By Sandra Gokee

Traditionally families here would share their feelings around the kitchen table. Today, I’m able to share with a wider community online. A few days after Jason’s death, I channeled my grief and anger into a post on my personal Facebook page, where I go by a different name than the one I use at work. I said I believed Jason had been murdered, and that the epidemic of police violence against Native American communities needed to stop.

The post went viral, and I heard from Native Americans around the country about their experiences with the police – and the legacy of ethnic cleansing, forced removal, and genocide that shapes the Native American experience to this day. Today, Native American people are three times more likely to be killed by police than whites and at a rate 12% higher than African Americans.

I had hoped this tragedy would lead to an honest dialogue between members of our tribes and the predominantly white power structure in Ashland. Instead, Ashland School District administrators put me on administrative leave and asked me to resign from my job teaching the Ojibwe language.

School administrators reprimanded me for “creating” racial tension – as if my expressions of grief and anger about the death of my cousin were to blame for the divisions in our community. They said I had violated school policies. But I wasn’t giving up the job I loved without a fight.

For years it was illegal for our tribes to teach our own language. Young people were shipped to boarding schools and even beaten if they spoke their native tongue. My dad was a language and culture teacher, and before he got sick I decided that I wanted to carry on that legacy and do my part to keep the Ojibwe language alive.

That’s why I fought back, and thanks to the ACLU of Wisconsin I’ll be able to return to the classroom in January. I want our tribes to be able to grieve, and I want to help heal the divisions that have riven the Ashland community for far too long. Silencing and retaliating against members of our community – and suppressing our constitutionally-protected right to free speech – will only exacerbate these tensions.

This is where we say ‘no more.’ This is where we come together and confront issues of injustice, discrimination, and police violence – openly and honestly. Together we can get back on a path of healing and reconciliation and build a future of greater trust, safety and understanding for all citizens.

On Friday, October 6th, The Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System voted overwhelmingly to approve a policy allowing for the suspension and expulsion of student protesters who “interfere with” speaking events.

The Regents disguised this crackdown on student protest as an effort to protect freedom of expression, when in fact it threatens to have (and may already be having) the opposite effect – chilling speech and silencing dissent.

The policy starts from the premise that the rights of speakers on campus are threatened – a premise that does not apply at UW campuses, where many controversial speakers on various topics have spoken without significant incident. The policy, and a nearly identical bill currently being considered in the state legislature, were ostensibly brought on by a protest of a Ben Shapiro talk at UW in November last year.

Since that protest is often used by proponents of this campus speech crackdown as evidence for the Policy’s necessity, it’s worthwhile to clarify what exactly happened at that talk. Organizers of the protest contacted the UW Police Department, and “established boundaries of what they could and couldn’t do, such as using megaphones or surrounding attendees.” They then conducted their pre-approved protest for between 10 and 20 minutes, before leaving as requested. The event reportedly continued without further interruption.

Anyone who would suggest that what those students did is a reason to mandate expulsion for future protesters should never be taken seriously as a champion of free expression. While protesters made attendees of the event uneasy, they hadn’t violated any rules according to UWPD, and voluntarily left after a few minutes. As the Supreme Court said nearly 70 years ago in Terminiello v. Chicago, “the core function of free speech under our system of government is to invite dispute.” Are we seriously to believe that the discomfort of people attending a speech justifies a mandated expulsion policy for those opposing the speaker’s message and an orientation program on “free expression”?

Even if the policy does not directly prohibit permitted protest activity, it and the orientation will likely have a chilling effect on free speech, signs of which I have already seen firsthand.

Since the vote by the Board of Regents, I monitored a protest of a speaking event. Although the organizers of the event had been in contact with UW administration and UWPD for some time, after the vote, they reached out to me with concerns about how the Board of Regents decision would impact their rally. Multiple people said that they felt the need to be especially cautious in the wake of that policy. I suspect that this was the true aim of the resolution: to deter and quash student dissent.

Let’s assume, for argument’s sake, that the “worst” of campus protests is yet to come. Perhaps a group of overzealous activists will try to shut down any event that isn’t expressly Maoist in character. Will this policy be adequate in securing the rights of expression for all on campus – including the protesters, the speaker and sponsoring student group? Not by a long shot.

The language of the policy would penalize students found responsible for disrupting the expressive rights of others, but the term “disrupt” is never clearly defined. 

The Policy’s vague and overbroad language means the student body will be forced to second guess all of their political expression. If a student has to decide between speaking out during a Q&A and expulsion, the student will almost certainly pick self-censorship. I would. Even if asking a controversial question is permitted under the Policy (it’s unclear as currently formulated), why risk expulsion?

Even if we assume that the Board of Regents went in intent on protecting free expression on campus, we should still be alarmed by the implicit assumption that only the expression of speakers is worth protecting. Either through ignorance, malice, or both, they decided that the chilling effect of their policy on protesters was acceptable.

It isn’t. Campus activism matters, and is entitled to robust legal and academic protection. The Board of Regents should reverse their decision immediately, UW Administration should voice their solidarity with all elements of the student body, and the state legislature should abandon their version of the “Campus Speech Bill.” In the meantime, the rest of us need to be ready to come to the defense of any member of our community that university officials attempt to use this misguided policy against.

Shaadie Ali is a senior at UW-Madison, and he serves on the statewide board of directors of the ACLU of Wisconsin.

ACLU of Wisconsin Stands Ready to Defend Students from New Campus-Speech Restrictions

The American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin today condemned a new policy adopted by the University of Wisconsin that the organization said threatens First Amendment rights by endorsing the suspension and expulsion of student protesters who merely “interfere with the rights of others to engage in or listen to expressive activity.”

“This vague policy leaves it for students attending a lecture to guess whether booing a statement that others applaud or asking a pointed question during a Q&A period will be deemed to ‘interfere' with those who support the speaker’s views,” said Laurence Dupuis, ACLU of Wisconsin legal director. “And protesters outside a speaker’s venue may legitimately wonder whether an attempt to persuade another student not to attend will be subject to punishment for interfering.  That the punishment could include suspension or expulsion makes the cost of guessing wrong so high that many students may self-censor – an unacceptable result in a university community committed to the open and robust debate.”

“Instead of protecting free expression, this new policy will have the opposite effect – threatening the First Amendment rights of students and suppressing constitutionally-protected speech,” said Chris Ott, ACLU of Wisconsin executive director. “Giving controversial figures the right to speak – which the ACLU supports – does not mean denying students the right to protest them. Rather than restricting free speech, the University of Wisconsin should foster an environment where all voices are heard and competing viewpoints can be aired without fear of punishment or expulsion. The university should repeal this misguided policy, and the ACLU of Wisconsin stands ready to defend any student whose rights are violated by its enforcement.”

The new policy, which was adopted in response to legislation passed by the Wisconsin State Assembly earlier this year and still pending in the Senate, which allows for the suspension and expulsion of students who engage in “disorderly misconduct that materially and substantially disrupted the free expression of others,” appears to go even further than the Assembly’s bill.

ACLU of Wisconsin Stands Ready to Defend Students from New Campus-Speech Restrictions