4 - The Michigan Daily - Tuesday, February 7, 1995 abe igan ailg V. JEAN TWENGE THE ERASABLE PEN 9 420 Maynard MICHAEL ROSENBERG Ann Arbor, MI 48109 Editor in Chief Edited and managed by JULIE BECKER students at the JAMEs NASH University of Michigan 7Editorial Page Editors Unless otherwise noted, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion of a majority of the Daily's editorial board All other articles, letters, and cartoons do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily. Policing the nternet 'U' misconstrues bylaw to suspend student F--k! and other words not to utter in good company niversity sophomore Jake Baker has a rather active imagination. In fact, he and his imagination concocted some graphic sexual fantasies and posted them on the Internet. On Jan. 9, he posted a story with a woman's name as the title. An attorney and University alum living in Moscow read the story from a file of sexual postings and protested to the Univer- sity. Now Baker has been suspended under an emergency order from University President James J. Duderstadt under regental Bylaw 2.01 - and faces expulsion from the University as well as FBI charges. This case raises delicate - and as yet unanswered -questions about Internet "crime." In the near future, officials will be debating censorship vs. free speech on the Internet and whether including the woman's name constitutes harassment even though it was not sent directly to her. The University wrestled with a similar dilemma last spring when one or more University students distrib- uted racist e-mail over the Internet. Although no perpetrator was identified in the incidents, University officials said at the time that posting racist e-mail to a generic message group -not to a specific person or group - did not legally constitute harassment. In this latest case, the FBI has charged Baker with distributing ob- scene material. This will be one of the first cases to fall under Congress' new computer- trafficking pornography law. The major point of concern is not Baker's imagination or even the free speech issues, but -as usual-the administration's handling of the case. Admittedly, the person in question may be dangerous. Certainly there is enough doubt to further investigate the matter before tossing him out into the street. After postpon- ing a second meeting with housing officials due to an exam and his lack of legal counsel, Baker was accosted after class, notified of his suspension, and allowed into his dormitory roomonly long enough to snatch some clothes. He had to sleep in a hotel room Thursday night and is barred fromclass. As Capt. James Smiley of the Department of Public Safety put it, "He was asked to leave and he's outta here" -just like that. Baker was put through all of this because somehow the administration deemed him a danger to order at the University. Bylaw 2.01 allows Duderstadt to take whatever actions are necessary to maintain order on campus. It is likely that Baker needs professional help - but is he an immediate threat to the safety ofthe University community? Although the mes- sage was posted Jan. 9, Baker was not sus- pended until Feb. 2. Almost a month passed and no one was physically harmed. This situ- ation hardly merited the urgent steps Duderstadt took to remove Baker from campus. David Cahill, Baker's attorney, believes that "the University has taken on the job of literary critic and decided it's a campus emergency. I think they've overreacted ... "Duderstadt's maneu- ver clearly violates the spirit - if not the letter - of the bylaw. The University must not have the power to throw students out on whim- it must be positive that it is an emergency situa- tion before acting. In addition to the careless haste with which this case was handled, the administration has fumbled badly by contradicting its precious Statement of Student Rights and Responsibili- ties, otherwise known as the code. Duderstadt's implementation of Bylaw 2.01 shows the hy- pocrisy inherent in the code-and then the use of a bylaw to circumvent it when convenient. Ironically, both the bylaw and the code require the decision of one person to seal a student's fate. This action conflicts heavily with the code, a "provisional" policy in which the ad- ministration has just demonstrated its lack of faith. Ifthe administration has no confidence in the code, why should the students? O ver Christmas break, my little brother reprimanded me for swearing. "Cursing is the crutch of conversational cripples," he told me. I hadn't heard that one since junior high school, and I laughed. Problem was, he was serious. "If you swear, you limit your vocabulary," said the kid who used to call me "shithead." "So then why did I do so well on my verbal SAT?" I countered. "Because you didn't swear so much in high school." On that, I had to admit he had me. When I was 4, my mother told me that "dummy" was a bad word, and I believed her. Teach- ers told me for years that smart people didn't swear: As a 16-year-old, I had the impres- sion that swearing was reserved for the kids in the corner who wore Megadeth T-shirts, smoked suspicious-smelling cigarettes, and said things like "I'm not fuckin' going to class." Saying I was "pissed off' was about as far as I went in high school, and my mother outlawed even that in the house. Then I got to college. My first day of orientation at the University of Chicago began with a welcome meeting in a large Gothic hall. At one point an administrative- looking person (actually a member of the campus comedy troupe) told us to note some changes in the test schedule: For in- stance, the swimming test would be held tomorrow instead of today. "Aw, fuck!" exclaimed a troupe member stationed in the aisle wearing a Big Bird innertube. I was amazed. This was an official meeting-and the guy had just said "fuck"! This was going to be different! This was going to be true freedom! This was going to be a school without hall passes! Sure enough, one of my professors talked about "shitwork" during the second week of class, and another gave an entire lecture on social sanctions after he (intentionally) said "Shit, I forgot my notes!" Sure, my dad had talked to me about "bullshit"jobs one sum- mer, but that was around the same time he started listening to the oldies station and wearing his bell-bottoms again. But these were professors far beyond their mid-life crises, and they said "shit" as casually as they would any other word. Plus, all of my college dormmates and friends swore like sailors - and that was when they weren't talking about sex. By my first Christmas home I had to stop myself from telling my mother that the turkey was "really fuckin' good." (Do NOT do this.) It almost felt like I'd taken a course in swearing, a la George Carlin. "Fuck! It's the police!" is beginning swearing, Carlin says. Intermediate swearing: "It's the fucking police!" Then there's advanced swearing: "It's the po-fucking-lice!" Courses or not, college is a strange ha- ven for swearing. College papers don't cen- sor many words, I suppose on the premise that young, easily influenced children (not to mention old, easily pissed-off senior citi- zens) do not read college papers. This is a good thing, because otherwise this column would consist almost entirely of dashes. Other publications are not so lenient in their use of invective. One conservative publication went so far as to blank out the word "dick" when quoting a (gasp!) safe- sex pamphlet. A tabloid I saw quoted a woman as saying "She's a dog and my husband is a b-d." Since dashes are 4 really nothing more than an invitation to play "Wheel of Fortune" and guess the word, I decided to tax my brain and go for it, right there in the checkout line. "Bitchhead?" No, too many letters. "Boogerbrained?" No, still too many letters: I wanted to buy a vowel. "Behaving like Dan Quayle's brain ... uh ... and head?" No, way too many letters. I finally had to flip inside to the article to find out that the word was "bastard." This paper can print unabashed lies, pictures of two-headed monkey-tailed alien babies, and people's sworn statements that Elvis is alive, but it can't print "bastard" on its cover. So does swearing really limit your vo- cabulary? I doubt it. It's phrases like "Con- gressman Sonny Bono" that really begin to undermine mental acuity, and I strongly recommend against their use. 01 11 1 JuM LASSER SHARP AS TOAST A TALE OF TWO HOLOCAUSTS (ho'lo-caust: a thorough destruction especially involving loss of life.) ya correct rememberance: I Isil OPEN TO PUBLIC f - FC "4,'T i-si f some work ne.ded: R t 1 AN) PANE VID N ERYf ) j NOTABLE QUOTABLE "There is no rule forbidding anyone from just being disgusting." - David Cahill, attorney for LSA sophomore Jake Baker, who was sus- pended after posting a sexually explicit message on the Internet . " I Opp, 9pqmp-mwm V Electronic tether? Restraint needed in tracking students 11 A South Quad resident was recently appre- hended for pulling a fire alarm. The evi- dence against him? University records showed that he had swiped his identification card into the door near the alarm just before it was pulled. This incident raises some serious legal and ethical issues. Of course, few would find fault with the use of student identification card records to catch the South Quad prankster. However, the University must take steps to ensure that its power to track students is not abused. At first glance, some may question the seriousness of this issue. Who would argue with controlling crime? But serious principles are at stake here. The University is a de facto government: It levies fees, provides services, maintains a police force and holds judicial hearings. Is it right for a government to hold such power over its citizens? Should people's privacy be so seriously infringed upon, with no real system of checks on the government's (University's) actions? These are not mere philosophical abstrac- tions. If this technology had been available in the late '60s, does anyone realistically believe that the University would not have taken ad- vantage of it to monitor student activist lead- ers? Today, a professor could ask for access to the records to see where a student was during class - and there is no rule on the books that would keep the administration from releasing the records. The expansion of Entr6e Plus off campus will enhance student life, but ominously it will allow the University to monitor students even off campus. Of course, the record-keeping serves useful purposes. It can trace criminal suspects. Very importantly, it can rectify situations arising from lost or stolen ID cards. The system should be retained, but with safeguards. Records should not be released without student consent or court order. The records of student movements should be treated as the private property of the individual students - not as public domain. If someone were ques- tioned about their movements by an authority, they would be protected by the Fifth Amend- ment from being forced to offer self-incrimi- nating evidence. In instituting these changes, the University must create strong regulations. It is not un- healthy skepticism to distrust the ability of the University to carry through on "good faith" promises - not because the University is inherently menacing, but because any free government must have adequate checks on its power. The compilation of records of student move- ment by the University provides some benefits to students, but the University must relinquish the dangerous powers it affords. Otherwise, Big Brother looms large at the University. LETTERS Provost errs in interpretation of 'U' defense policies To the Daily: Students and members of the faculty will want tobe clear about the liability to which they may be personally exposed if, serving on University "harassment" boards judging other students or faculty, the constitutional rights of the accused are unfairly infringed. Provost (GilbertR.) Whitaker and the general counsel (in their let- ter to the Daily of 1/19/95) called attention to the University's "De- fense and Indemnification" policy according to which the University will pay for legal de- fense and damages assessed against an individual implement- ing or enforcing a University policy (such as the Sexual Ha- rassment policy) if that action is "in good faith and in the perfor- mance of his or her University responsibilities." Their report is accurate, and I am certain that it is sincere. But that policy cannot relieve members of the faculty, or stu- dents, of all anxiety in this arena. Federal courts have held that if "clearly established statutory or constitutional rights" have been disregarded, individual students or faculty may not be immune from personal liability. This the provost and general counsel do not contest. If in some future case . _s _ 1ll~ ! '0 ~f M they contend (and determine) that individuals at risk had not been implementing University policy, or had not been doing so in good faith. Much would depend, in such circumstances, upon Uni- versity judgments whose sub- stance cannot be predicted with confidence. It is therefore correct to re- port, as I did to the community in my earlier letter to the Daily (1/ 11/95) that faculty members and students who serve on sexual harassment boards and the like may be subject to "substantial personal liability" if the rights of the accused are unfairly abused. The claim of the provost that my report is "not true" is simply mis- taken. It is an honest mistake, no doubt, based, I infer, on the provost's personal conviction that the University would never fail to support a faculty member or student in distress. But prudent members of the University are well advised to be thoughtful about the boards on which they serve, and about the codes they are willing to help enforce. Regarding the personal liabil- ity of individuals who enforce harassment codes the provost and I disagree, but there is a far more important matter upon which I know we are in full agreement: The University of Michigan ought to be a place where argu- ment is civil and respect for people and talent is given by all without reference to or regard for sex or race. But when arguments become heated, and push comes to chn,,. wa, theI n,,;,e...,, judgment on words or conduct is not our business as a University, we do it very badly, and we will be a better University when we stop trying to do it at all. Carl Cohen Professor of Philosophy Lofts pose hidden danger To the Daily: As the parent of a Michigan first-year student, I have some serious concerns and complaints about the building of lofts in the dorms. The University very of- ten puts students in a room called a "converted triple." Since these rooms were meant for two and now accommodate three stu- dents, many of the students have lofts built. There are also many lofts built in regular double rooms. Nobody takes responsibility forthe safety of these lofts. There seems tobe no building code, nor any inspection performed on these lofts. The loft built in my daughter's room (by a company called Hungry Student Builders) collapsed on the seventh day. She was taken to the hospital by ambulance and missed the first day of class. Theemergencyroom staff said they see several inju- ries each semesterfrom accidents cause by lofts. Icalled the University Hous- ing Office (and spoke to a secre- tary) while my daughter was in the hospital. I was upset that she was injured and concerned about room, they thereby increase loft business in Ann Arbor. By tell- ing the students that they must take the lofts down at the end of the year and put the rooms back with the original furniture, they create a new demand for lofts. Either they should keep a double room to simply two people, or the University should build loft and keep the room that way, so that three people can live in ad- equate space. In any case, I think it is ap- palling that we let our students live in lofts that do not have to meet any safety code and that do not have any required inspec- tions. I hope that more parents and students become aware this situation before any more injuries take place. Hopefully, some good will come out of our experience if some standards or inspections are created. Diane and Scott Brown Deerfield, IL Cartoonist is 0 creatively exhausted To the Daily: In their parting words, Flint Wainess and Sam Goodstein ex- pressed their thanks to their "re- silient" editorial cartoonist, J' Lasser. Perhaps a more fittin word would have been "redun- dant." Thursday's depiction of The Union proudly flying the Nike flag is Lasser's third or fourth commentary regarding University Housing Division Alan Levy, associate director . ,- L C .. -..J & A..:. ! - n .,I .,,,r . 4 A 03