who are frightened (see here for one example). Somehow the University has to create a climate in which Jewish students are not intimidated while at the same time preserving everybody’s right to free speech.
In the end, the administration should answer the students’ letter above, just to let them know that their narrative and feelings were at least received, read, and considered. And I expect the University of Chicago to strictly enforce the rules governing speech, including not disrupting classes with loud chants or megaphones, not sitting in buildings, not blocking access to buildings, not ripping down posters, and not shouting down others trying to exercise their freedom of speech.
I wanted to put the students’ letter above on the record, because it doesn’t seem to appear anywhere else. Thanks to Ms. Ross and Ms. Elkin, who took the time to express their feelings civilly, allowed me to share them, and yet have still gotten no response from our administration that their feelings were heard, much less considered.
I don’t believe an incident like this has occurred since the Vietnam war, but within the last two hours students and other sympathizers with Palestine (and those who hate Israel) demonstrated in front of the administration building on campus (Levi Hall), blocking access to the building. I was told that those in the building couldn’t get out, and those wishing to enter couldn’t get in.
I was also told that this was a violation of university regulations in several ways: demonstrating without a permit, disrupting campus activities with loud noise, blocking access to University offices, and constituting a fire hazard. Also, the University police told me that several demonstrators actually entered the building, which is also a violation if you don’t have business there. And while it would be free speech if it were a more quiet and a permitted demonstration, and didn’t block entry to buildings, it should have been broken up by the University. The police told me that couldn’t do anything as they were “waiting for orders from above” (i.e., the administration). I have no idea what the administration did, if anything.
The demonstration lasted well over an hour, and then, at about 10 a.m., the students who blocked the building entry scuttled away very quickly. I don’t know if someone in the administration spoke to them, or there was a time constraint on the demonstration.
Here are some photos and a video I took. Click photos to enlarge them.
Students and their supporters blocking access to the administration building. The masks they’re all wearing may be to avoid identification, as I think they could be suspended or punished for what they’re doing:
A group of students holding signs. There were many, and of course no openly pro-Israel student dared show up:
One of the students (I’m not sure, of course, if these are all students) shouting slogans through a microphone. Several students took over the mike, and the slogans included the “From the river to the sea” chant calling for Israel’s elimination, as well as a call for the University to disinvest from Israel (we have an ideologically-neutral investment policy), and other calls, most of them strongly anti-Israeli. It was very loud, as the demonstrators chanted in a call-and-response with the person holding the microphone. There was also one chanter with a megaphone.
I’ve talked a lot on this site about Mātauranga Māori (“MM”), the mixture of indigenous legend, practical knowledge, superstition, theology, and morality that is suddenly about to be injected into New Zealand science classes (both secondary school and college), with the intent of teaching it as a “way of knowing’ coequal with science. Because it’s ideologically incorrect to say anything against the founding population, I get a lot of letters from disaffected Kiwis who abhor the anti-progressive trend of making modern science coequal with a lot of ancient superstition. (I repeat once again that MM should certainly be taught in school sociology, history, and anthropology classes, but only the small bit of practical knowledge that MM comprises deserves a place in science.)
Anyway, I got hold of the future plans of one university, the University of Waikato in Hamilton, New Zealand, which confirms the vow that two of its administrators recently took:: to make the whole university into an institution to teach MM and promulgate Maori “ways of knowing”. It is the wokest University of any school I know, for it has vowed that its mission is to adhere completely to the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi: a document guaranteeing rights to the Māori, But that’s not Waikato’s only goal: it’s not just equality or even equity this university wants, but to convert itself into a kind of academic iwi, a Māori group or tribe. Whatever its plans call for—and I have three planning documents—they’re not calling for building a real university. in the way we know it The university is to be decolonized and turned into an iwi, valorizing and teaching all things Māori.
First, here’s main strategy document for the next two years, which you can get as a pdf by clicking on the image:
This document isn’t as hard-nosed as the other two I’ll mention, but MM is a big part of it. A few goals (all bolding that isn’t italicized is mine):
Strategic priorities
1.) Embed mātauranga Māori into teaching, learning and the curriculum.
Number one!
From “Taskforce Objectives”:
Strategic priorities
2. Ensure that academic appointment, advancement and promotion processes require staff to reflect on their engagement with mātauranga Māori, as well as recognising the wider knowledge and contribution that Māori and Pacific staff provide to scholarship at the University. . .
5). Provide support and opportunities for staff to engage with matauranga Māori within their areas of academic expertise, and to ensure that matauranga Māori is embedded as part of the curriculum.
This ideological/political/religious basis for promotion, appointment, and advancement is explicitly forbidden in places like The University of Chicago. All that matters, according to our Shils report, is research, teaching (including supervising grad students), service, and contributing to the intellectual community. Any considerations of gender, race, ideology, ethnicity, and religion are forbidden.
And the last paragraph:
The success of initiatives to recruit new and retain existing Māori and Pacific academic staff will determine our ability to provide appropriate leadership for the integration of Mātauranga Māori and traditional Pacific knowledge into the curriculum and our research programmes.
There’s a lot of embedding planned, but I must that 32% of students at this school are of Māori descent, the highest proportion of that ethnic group in any New Zealand university. But make no mistake: all NZ are going this route. The question is whether the curriculum must cater to the “way of knowing” of the ethnic group that is so prevalent, and to be infused into the science curriculum. Two-thirds of the students, after all, are not Māori.
Here’s the second document, the “research plan”. Click to read it:
Here’s their main research objective (emphasis is mine except for the bits in italics)
OBJECTIVE 1- INCREASE RECOGNITION, INTERNALLY AND EXTERNALLY, OF OUR WORLD-CLASS SCHOLARSHIP THAT REFLECTS OUR PLACE IN THE WORLD, AND IN TE AO MĀORI, AND GROW THE NEXT GENERATION OF RESEARCHERS RECOGNISED FOR THEIR ABILITY TO CREATE SUSTAINABLE FUTURES THROUGH LOCAL AND GLOBAL LEADERSHIP.
Scholarly excellence rooted in deep disciplinary expertise is the foundation upon which our research reputation rests. World-class scholarship means the excellence of our research is internationally-recognised and benchmarked. This does not mean the University’s research endeavours are only for the rest of the world, but must reflect our setting, our region, and our country, blending the perspectives of tangata whenua and tangata te Tiriti, as well as Pacific approaches and methodologies. Our unique opportunity, as we engage with the work-programme of the 2021 Taskforce, is to embed mātauranga throughout our researcher’s capabilities, treasure the input of Pacific knowledge systems, and celebrate the synergy with other approaches to science and knowledge generation. Recognising this opportunity, and working with it, will enable our research excellence to shine through.
. . . What will the University do to achieve this objective?
• Establish a process to identify and develop researcher capacity and capability in mātauranga Māori, and in Pacific research methodologies.
• Recognise a broader definition of excellence in our suite of annual research awards.
• Further develop specialist mātauranga competency among the professional staff supporting research, to deliver excellence in mātauranga.
. . . Pou Whaitake – Relevance operates at differing geographical scales: local, regional, national and international, and it encompasses our place in the world. Relevance means that mātauranga Māori, and Pacific knowledge systems cannot be separate from other approaches and methodologies, because we will benefit most when all are woven together to create synergy and space for all.
The above paragraph sounds good, but what does it really mean. How is one suppose to weave together the search for dark matter, or the nature of sexual selection, with MM? These are concepts developed outside that paradigm.
. .We are committed to implementing the recommendations of the Taskforce Report (2021) and to become an institution that rejects casual and systemic racism, honours Te Tiriti o Waitangi, and values mātauranga Māori. University-based research has evolved over centuries in the traditions of Natural Philosophy, as such we cannot simply “bolt on” Māori and Pacific knowledge systems and hope to gain value, whereas if we deliberately make space for mātauranga and Pacific approaches we can add depth and meaning to our research endeavours. As such, mātauranga Māori will be woven throughout the four pou of excellence, impact, relevance and resilience; and is an integral part of all five objectives in this Plan.
Once again the Treaty (“Te Tiriti”) and MM are virtually worshipped, and will be made ubiquitous. They’re not just “bolted on” to education, either, they are woven throughout every aspect of education.
This university aspires to world-class excellence, but seems to think that embedding MM throughout the school will “enable [their] research excellence to shine through.” It won’t because world-class research is beyond MM itself, though of course perfectly capable of being done by Māori. What is happening is that the University is cosseting its Māori students in an ethnic cocoon at the expense of their education. They’ll know a lot of MM, which they probably know already, but won’t be exposed to “non-Pacific knowledge systems” and therefore won’t acquire a parochial education. Now I’m not sure what balance needs to be struck between MM and “Western” or “Crown” knowledge, but you don’t see these research plans calling for the students to be exposed to the classics, to modern science, or much of the humanities. If you read this poorly written document, you’ll see it’s all about “achieving research excellence,” but it’s really obsessed with measuring research excellence. There’s a lot of talk of aspirations, but no concrete plan to realize those aspirations beyond infusing everything with MM.
Finally, here’s the Academic Plan (click on screenshot):
He Timatanga / Introduction
In recognising the importance of Te Tiriti o Waitangi / The Treaty of Waitangi and emābracing our motto Ko Te Tangata / For the People, diversity, equity and inclusion figure prominently in this Academic Plan. Teaching for diversity means acknowledging and working with all students’ lived experiences. Equitable teaching and learning is available to all, is fair and just. Inclusive teaching and learning happen in environments where everyone feels a sense of belonging, that are equally accessible for all, and are welcoming for all.’ In addition, the Plan acknowledges the important role that Māori, and also Pacific learners, teachers or educators, families and communities play in enhancing the mana of the University of Waikato. Pacific peoples have a rich history and tradition of knowledge and learning which the University is keen to harness in order to ensure our Pacific students flourish and excel.
Once again homage is paid to the principles of the 1840 Treaty, which says nothing about what is to be taught in schools. It’s being interpreted to mean “Māori principles will dominate and guide education at this university.”
And the PRIMARY academic objective:
OBJECTIVE 1 – EMBED MĀTAURANGA MĀORI INTO TEACHING AND LEARNING
I won’t translate this for you except to say that Aotearoa is the Māori word for “New Zealand”:
The University of Waikato, in committing to implementing recommendations in the Report of the Taskforce to become an institution that genuinely honours Te Tiriti o Waitangi, is not systematically or casually racist and that values mātauranga Māori (Māori knowledge and Māori ways of knowing), has an opportunity to lead the way in this. Truly transforming our teaching, learning and curriculum in this manner will benefit tangata whenua as well as all students and staff, making the University of Waikato a welcoming, inclusive, forward-thinking, place to study and work. Tangata whenua as kaitiaki and as key educators are helping bring about greater cultural and environmental awareness. Some of our papers and programmes at Waikato already fully embed within them notions of kaitiaki and mātauranga. We all, however, need to commit to inspiring and supporting students to be guardians of our precious resources which will also help us advance the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals. One of the principal outcomes recommended by the Report of the Taskforce is: “All staff and students enjoy enhanced academic experiences and results from the embedding of mātauranga Māori through existing teaching and research approaches”. Over the past few years, there has emerged within Aotearoa New Zealand’s universities and other research organisations a wider appreciation and integration of the important role mātauranga Māori plays in regards to understanding the world around us. This ought, where possible, to extend to teaching, learning – what we teach and how we teach it. This includes assessment because as the Report of the Taskforce (p. 29) notes, it is important to: “Establish alternative forms of assessment in addition to, alongside, or in place of written forms of assessment where suitable and effective (e.g. oral, creative practice)”.
And this is how they will do it:
What will the University do to achieve this objective?
• Develop and begin to implement professional development for all staff on Te Tiriti o Waitangi
• Begin work on establishing exactly what a mātauranga Māori approach to teaching, learning and curriculum might look like in different disciplines. In some subjects this work is well established, in others it is underway, in still others it is yet to begin. In reality, it is likely that mātauranga Māori will be more challenging to implement in some subjects than in others but conversations need to begin and steps taken towards this enhanced academic experience
• Develop and begin to implement professional development for colleagues on the principles and practices of mātauranga Māori in relation to teaching and learning
• Review ‘Cultural Perspectives’ papers to ensure the criteria and learning outcomes remain relevant and are achievable and to consider the relationship between existing Cultural Perspectives papers and future papers that will adopt or engage with a mātauranga Māori approach
Note that some subjects may be harder to “make over” with MM than others (try quantum mechanics or evolutionary biology, for instance) but made over they will be.
To enter into New Zealand secondary or tertiary education is to go down a rabbit hole where all values are upturned to adhere to the Treaty and to MM. If universities do this, so thinks their administrations as well as the Ardern government, they will take its place among the great educational institutions of the world. But everybody know that’s not true. In fact, secondary education in New Zealand has been in the dumper for years, and this new direction will just make it worse. Perhaps the government doesn’t realize that this will eventually redound upon New Zealand’s international rankings. Those who focus obsessively on Māorizing universities may not suffer, but eventually the Vice Chancellors of the schools will be held accountable.
The more I read about woke groups and “progressive” liberals, the more I see their demands converging on a type of university communism in which hierarchies are spurned, power rests in the hands of all the people, who decide everything as a group, speech is censored, and people get stuff according to their needs, not their abilities (ergo the calls for dissolving the meritocracy).
At least that’s the idea that struck me when I read a new op-ed in our student newspaper, The Chicago Maroon, by the “Library Activist Network at UChicago,” a group of activists who work at the library but refuse to give their names. Even the title of the piece, “A People’s Library and a People’s University”, conjures up that image. The anti-hierarchy and meritocracy trope is particularly strong when the anonymous writers argue that they want the University administration abolished (along with the Board of Trustees), and “replaced with student-staff-community council.”
You can read their beefs and demands at the site below (click on screenshot):
Their complaint is that the library as well as the administration are foci of “structural racism”, and the library and University must take action to remedy this. That includes abolishing the University police force— long a demand of student activists here.
First, what is the evidence that the library is structurally racist? I can’t find any. The long op-ed mentions “racism in library spaces in the past year” But Googling “racism University of Chicago library” leads back only to the op-ed above and an earlier one by the same group that gives no examples. If the Library is rife with structural racism, we should be hearing of incident after incident there; but I’ve seen none in the “progressive” student newspaper. Now surely, as in all areas of society, some people in the library have racist attitudes, but that is not structural racism, which is racial discrimination embedded within the library system.
One complaint is that the library workers are underpaid and subject to authoritarian dictates by those above them in the hierarchy, who are “privileged.” There may be some truth in the poor treatment of workers, but I can’t speak to that. But the activists’ important concern is their objection to the University of Chicago police, who have full police powers on and around campus. For some reason I can’t fathom, the activists want the campus police completely abolished, which only a chowderhead would argue would make the campus safer—much less attract students. Here’s the big complaint about our cops in the op-ed:
The Board of Trustees, outgoing president Robert Zimmer, and Provost Ka Yee Lee refuse to tell us how much they spend on a private police force that shot a student during a mental health crisis, taunted student protesters and endangered their health, and harassed students. While UCPD is exempt from public oversight, its few published statistics show that officers disproportionately stop and question Black people, the majority of whom are not breaking any laws. Despite daily reminders that UCPD does not keep our community safe, University leaders continue to defend UCPD and seek to avoid and delay accountability through yet more committees that go nowhere and accomplish no actual change.
I don’t think Universities regularly reveal the budgets of their constituent units budgets to the world, and so don’t know see that is so odious. As far as I know, nearly all units of the University, including my own department and others, have a budget that is not publicly available.
As for the student shot “during a mental health crisis”, I described it in a 2018 post. Charles Thomas, a fourth-year student with mental health issues, was accosted by campus police after he went through an alley, breaking doors and car windows with an iron bar. He then started screaming and went after the University police who showed up; here’s the Maroon‘s own description:
Bodycam and dashboard footage released by the University shows officers confronting Thomas. As he walks toward them, an officer can be heard shouting, “Put down the weapon!” while Thomas shouts “What the fuck do you want?” and “Fuck you.” About a minute after the officers arrived on the scene, Thomas begins running rapidly toward the individual wearing the body camera, who commanded Thomas again to drop the weapon, and then fired a single shot into his shoulder.”
The Chicago Sun-Times reported that the cop repeatedly asked Thomas to drop the weapon, which was a three-foot-long iron bar. This is verified by the bodycam video shown on the Sun-Times site (see also the second video on this page.) Thomas was jailed for a while, had another episode in which he was tasered (not by the U of C police), and finally underwent a program that prompted the prosecution to drop the felony charges against him.
Still, this incident is repeatedly cited by campus activists as a reason to abolish the University of Chicago Police force! What was the cop supposed to do? Let himself get bashed in the head with an iron bar? He shot the student in the shoulder to disable him, not to kill him, and I see that as proper police procedure.
The accusation of disproportionality in stopping people of color on campus or in traffic should be taken seriously, and there is disproportionality of confrontations compared to the community composition at large. But as John McWhorter and Glenn Loury have emphasized repeatedly, this depends on whether there is a disproportionality of incidents among groups that require the cops to be called. (Traffic stops are a different matter unless there is differential disobeying of traffic laws, but studies in other areas have shown evidence of racism from traffic stops,—but not from shootings.)
Finally, as for “endangering the health of student protestors”, this refers to students occupying the University Police Station after a demonstration in front of the Provost’s house (which was illegal but allowed to go on for a week) was broken up. The “endangering health” business apparently refers only to the fact that although the students were trespassing and asked to leave, they were neither arrested nor kicked out. Their “health was endangered” because they were not allowed to order pizza, receive food brought by others from outside, or use the cops’ restroom, which is not public; and they were told that if they needed to get food or use the restroom, they were free to leave the station, but would not be let back in. That, too, sounds like a fair deal. After all, the occupying students could have been heaved out of the police station or arrested for trespassing, but were not. And actually, the students were endangering their own health as well as that of the police, for this crowding into the police station occurred at a time when Covid restrictions prohibited such crowds.
But none of this has anything to do with a “people’s library”. It reflects the misguided sentiments of activists who work in the library, and are using present social unrest to leverage a number of changes they want. Within the library itself, this includes forgiving all library fees and fines, ending police and security presence in the library, raising benefits for staff, including free remission of U of C tuition to workers (even faculty don’t get that), create a committee to investigate the library’s connection to slavery, open the library to everyone from the South Side Community, and “hire librarians and library workers with expertise in reparations to support the proposed critical race studies department.”
And then there are all the “demands” that have even less to do with the library, including supporting the BDS movement and “cutting all University ties to Israel”. To wit:
The Library Activist Network also endorses the demands of the individual organizations of the UChicago Student Activist Network:
Release the budget, disclose investments and endowment spending, and give students control in determining where University money is spent (UChicago Student Action)
Cut all University ties to Israel and adopt Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) principles on campus (Students for Justice in Palestine)
Create a truly accessible University that includes physical, academic, and digital accommodations, with a fully funded and community-led disability community center (Students for Disability Justice)
Divest from all systems of war and militarism, domestic and international, including UChicago’s Crime Lab that works in service of the Chicago Police Department (UChicago Dissenters)
As usual, these organizations take stands verging on anti-Semitism. For “cutting all University ties to Israel” goes beyond the BDS principles. And do they realize that abolishing the campus police, who have a number of call boxes scattered across campus, will result in parents refusing to send their students here?
I suspect there are some reasonable demands scattered throughout this histrionic list of reforms, but their force is weakened by their being embedded in a list of things that will never happen and in fact will alienate potential allies like me. It’s as if the social unrest of the last 18 months has somehow given campus activists a license to ask for everything, including things that are impossible or unfeasible. It makes them look petulant and unreasonable. They are “demands,” not “considerations”.
And the activists’ refusal to give their names bothers me as well. I suppose that, if asked, they would say that they fear retributions, but this is the University of Chicago, and retributions against those who speak out—even against the University—are strictly forbidden. That’s part of our free speech policy.
In the history of social activism that I know about, I don’t know of many cases in which protestors insist on hiding their identities. This is a fairly new trend. And it’s unjustifiable in light of the University’s policy of not punishing peaceful protestors. In this case, anonymity is in fact a sign of cowardice—of refusing to stand behind your words as an identifiable person.
