VIO | Blog Row

Today’s Flat Hat staff editorial is an excellent example of how, it would appear, the student body is now dealing with an editorial board much more reasonable than those in years past. “Nichol snubs students” accurately reflects the nature of former William & Mary President Gene Nichol’s interview with Williamsburg’’s local PBS station a few days ago. The entirety of the editorial is as follows:

Former College President Gene Nichol ended his near month and a half of silence Friday to talk to the press. But he wasn’t talking to reporters or answering the questions you might expect. Instead of granting repeated interview requests from the student media, Nichol appeared on PBS, talking cozily with WHRO host Cathy Lewis about issues ranging from the strain on his family to the intellectual rigor of students at the College.

While Nichol has a right to privacy, his resignation e-mail raised more questions than it answered. He has yet to justify his accusations against the College’s governing body — accusations that put Board of Visitors members in the awkward position of having to defend their decision while avoiding further damage to the reputation of Nichol and the College. The BOV faced an interrogation from students, faculty and staff while Nichol shied away from further discussion of his unsubstantiated allegations.

Nichol has snubbed the very students he claims to have championed. It is time for him to answer for his actions in an open, honest dialogue — the way BOV members answered for theirs.

There isn’t much more to say about it than that. Honestly, though, I’m shocked I’m reading this in The Flat Hat. A year ago, an editorial like this would never have been a reality. Cheers.

[NCF]

At about 4 am today, the dorm room door of Editor in Chief Emeritus of The Virginia Informer Joe Luppino-Esposito (’08) was vandalized with glitter, shaving cream, and the duct-taped affixing of front pages of The Informer. The page in question was from The Informer’s February 13 issue, featuring the infamous “NICHOL RESIGNS” headline.

As childish as this is — after all, it IS April Fools’ Day — it does, I think, speak to the larger issue of intellectual diversity and tolerance of thought that is exhibited — or, sometimes, not exhibited – at William & Mary. The Informer put out a press release on this vandalism this morning:

“I’m just worried about what will come next for students who dare to speak up and stand up for what they believe in,” said Andrew B. Blasi, the newly-named editor in chief of The Virginia Informer. Blasi said that the newspaper would be following up on the story in the coming days. “The sixty members of The Virginia Informer and I expect a statement from the university regarding this incident that includes what they plan to do to deter these types of personal attacks against students.”

“Year after year the school talks about diversity,” said Luppino-Esposito. “But what about intellectual diversity? What about getting some protection for students who, after seeing incidents like this, will be intimidated to exercise their rights? It’s time for William and Mary to tackle these issues, because they are becoming enormous problems. Conservatives need a safe haven on campus from radical students who want to silence them….I’m just afraid many will be intimidated enough to stay quiet and refuse to question the environment around them, and that’s very bad for the future of free speech on this campus.”

Slow news day or not, this press release was picked up and reported on by The Daily Press in today’s issue:

The former editor of the Virginia Informer, a conservative-leaning campus newspaper that long called for Gene Nichol’s ouster as William and Mary’s president, had his dormitory room door vandalized early today.

Joe Luppino-Esposito contended the vandalism — shaving cream and glitter across his door, along with copies of the Informer issue that recapped Nichol’s resignation covering the doorway — was retaliation for his opposition to Nichol.

The bottom line is this: glitter, shaving cream, and duct tape are the products of a high school mind, one still excited by the concept of leaving flaming bags of dog crap on people’s front porches and which delights in, say, throwing rotten eggs at old people. Assuming it was a single individual, he should probably get ready for a phone call from campus police in the next day or so. The ID system on campus records each and every swipe of an ID card into dorm buildings. I imagine that there aren’t too many people trying to get into Harrison at 4 am on a Tuesday morning, so whoever did this has a very good chance of getting caught. If this person were smarter, he would have realized this.

And the larger issue here, also, is that what Informer haters don’t seem to realize — and I don’t know why they don’t, because it’s happened enough times by now — is that every time this sort of thing happens, it only benefits the very organization they are trying to belittle. The door of The Informer’s former editor in chief gets vandalized, the paper puts out a press release complete with pictures of the incident, and we end up with a lot of sympathetic, positive press.

It’s really quite that simple — just ask the people who started the “Pick up a copy of The Virginia Informer today! THEN BURN IT.” Facebook group, because that’s exactly what happened.

[NCF]