This letter to the editor is in response to Ross Abbott's column "Oklahoma University wrong to expel students" published March 17.
From one Gamecock to another:
Hi Ross, I read your piece on the situation coming out of Oklahoma University, and I, as a journalist, just wanted to give you some friendly advice. I first want to tell you when I read the title of your article I was none too pleased.
It probably has something to do with me being a black woman who thought that little jingle was off-beat and terribly racist. I could not understand why anyone, let alone my fellow Gamecock, would want to let those boys continue to enjoy the benefits of any civilized learning institution, (even though it's clear those SAE members need to learn a thing or two about being civilized human beings).
Now at first I was up in arms that a journalist would disregard the golden rules of writing and state his opinion. Every journalist knows that when it comes to writing, their opinion does not matter.
I then did a little research and saw that you were writing in the opinion section, so I can't scold you there. Then I did some more digging and found out that you aren't even a journalist, so I can't expect you to spot the mistakes you made in that little think piece of yours. Let me give you some pointers in case you plan to write some more in the future.
I saw that you referenced free speech to defend why those young boys should not have been expelled. Kudos to you for having the names of cases and everything. I'm going to give you some knowledge that was passed to me from the brilliant and eccentric Erik Collins and his media law class: Free speech does not protect hate speech. Hate speech — aka that little chant those SAE boys were singing so enthusiastically to — is speech that offends, threatens or insults groups based on race, gender, ethnic groups, disability or sexual orientation.
The reason that it's not protected is because hate speech can often incite prejudicial action, like not allowing qualified young men into a bigoted chapter of an organization based simply on the color of their skin.
Glad we got that cleared up. If you have any questions you can catch me at the next Hip Hop Wednesday on Greene Street or a National Association of Black Journalists meeting; with a little fine tuning you could be a great writer for us one day.