Like they do every year on Sept. 11, the College Democrats and Republicans engaged in a fairly obvious display of remembrance by sticking American flags on Bascom Hill. For the most part, the event was a repetition of its predecessors, where 2,772 flags – one for every victim of the tragedy – are planted. Conspicuously absent, however, was the memorial service, during which members of both groups indulge in a little harmless nostalgia, courtesy of shared experience and selective amnesia.
As Central Reservations informed Stephen Duerst of the College Republicans when they e-mailed to reserve the bottom section of Bascom for the flag-planting, the hill is available for displays only. “Actual events,” including candle lighting and singing, were declared off-limits. The show was thus terminated early, with Duerst and company concluding it would be too onerous to move the speaking portion elsewhere. And while the regulations regarding Bascom were written in 2002, this is the first time it has been enforced upon the annual service.
To be sure, the absence of a generational crisis on the magnitude of Vietnam has made declining interest in national affairs a certainty. But prohibiting even the blandest of vocal expressions – including a song – their proper place at the physical heart of the public discourse is not only wrong, it’s a sign of the times. In the absence of serious student agitation, our kindly overseers have taken it upon themselves to decide which forums are appropriate for public expression, and of which kind. On Bascom Hill an imagined right not to be confronted with an audible provocation to think takes precedence over free assembly’s greatest benefit – a conversation.
And while transparent and ultimately meaningless appeals to national unity aren’t the most enviable highlights for a discussion of the public forum, it is nonetheless perverse that the home of the plaque which enshrines the concept of sifting and winnowing is now off limits to those wishing to benefit from it. For such events, the organizers were pointed in the direction of Library Mall.
In practice it seems as though enforcement of the 2002 ban was likely geared towards groups such as the Student Labor Action Coalition, which last spring held a rally in front of the Chancellor’s office to draw attention to the university’s contract with Nike, which was accused of mistreating workers at the plant that produced university apparel. Graced with a microphone and speakers, the rally was loud, and could certainly be characterized by its detractors as obnoxious. But it did not turn violent, nor did it significantly disrupt the ability of anyone else to get on with their day. However, even if SLAC had actually intended to make hoodlums of the fifty-something leftists in attendance, it is not within the purview of state employees – whatever their job descriptions – to broadly muzzle an entire student body at the place most students regard as the heart of their community.
Certain realities are inevitable. Your average passerby, overburdened with books, debt and an ill-timed hangover probably couldn’t have been bothered to wade in to a sea of cheap plastic and fake wood and partake, no matter what the cause. The ceremony almost surely would have been limited to a few demagogues preaching unity while secretly pondering what aging rocker they will one day identify with in order to nab that coveted spot up on Capitol Hill. Such is the convenient vapidity of the prevailing discourse on national tragedies. Someone would have taken a picture and we all would have gotten back down to the mentally taxing spectacle of a football weekend in America’s greatest college town.
But a better hypothetical, the aforementioned passer-by might have actually had the time to spare for a brief walk amidst the stars and stripes. They would have walked onto the grass and installed themselves amidst 2,772 repetitions of the most controversial square of cloth on earth in order to simply listen. Then, in all likelihood, that anonymous observer would have left, further convinced that apathy is indeed the best response to a political system founded on thoughtless displays of patriotism and oratorical stoma.
Then again, they might have spoken their mind.
Sam Clegg ([email protected]) is a senior majoring in economics.
