Friday, October 05, 2007

The Collegian

The Collegian's Editor in Chief didn't get fired from his job. What is your response to this and what are your jusifications behind it?

13 comments:

katrina337 said...

I'm glad he didn't get fired. This is totally self-awareness as to my personal morals and values and whatnot. I think people should be able to express themselves, and as we have freedom of speech under the first amendment to the Constitution, I don't agree with that being taken away the moment we step on school grounds. So he allowed them to express their views, isn't that the point of a newspaper? Shouldn't multiple views be shown as opposed to only one view that will make sure no one gets offended? Would we ever have advanced as far as we have if no one had presented the public with something they're uncomfortable with? I would argue that we wouldn't. I think most of our "knowledge" comes from disagreement (which is why it bothers me when people want to just agree to disagree instead of talking things over, I mean, I don't think one or the other has to end up taking on the other's view point, but I think it at least should be discussed).

Dani said...

I agree with Katrina in that he didn't get fired, and as with her, its self-awareness because I have faith in our Bill of Rights. If we have the right of free speech i don't understand how that can be taken away at school, work, or anywhere else.
This led me to another area where free speech has been called into question: political correctness. It seems as though so many people are scared of the image they'll present (or the image of a company that says something un-PC) that it censors their voice.
I'm not sure exactly where i stand on this issue; on the one hand, i believe in free speech and have faith in that its a good thing. Logically, i believe its a necessity. However theres the other side where slurs, lies, etc come in. Any thoughts?

Dani said...

for those who don't know what happened, here:
http://www.collegian.com/home/index.cfm?event=displayArticlePrinterFriendly&uStory_id=3d1c6163-99da-46d7-b128-f0aa9c8030c0
(the article is biased, im sorry, but I thought it was pretty good)

Kenshin_Himura said...

Well, I, too am glad he was not fired.
Again, repeating the obvious, the basic constitutional rights of "freedom of the press" were being invoked.
And the thing is, the person who wrote the article has had no problems whatsoever...
So, does this mean that had he censored it for others, would the effect of the article still have made as much relevance?
Also, imagine this:
One single "foul" word is posted on a newspaper and there are huge articles everwhere.
Yet, when wandering the halls of just about any high school, there are more references to these "foul" words than if every word in a newspaper would have used the same language.

Rebecca said...

The issue isn't so much with the statement, but with the F word. As part of the code of the ethics at CSU a rule states that profanity is forbidden. Yes, he was exercising his freedom of speech right, so his actions were legal. However, this isn't about whether it was legal or not, this is about whether he should be fired or not. Using freedom of speech may make him a model citizen, but blatantly violating one of the rules that he was supposed to abide by as editor and putting his paper and his staff's jobs on the line makes him a bad boss. That, he should be fired for.

katrina337 said...

What's the point in having freedom of speech if everywhere you go there are rules against using words? I mean, I do think it makes the paper look more professional when they don't have profanity every other word, but honestly, I think it's acceptable. It's an opinion. It's not like he's shoving profanity down our throats. It's also a school rule that we can't use profanity, and not many people abide by that; no one gets fired from school. You're supposed to get suspended, and I disagree with that as well.

I think we get too touchy with ethics. I don't think we should even have rules against such things, so I suppose I care a lot less when someone breaks such a baseless ethics code such as that (to that extreme I think it's baseless, not in its entirety).

Dani: I like your last bit, and I'm confused on that as well. Because on one hand, I'm for freedom of speech in the entire meaning of the phrase, but on the other hand, there are some things that people should have the decency not to say. So...that's a contradiction, and I don't know, basically.

Rebecca said...

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for freedom of speech. The guy definitely has the right to speak his mind. The thing is, he also has to remember that he has responsibilities to his paper. When he knowingly violated a rule he must have known that there would have been consequences that would affect not only him, but the paper and everyone working on it as well. I don't think someone who is willing to knowingly endanger the jobs of the people working on the paper should deserve the right to run it.

katrina337 said...

I think it's a risk that needed to be taken to help break an ethics barrier in this society. I mean, it obviously got people into a debate over the ethical value of it. I suppose it's just our personalities clashing: I believe it's worth it and you don't (I don't mean that to sound harsh or anything, I just find it interesting). I don't know, the way I see it, I think rules of the sort need to be broken every once in a while, mainly because I don't perceive the rules as needing to exist. Even if it endangered other people's jobs-the outcome may be worth the consequences.

katrina337 said...

If CSU is "prohibited from censoring or regulating the content of its student media publications", then why would they be able to fire him over that?

KellyR. said...

Okay so just out of pure questioning what is everyone's thoughts on The Catcher in the Rye? Do you think that this book should be banished because it involves foul language? Or is it also a choice to show freedom of speech or is there nothing in common and I should just think that these two have nothing in common.

Dani said...

I think that sometimes in order to get people to realize theres a problem, you have to break the rules.

I understand the point about the editor not abiding by the rules, but that rule technically violates our first amendment; so how can it truly be a regulation? I would think that the laws that our nation is built on would trump CSU policy

katrina337 said...

Yeah, I totally agree with Dani.

Kelly: I think that the foul language in C&tR also served a purpose, so I believe it shouldn't be banished. But I'm not entirely sure if it pertains to it because it has some of the same issues except author's generally aren't under contract to not use profanity...

...by the way, isn't there something in the constitution that says you can't sign away your constitutional rights? Making what he did perfectly legal...or so I think.

Anupama said...

In response to Kelly's question about the Catcher in the Rye, i would have to agree with Katrina. The author of Catcher in the Rye did not have a contract anywhere in his description of "author" that said he was not allowed to use profanity. He wrote a book and it was published by a publisher who agreed to publish it because they thought the book was good. In the case of the collegian, the editor did not go to every single one of his sponsors and ask if it was okay for him to publish what he wanted to say.
It's the whole order of operations here, the author of CitR wrote his piece and then found a company to publish it. The editor of the C had sponsors, (serving as the equivalent of the publisher) and THEN wrote his article.
I don't think you can compare the two as they're entirely different.

I agree with the decision for him to not lose his job. He may face consequences, (such as losing the 30000$ in sponsors) but legally he cannot be removed from his job because of the free speech issue.

I think it's interesting how, whenever reported on by the media, the fact that the entire newspaper was on the topic of Free Speech was neglected. Taken out of context, the whole situation seems to be a political statement as opposed to anything else and it frustrates me that this is the perception from which the rest of the nation might have on the whole situation.