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From: rick@uwmacc.UUCP (the absurdist)
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin
Subject: Re: Defending Eric Mading
Message-ID: <2032@uwmacc.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 23-Nov-87 10:50:26 EST
Article-I.D.: uwmacc.2032
Posted: Mon Nov 23 10:50:26 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 26-Nov-87 00:20:41 EST
References: <7427@eddie.MIT.EDU> <1853@chinet.UUCP> <7439@eddie.MIT.EDU> <34296@sun.uucp> <7460@eddie.MIT.EDU>
Reply-To: rick@unix.macc.wisc.edu.UUCP (The Absurdist)
Organization: UW-Madison Academic Computer Center
Lines: 39

In article <7460@eddie.MIT.EDU> ooblick@eddie.MIT.EDU (Mikki Barry) writes:
>Maybe you should have said *some* of the people involved.  Nobody has said
>that those for pulling Eric's account do not have the right to say that.
>Your attempt to put my point of view in simplistic terms has distorted it.
>Of course, the University of Wisconsin can do what the hell it likes.  But
>remember, it gave the account back.  It thought that Eric's First Amendment
>rights were violated.  If you disagree, more power to you.  I happen to
>agree with them in this specific case.

Mikki,
	according to the posting from UW Comp Sci's news administrator,
they notified someone in the Dean's office, and were told that they
"might" have violated Eric's First Amendment rights.  If you think
about it, any bureaucracy as large as UW can't make up its mind
about anything like this in the 1-week turnaround in the Mading
affair;  it was an ad hoc decision to put everything back the way
it was.
	This decision was also no doubt influenced by a recent incident
in which a local fraternity was put on suspension (without a hearing)
because some of its members were charged with starting a fight in
another fraternity house and uttering racist slurs.  UW started
its own investigation, (AFTER the suspension) and the first thing
the "special prosecutor" (a professor from the UW Law School) did
was advise the Dean's office that suspending an organization without
a hearing was a violation of their first amendment rights.
This has no doubt left them shy of other arbitrary actions.  It
doesn't constitute a ruling that students have a right to use
machines to post news.  Only a ruling that acting hastily is 
a bad idea.

(Re the frat/racism case:  they were not found guilty, just charged.  
Punishment without trial, I love it.  Not to mention collective guilt.
Sometimes I feel like I'm living in Wonderland:  first the sentence,
and then the trial.  I am not fond of the fraternity system, but I
am fond of the US system of justice, and what has been going on with
this case isn't it.)
-- 
Rick Keir -- all the oysters have moved away -- UWisc - Madison
"Watch the skies...."