On Sun, 11 Sep 2005, Michael Torrie wrote:
So, you won't ever hear me complain that BYU doesn't let people display pr0n
on the jumbotron during football games (although what's with those short
cheerleader skirts, anyway?), or run for-profit websites out of their campus
offices. But if Notre Dame searched everyone's backpacks upon entering campus
to see if they were bringing in any contraband Book[s] of Mormon[s] (because
really, space on campus is limited and they don't want that space taken up by
such things), I (and plenty of others) would raise the Big Brother cry.
I hardly see how this example relates to BYU's acceptable use of IT
policies (such as they are).
I'll use smaller words. BYU says: "we don't have to let you use our campus
for things we don't approve of, so we'll watch over your shoulder and make
sure you don't." If Notre Dame, a Catholic school, did that with backpacks
and the BoM, we'd complain, because the limited resource isn't the issue, it's
imposing your will on others rather than letting them make their own choices.
Filtered web access is also about control, not scarcity.
Under a big brother society you don't have a choice as to what you are
subjected to. You do have a choice here at BYU. If you need more
"freedom," nobody is stopping you from going somewhere outside of BYU to
express yourself. I'm taking a very extreme point of view here, just
because I get so tired of people talking about how BYU owes them this or
that or wishing BYU wouldn't suppress them. As if academic freedom is
somehow a basic right that BYU must grant them.
Correct, and of course Winston Smith's membership in the organization (along
with his job, relationships with friends, etc.) was duly revoked as well.
All you're saying is, "if you don't like the way members of the administration
impose themselves on the BYU community, just leave." I could likewise
respond, "if you don't like the way I, who am also a part of BYU, wish to
define The Way Things Should Be at BYU, why don't *you* just leave?"
Of course, I can't expel you from the community for not obeying my commands,
nor would I want to. But just because various bureaucrats can doesn't mean
they control what BYU *is*. I don't stay at BYU because of all the wonderful
ways my freedom is limited here. I stay because there are cool people here I
enjoy interacting with, and despite the authoritarians who think they know
what's best for me. If the authoritarians get despotic enough, I and others
will find another community to live in. But I won't pretend to like them in
the meantime or be silent because you don't like my ideas.
-J
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