As President David Frohnmayer dons the robes of one seemingly protecting free expression in two current campus issues, the robes become transparent. They reveal one who, committed to resolving budgetary problems, tramples on free expression to protect major sources of revenue.
The squabble over KUGN is the small-timer among the two. Students and faculty urge the University to ask the radio station — anchor of the Oregon Sports Network — to not carry other programming whose viciousness and bigotry toward minorities contrasts to the University’s mission statement and principles.
Cause of the concern is the daily syndicated show of attack talk show host, Michael Savage. Recordings document the program’s savagery toward minorities. The request is not that he be censored, but that the University make it clear to KUGN that it will not give silent approval to the Savage words by having Oregon game broadcasts originate at a station that carries them. Ironically, a high proportion of players on the men’s basketball and football teams are of a race subjected to the verbal bigotry.
If KUGN is not willing to make the choice, the University should exclude it and any other station that carries bigotry from bidding for the broadcast contract up for bid again this June. This should be part of the stated criteria, along with other restrictions. Money is involved, as the current contract is worth $1 million to the University Department of Athletics. Will other stations bid as high? Perhaps not. But the rights are an advertising goldmine, and bids of others would be comparable.
When the president praises student concern, but rejects their request to move to another station, he is disingenUOus, if not hypocritical. Whether the station calls itself “the voice of the Ducks,” listeners to all of its programming associate it with the Ducks.
The big-time squabble relates to the proposal of Prof. Frank Stahl that the University Senate formerly oppose the United States starting a preemptive war against Iraq, or anyone. The president’s response was, once again, crafty: “It is not the place of this University to be captured by any one political voice.”
If the issue is political, it is only because, as Stahl said, an anti-war vote could cost the University support from the Republican state Legislature and from corporations that profit from a war economy. This also might lead to potential loss of grants from federal sources accountable to the war stance of the Bush administration. When a president feels his hands are tied by the will of donors whose money is needed, the University is fortunate to have a spokesman of principle like Frank Stahl.