We certainly hope a silenced student newspaper is not the image of academic vibrancy and a free exchange of ideas UW-Oshkosh or the university system wants to portray to the outside world. Instead of idly sitting on the sidelines, university administrators should take strong steps to reorganize funding for the newspaper so that it is no longer vulnerable to such transparent censorship by the student government. Because even if Tuesday's vote fails, the threat of such action in the future threatens to permanently chill the free speech of student journalists. Moreover, we'd expect the faculty to take a strong stand in support of the student newspaper and the positive role it plays on campus. The Advance-Titan not only provides students with valuable experience in all facets of running a newspaper, it is an important forum and outlet for the university community.
Academic freedom is indeed a hollow concept if it applies only to tenured faculty.
Student editors, like their professional counterparts, need to be fair, balanced, accurate, objective and responsible. They learn to make decisions, and along the way make some good choices and some mistakes. What is particularly distressing is that an anonymous letter to the editor published in the Sept. 27 A-T that takes a revisionist view of the Holocaust seems to be a strong undercurrent in the desire to shut down the newspaper. There is a troubling trend among some academics to suppress and censor speech they find distasteful instead of using the episodes as opportunities to teach, learn and listen. Therefore, the university community can rightfully criticize student editors for their apparent failure to follow their own policy on letters to the editor.