We can’t have hurt feelings on a college campus, can we?

The College Fix reports.

University investigates April Fools’ newspaper because it hurt a grad student’s feelings

Did you know that by refusing to meet with a grad student you have offended, you have “intimidated her in an attempt to take away her freedom of speech”?

The University of Wisconsin-Superior’s Debbie Cheslock filed a “formal grievance” against her school paper, the Promethean, after it ran an April Fools’ edition that included “demeaning language,” the Duluth News Tribune reports.

Now the school is investigating the paper for “unethical and unprofessional journalism” that shows “disrespectful and offensive language,” according to a since-scrubbed Facebook post by the administration.

This comes our way via the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), which notes a few things:

The editor-in-chief who wrote the parody article mocking Jewish stereotypes is Jewish

The April Fools’ edition is paid for with advertising revenue, not student fees

The paper warned readers on its Facebook page that they might be offended by the satire

Nonetheless, because the print edition “didn’t have a disclaimer,” it offended people “in protected classes” and the editors refused to meet with her, student Cheslock demanded the administration punish the Promethean.

Did we mention she’s staff in the Gender Equity Resource Center?

FIRE wrote to UW-Superior Chancellor Renée Wachter on Wednesday, warning that its “active investigation” of the Promethean, whose April Fools’ edition is immediately identifiable by its above-the-fold cover,

is a chilling and unacceptable infringement upon the students’ rights to free expression guaranteed by the First Amendment and an unacceptable suggestion to UWS students and faculty that protected speech may be subject to disciplinary action.

Judicial precedent suggests the university could be successfully sued for no other action beyond opening an investigation into unambiguously protected speech, FIRE says.


 
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