Anti-Semitism at UC Campuses: First Amendment Right?

HERE’S WHAT I KNOW-This year has not been a good year for Jews on college campuses. Among the multiple acts signaling a rise in anti-Semitism, at my alma mater Vanderbilt University, three swastikas were imprinted on a wall of the AE Pi House where I spent time as a little sister. In February, anti-Semitic graffiti was scrawled on the walls of the AE Pi house at UC Davis. Just a month later, anti-Semitic and anti-Zionist graffiti were found in a restroom and on a university-owned building at UC Berkeley. 

The same month at UCLA during the Student Council’s confirmation of the nomination of a student to the council’s Judicial Board, the student nominee was asked, “Given that you are a Jewish student and very active in the Jewish community, how do you see yourself being able to maintain an unbiased view?” 

Just this month, a student allegedly on work study at UCLA Health spewed a stream of anti-Semitic and anti-Zionist comments on a Facebook thread that was also peppered with expletives. 

This week, the employee relations manager at UCLA Health/David Geffen School of Medicine responded to a message from a pro-Israel group stating that the student’s comments “display insensitivity of the history and racial diversity of the Jewish people and a lack of empathy for those who are different.” The manager went on to explain that the rhetoric “doesn’t represent the values of our institution or the beliefs of our campus. Sentiments like this are worthy of our condemnation. The University cannot control the activities of individuals in their personal lives when they are not acting on behalf of the University. The first amendment protects individual private speech, however reprehensible the University finds it.” 

When I first read about the comment thread, I shared the University’s response. “I may not agree with what you say but I’ll die defending your right to say it.” I was not a proponent of the Patriot Act and am not in favor of Donald Trump’s proposal to “get rid of” the internet. Preserving the Bill of Rights is essential to our democracy. The second we allow the dissolution of illegal search and seizure or freedom of speech is dangerous territory. 

The ACLU stance on hate speech on college campuses is that “views are entitled to be heard, explored, supported or refuted.” When hate is in the open, the problem is transparent to all, allowing opponents to organize to counter the hate speech and “forge solidarity against the forces of intolerance.” Intolerant speech is a symptom of bigotry. Addressing the bigger picture encompasses counseling about bigotry and adding to the curriculum. 

We walk a fine line when we allow for restrictions of our freedoms, be it the freedom to assemble, speak, publish our thoughts or even practice a certain religion. It’s easy to allow our fears to bring knee jerk reactions to agree to these limits when politicians propose them; but throughout history, that’s exactly how totalitarian and fascist governments achieved power. 

We live in tenuous times. We are challenged by the threat of terrorism and crime. We accept police brutality and gun violence. We are willing to let government agencies conduct intrusive surveillance on all of us, often without just cause. These are slippery slopes. 

We must do what we can to preserve the Bill of Rights and to uphold the Constitution but at the same time, we must insist that hatred and intolerance are not accepted. We are giving a free pass to anti-Semitism because the issue of targeting Jews, for whatever reason, doesn’t fall into the category of political correctness. 

The employee manager at UCLA Health was right in stating that we must preserve our First Amendment rights. Hate speech is not legally regarded as an exception to the First Amendment. As an educational institution benefiting from diversity, UCLA and its agents do have a duty to expose and take a stance against intolerance, something they have minimalized through a lukewarm, canned response. 

Are we ever going to eliminate intolerance, anti-Semitism, racism, bigotry, sexism, or homophobia? Probably not. We can at least try to educate those who perpetuate or listen and we can make it clear that we will not tolerate hateful rhetoric.

 

(Beth Cone Kramer is a Los Angeles-based writer and CityWatch contributor.) Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

-cw

  

CityWatch

Vol 13 Issue 103

Pub: Dec 22, 2015