Last semester, Chancellor Kent Syverud spoke about a lack of free speech on Syracuse University’s campus. Now, his administration is punishing expression of free speech with interim suspensions. If SU administration condemned hate speech with the same energy with which they have condemned protesting, perhaps they would have caught the perpetrators of the numerous hate crimes and bias incidents that started the #NotAgainSU movement.

On Nov. 29, 2019, Syverud sent out a campus wide email with the subject line “Rising Above Hate and Fear.” Syverud’s message was intended to welcome students back from Thanksgiving Break to a campus that had recently made many students feel unwelcome.

If the Chancellor had managed to hold on to any scraps of credibility after last semester’s ineptitude, he lost them today. Today, student protesters continued an occupation of Crouse-Hinds Hall, where they pushed urgently for change on our campus, just as the Chancellor had called for in his email. Department of Public Safety officers rose to the occasion by blocking entrance to the building, preventing student protesters from eating, and threatening them with suspension.

The administration’s response to the occupation of Crouse-Hinds by student protesters on Monday confirms their lack of commitment to the implementation of student demands. Why can’t the administration react to hate crimes with the same swift speed and succinct cohesion with which it opposed student protesters this week?

Student protesters who occupied Crouse-Hinds Hall were told that if they did not vacate the building when the building closes, they would be recommended to the Office of Student Rights and Responsibilities. Many students remained in the building overnight anyway.

DPS officers barred the entrances to the building all day Tuesday and prevented protesters outside the building from delivering food and health supplies to people inside the building. The conduct of DPS officers at Crouse-Hinds reflects the department’s commitment to aggravating the wellbeing of students of color.

The administration has long demonstrated indifference towards the well-being of marginalized communities on Syracuse’s campus. SU authorities have failed to apprehend and punish the perpetrators of the dozens of hate crimes that occurred on and around SU campus in the final weeks of last semester. SU administration failed to cancel class after a white supremacist manifesto was posted to an online SU forum on Greekrank, confirming a clear indifference to the safety of international students, Jewish students and students of color.

This week, though, the administration has crossed the threshold separating indifference from hostility. Blocking student protesters from access to food and health products jeopardizes the immediate safety of those students. Searching student protesters’ bodies and bags, and confiscating food, breaks these students’ Fourth Amendment right against unwarranted search and seizure. The administration’s issuing of suspension notices to protesters at Crouse-Hinds is absurd. The university should, and probably will, rescind these suspension notices.

The administration’s response to this new student protest has confirmed what I previously feared about Syverud. His greatest crime is ineptitude. The Chancellor is sincere when he says he wants to create a safe campus. He is completely incapable, though, of creating the safe and welcoming campus he envisions.

I have lost all faith in SU’s administration, which has prioritized the suppression of student protests over the protection of student safety. The administration has signaled to students, in no uncertain terms, that it is furiously determined to maintain the status quo.

A demonstrated commitment to the undermining of student protesters’ basic rights has convinced me that it is time for Chancellor Syverud and DPS Chief Maldonado to resign.

 

Patrick McCarthy is a senior creative writing and American history major. His column appears bi-weekly. He can be reached at pmcca100@syr.edu. He can be followed on Twitter at @pmcopinion.

Published on February 18, 2020 at 10:56 pm