Development requires growth and growth requires freedom. The Office of Student Development facilitates neither.

To make a difference at Marquette, one needs approval. This approval can take very long and is a burdensome obstacle to the free enterprise of students. In the spirit of being solutions oriented, I propose a new paradigm called: “free to choose,” or “innocent until proven guilty.”

This paradigm would allow students to assemble new organizations with less hassle and current student organizations to serve their missions with fewer delays. At its core, this standard would permit new groups to form after drafting a one page description of their proposed missions and expected programming, with a brief addendum to explain how officers will be elected. Within three business days, the Office of Student Development would decide whether or not the organization is egregious to the Catholic faith or the Jesuit order and return a response to the group’s founders. If the organization’s undertaking is at odds to the Catholic faith, the group could be further considered for approval if for no other reason than it being “educational.”

For current student organizations, I propose an end to the draconian practice of needing the blessing of OSD for every piece of literature. What is the very worst that can happen from eliminating the procedure of prior approval for literature and flyers? I would imagine an occasional curse word, perhaps an inappropriate picture or even an idea that someone disagrees with. As a matter of disclosure, I do not condone the use of swearing, inappropriate pictures or socialism. Doubtless, there would be juvenile members of the community that would abuse their freedom and they are to be marginalized, disciplined and prayed for.

This proposal allows Marquette students to more freely choose how to make the most of their years on campus. If a student or an organization runs afoul of the bounds of decency, proper punishment(s) could still be administered by university officials.

“But how does Marquette preserve its Catholic identity?”

I believe that a Catholic university should fervently celebrate its faith at every opportunity while bringing in speakers and hosting events that do the same. If non-Catholics do not share in this enthusiasm, they are still very welcome at Marquette and are free to choose not to attend any program where the virtues of Catholicism are presented.

On the whole, for this entire suggestion to work, it requires the collective trust of the Marquette community, and the belief that their students and peers are mature enough to handle the responsibility of their own actions. It is possible for reasonable people to disagree with the ideas suggested within this article, but, if nothing else, the money saved by needing fewer administrators could be used to resurrect the Raynor Scholarship.

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The Vagina Monologues will be performed in April as the centerpiece of a multi-disciplinary symposium sponsored by the Honors Program.

It would seem opponents of the performance, myself included, need to prove two propositions: First, that at a Catholic university there are limits to academic freedom, and, second, that a reading of the Monologues falls outside those boundaries.

The first premise is a matter of doctrine, while the second is a prudential (situational) judgment.

Ex Corde Ecclesiae was promulgated in 1990 by Pope John Paul the Great as the apostolic constitution governing Catholic institutions of higher education.

In it, the Pope, himself a former university professor, wrote: “Freedom in research and teaching is recognized and respected according to the principles and methods of each individual discipline, so long as the rights of the individual and of the community are preserved within the confines of the truth and the common good.“ (General Norms Article 1 § 5).

So then, does a reading of the Monologues fall outside the “confines of truth and the common good?”

On the one side of the common good ledger is the value of learning about the experiences of women and increased awareness of sexual violence against women. Opposite is the affect on the audience of the obscene and vulgar parts of the play, including extensive foul language and offensive stories about immoral activities.

As to truth, again on the one side is the literal truth of the rightfully shocking nature of violence against women, and the truth of the statements of women interviewed by the playwright. On the other hand there are the larger, transcendent truths of human sexuality, the family, love, and authentic femininity that are assaulted and insulted by the play.

I will grant there are arguments for both sides of the second question (I will assume that Marquette accepts the first premise, though unfortunately that may be a dubious assumption).

Many Catholic college presidents have also been forced to respond to the situation the Rev. Wild now finds himself in. Some have caved and admitted it in under a mistaken notion of “academic freedom,” denying the first premise.

Others have acknowledged the first premise, yet came to a different prudential judgment.

As noted above, there are both costs and benefits to be weighed on the question of truth and the common good. Thankfully, several college presidents have acknowledged that the benefits can be achieved without the costs, because the good of increased awareness of violence against women can be found in programs without the drawbacks of the Monologues.

This is the path Marquette should take – accept the first premise, that at a Catholic school we willingly accept limits to academic freedom for the sake of other, higher values, acknowledge the costs the Monologues impose, and instead support other ways to address the important issue of violence against women.

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It is striking how events conspire together so each year a particular topic emerges as the central battleground of university life.

Two years ago, everything centered around the nickname debate. At the end of it, for a brief while, we were stuck with “Gold.” As student outrage gushed , the leadership of the Marquette University Student Government put out a statement supporting the decision.

While the Board of Trustees quickly came around and reverted to “Golden Eagles,” the tone was set for the next year. Student involvement in university governance became a major topic of discussion. Both candidates for MUSG president pledged to fight for a student representative on the Board of Trustees as a visible sign of increased shared governance.

Last year, students lost a lot of steam in their battle for greater representation in university decision-making. While MUSG’s leadership has admirably made the case to the Board for a greater student voice, we’ve seen no tangible progress. And as more of us who were around for “the Gold” graduate, the issue is less and less at the fore.

So far this year, the student theme is academic freedom.

On the one hand, we have the Vagina Monologues. Denied by the administration last year when a student organization asked permission to perform them, they are now permitted because the performance is sponsored by an academic program with faculty present.

I have argued (see the Feb. 14 issue of the Warrior) that the performance is an abuse of academic freedom, and there are limits to current notions of “academic freedom” at a Catholic campus.

The same week that the administration allowed the Vagina Monologues, it denied permission for a student organization to form under the moniker, “Students for Academic Freedom.” SAF would have done rather innocuous things, like advocate for a Student Bill of Rights or ask that students be able to see reading lists before they sign up for classes.

The administration turned SAF’s application down in the name of, ironically, academic freedom. Take the latter example of public reading lists. If faculty had to disclose the lists for their classes, [conservative] students [like myself] may find questionable material on those lists and inquire further or object to their inclusion.

Or, perhaps we would find that certain professors assign overwhelmingly ideologically biased books.This would put pressure on the faculty to change their book lists, thus wrongly (in their minds) crimping the academic freedom of the faculty.

And this is where it all comes together. The argument being advanced by the administration is, again, that students have nothing to contribute to the governance of the University. We should just pay our tuition, show up in class and otherwise do as we are told.

We should not know how the University is run, we should not speak up about ideological bias among faculty and we should not question decisions made by “the adults.”

This battle over academic freedom is a direct outgrowth over last year’s debate about student involvement in University governance.

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To the editor:
In response to Mike Snider’s question as to why Dr. Daniel Maguire has not been excused from teaching at Marquette University, the answer if fairly simple. Marquette has explicitly stated, in both in its Mission Statement and Faculty Handbook, that the presence of academic freedom in the classroom is necessary to the advancement of knowledge and scholarship.

Or more simply, it is a right guaranteed to faculty so that they may freely explore the boundaries of their discipline without being fearful of retaliation.

The reason why Marquette has chosen to guarantee this right to its faculty is a question of identity. Marquette is not a seminary. Marquette is not school of religion, but a religious school. Marquette recognizes itself as a scholastic institution which cherishes its religious identity, not vice versa.

As a note, the same constitutional right that gives Mr. Snider the ability to publicly question whether or not Dr. Maguire’s presence is appropriate also grants Dr. Maguire’s the ability to speak his mind in his classroom. As such, the removal of Dr. Maguire on such grounds would be legally bankrupt.

However, Mr. Snider does have the right to question Dr. Maguire and his teachings as suitable to the Catholic belief. And as Mr. Snider has noted, the Archbishop Dolan already responded to such concern.

In all, I would suggest we all take the following course of action. Save our breath, realize we are not always going to agree with professors and worry about ethical and legal violations on campus before ideological differences in the classroom. Or at least, review the rights accorded to faculty before we ask, “Why is he still employeed?”
–Sean Cahill

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Marquette is no exception to the rise of new issues regarding freedom of expression on the Web that has emerged with the ever-expanding blogosphere.

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