Sorry this took a week to post, but better late than never. It’s a letter in support from Mike Alewitz, an internationally renowned muralist, Associate Professor of Art at CCSU, and the YSA advisor. He was a student activist at Kent State University and a leader of the national student strike following the massacre of four students on May 4, 1970. The letter was published in the New Britain Herald, but I can’t find the link for some reason–if someone would like to pass it along, I’ll add it asap.
Is the right to protest antithetical to existing standards of student journalism?
That question was posed this week at Central Connecticut State University, when Marissa Blasko was dismissed from her position as Opinion Editor for the student newspaper, The Recorder. She was not fired due to her job performance, but because she is active in the antiwar movement and is a member of the Youth for Socialist Action club.
Given the uproar following her dismissal, it is worth revisiting how democratic rights and student journalism developed in the past few decades.
Prior to the free speech movement of the mid 1960s, most universities did not allow political activity on campus. The ability to distribute leaflets, sponsor forums or hold demonstrations – these rights were won in tandem with the civil rights and anti-Vietnam war movements. Teach-ins and rallies helped to change the consciousness and revise the role of the university as a place where students could question the fundamental nature of society.
One of the conquests of that time was the development of independent campus newspapers – publications financed and controlled by the student body. The papers were forceful advocates for students, frequently experimental, and addressed themselves to important cultural and political concerns.
But today, campus life has changed. As we slip deeper into an economic crisis, and pressures on students mount, the question is raised: Should campus newspapers seek to enforce the values and ethics of the commercial print media, or be a voice for students to express their own aspirations.
This is no small matter – already working long hours and sinking into debt, students face increased tuition and a shrinking job market. The pressure to focus on job training has much validity.
But how did we arrive at this situation? The social and economic crisis did not come into being by greedy bankers and corrupt officials alone. It was facilitated by many of society’s institutions, including an often-malleable press that covered up the truth about the war in Iraq and the collapsing economy.
Those systemic problems provide clear proof of the need for a liberal arts education. Study of the arts and sciences is the foundation for developing the ability to see and investigate. It helps to develop the skills for analytical thinking that are essential for a free and critical press.
The nature of the press is constantly changing. There was a time when the US had hundreds of competing newspapers. Most cities had several mainstream dailies. Unions, community groups and churches had newspapers, magazines and even radio stations. Every immigrant nationality had papers in an array of different languages. There were publications for every ideological tendency: socialist, communist, populist, anarchist, social democratic, syndicalist, pacifist, agrarian, industrial, utopian, etc.
The public was exposed to a broad range of ideas presented by the publications advocates. Good reporting meant honest presentation of the facts and direct acknowledgement of what was fact and what was opinion – not the false claim that the reporter or editor was a cipher without prejudices, opinions, religious or political beliefs.
Over time, our media has become more centralized and sanitized. Today, virtually all our commercial media – television, movies, cable, radio and magazines – are owned and controlled by a handful of conglomerates. Our leading newspapers are struggling to survive.
Ironically, this is an extraordinary moment for an aspiring journalist. The Internet has made it possible for student writers to practice their craft in an unprecedented manner. A new journalism is being created that allows individuals to acquire a readership with incredible speed.
The growth of Internet journalism will mean the disappearance of many newspapers. But it is a dialectical process – it may very well lead to a revitalization and improvement of the printed media that survives. Young people will be attracted to journalism that is optimistic and forward-looking, not the policies of discredited institutions that have failed in their social responsibilities.
Consider these journalists: John Reed, Edward R. Murrow, Dorothy Day, Margaret Bourke-White, Upton Sinclair, Hunter Thompson, Mark Twain, H. L. Mencken, Alice Dunnigan, Seymour Hersh, Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward, Ernest Hemingway, Truman Capote, I. F. Stone and Howard Cosell – these writers were passionate in their beliefs – would they have been barred from working at The Recorder?
In a recent poll conducted by Rasmussen Reports, respondents were asked, “Which is a better system-capitalism or socialism?” Among people under 30 years old, 66% are actively questioning capitalism as a system.
As the world experiences the repercussions of the economic crisis, young people are going to organize unions, unemployed leagues, antiwar demonstrations, coalitions fighting for student rights – and in the process of organizing they will consider socialist, anarchist, libertarian and many other ideologies. That has been true of every generation.
CCSU students have a right to participate in such activities and consider those ideas. That includes Marissa Blaszko.
