Monthly Archives: October 2020

Profanity Proliferates on the Lawn

Posted on October 10, 2020 by | Leave a comment

by James A. Bacon

After a resident of the Lawn at the University of Virginia posted signage saying, “Fuck UVa,” outraged alumni raised a stink in a series of letters to UVa President Jim Ryan. For the time being, said Ryan, Lawn residents’ free speech is protected by the First Amendment, but the administration is working on a longer-term solution. In the meantime, at least one other Lawn resident has joined the first in using the same profanity to express his/her/their/zir/its antipathy to the university (in the sign seen at right).

Rob Schilling, a talk radio host at WINA radio in Charlottesville, photographed that sign, as well as several others displayed on Lawn doors, and displayed them on a videocast. (No direct link, but you can find the videocast on The Schilling Show blog.) Continue reading →

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Newspeak for a Racial Spoils System

Posted on October 8, 2020 by | Leave a comment

Photo credit: Washington Post

Letter from Walter L. Smith

How did this alumni disconnect happen?

Over the years I think alumni have become inured to politics coming out of our academical village, in line with a Jeffersonian belief in free speech. But that creeping politicization has now become an obsession which seems to have reached a peak with the Unite the Right rally and stayed at that level since, to the detriment of actual intellectual inquiry and reasoned discourse. Since the Unite the Right rally it seems all the alumni hear from the people in charge of the University is racism and contextualization – ponderously named Committees to study “controversial” topics and make recommendations which seem aimed at wiping out history in the name of “racial equity.”

Published reports about the Unite the Right rally describe the “white supremacists” as ranging from dozens to 250. While I am not sure all of the people were actually “white supremacists,” to gather a group of 250 of them required an assemblage from all over the United States. I would guess that there
are more dangerous drunks in Charlottesville on a football weekend than “white supremacists” in all of the Commonwealth of Virginia. Seriously, 250 (at most) whackos “took over” our Grounds that good people needed to take them back and wear TAKEBACKOURGROUNDS wristbands years later? Continue reading →

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Posted in Race, Equity and Diversity

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Fraternities as Bastions Against the Cultural Totalitarians

Posted on October 7, 2020 by | Leave a comment

The University of Virginia’s fraternity row. Photo credit: Daily Mail

by James A. Bacon

Back when I attended the University of Virginia many moons ago, I was a GDI — an acronym for a God-Damned Independent. During the fall rush my first year I attended two fraternity parties on Rugby Road and found nothing entertaining about hanging out with people whose sole purpose seemed to be getting sloshed. Those two experiences were all I needed to needed to convince me that I would never join a fraternity. 

As much personal disdain as I had for the Greek system, it never occurred to me to want to abolish it. It never occurred to me to insist upon imposing my values upon others. My philosophy has always been to live and let live. If the frat boys wanted to spend their colleges years in a drunken stupor, that was their choice and nobody’s business but their own (and their parents).

But we live in a different time now. We live in an era in which cultural totalitarians presume to tell everyone else how to live. And the cultural totalitarians are taking aim at fraternities and sororities as evil institutions that reinforce class stratification, elitism, discrimination and cultural appropriation, and, thus, must be abolished. I now find myself in the anomalous position of defending them. Continue reading →

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Posted in Speakers, Panels and Events

UVa Counsel Opines on Free Speech

Posted on October 5, 2020 by | Leave a comment

The “F— UVa” sign on the door of a University of Virginia resident of the Lawn violates no university policy and is protected by the First Amendment, concluded University Counsel Timothy J. Heaphy. However, a new policy banning all signs on lawn room doors could pass constitutional muster if applied prospectively instead of retrospectively.

“A new policy banning signs would also maintain the historic character of the Lawn, consistent with its status as a UNESCO World Heritage Site,” Heaphy opined in a letter addressed to university Rector James B. Murray Jr. on Sept. 29. “Students would have ample other opportunities to exercise free speech even if they could not post signs on their doors.”

However, he warned, “a blanket rule against all posters would be overinclusive, as it would remove the ability of any lawn resident to use his or her prominent
residence as a forum to promote events, highlight activities, or show support for particular perspectives or ideas.” Read the full BOV Statement in support of Ryan.

Bacon’s bottom line: Heaphy’s argument against restricting free speech makes sense to anyone who reveres the U.S. Constitution. I just wonder how long the logic would hold up if someone posted “Blue Lives Matter” or “Make America Great Again” on a door sign on the Lawn. Can anyone be found to do such a thing? It would make an instructive experiment. Continue reading →

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Posted in Freedom of speech and expression

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