Freedom of speech not a substitute for good judgment

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By Stephen Phillips

The Daily Reveille’s management made a mistake Wednesday, Sept. 12. But before I delve into this, I want to start by clarifying that while this is undeniably an attack on The Daily Reveille’s recent lapse in judgment, I have nothing against the paper in general. I still read it almost every day, and I suspect that most of you do the same.

I almost missed Wednesday’s issue of The Daily Reveille, where columnist Michael Denton wrote an article entitled “America needs to stand against homosexuality.” Unpopular article indeed.

Several readers showed me the column in class and in the library that day, and I couldn’t help but laugh – after all, isn’t Tiger Weekly supposed to be the conservative paper?

It’s not Denton’s overzealous and cowardly means of getting his 15 seconds of fame that bothers me, however. The more than 250 comments on his article pretty much sum up most of what needs to be said about him.

But what about this freedom of speech defense rearing its foul head over Denton’s article? I’m referring to the column written by The Daily Reveille’s editor-in-chief du jour, Justin Fritscher.

The Daily Reveille is a great paper, and that’s not just my opinion. The Princeton Review ranks it as the 12th-best and most popular college newspaper in the country. But with such a ranking comes a responsibility to live up to it.

At any newspaper, editors come and go but the paper remains. Therefore, it’s the editor’s job to do better than the guy or girl in charge before him – it’s never in the best interest of an editor or the newspaper to make bold statements or take risks that put the reputation of the paper in jeopardy – especially if that paper is older than the editor.

I am an advocate of free speech; obviously, you can’t effectively run a paper without supporting the first amendment whole-heartedly. In fact, I am strongly against advertisers governing a paper’s political correctness.

However, there is a certain level of business sense, management skills and respect that the editor-in-chief of a publication must develop to maintain the integrity and the reader respect of his paper.

An editor requires business sense because a big chunk of a newspaper’s revenue comes from advertisers. Like I said, I am against bending over backwards for advertisers if it means sacrificing the integrity of the paper – but at the same time, you have to respect the paper’s sponsors. They are the customer, and they want to benefit from the popularity of the paper.

You don’t insult customers by making negligent decisions that affect the overall value of their investment. They can easily take their business elsewhere.

Management sense – knowing when to draw the line and make the right decision regarding editorial content. For example, when an editor is presented an opinion piece that completely alienates a chunk of the paper’s readers, he must make a mature management decision. Does this article benefit the paper? Does he really need to run this just to get the point across that the paper advocates free speech?

And this is where respect comes in – respect for your readers, your advertisers and the rest of your staff members, whose reputation as journalists reflects the paper for which they work.

A good manager knows when to step back and reevaluate a potentially harmful situation. He realizes that free speech doesn’t mean he has no power over what goes in his paper. He realizes that censorship is not the only other option. A good manager knows there’s a better way.

While Denton’s piece was not necessarily “hate speech” (but it is damn close, mind you), the headline was sensationalized, and the article seems more like a cry for attention than a beneficial opinion column. Someone had to have noticed this and tried to speak up about it. Unfortunately, Fritscher “approved the column Tuesday night.”

That was an error in judgment. Believe me – as an editor, I’ve made my fair share of judgment errors. And then I print a retraction, not a defense.

Fritscher should have taken his support of free speech a step further by allowing someone else to write a refuting column alongside it – a column that attempts to balance Denton’s fanatic view and represent a larger portion of the paper’s readership.

Did Justin Fritscher give any member of his staff this option, or did he limit the opinion section to its regular Wednesday writers? Does Fritscher find Denton’s willingness to debate and the inevitable flurry of angry letters to be a sufficient means of covering both sides of the spectrum? Because I don’t.

There should have been balance. There should have been opportunity for other staff members at The Daily Reveille to refute his column. Not just the proprietary opinion writers, but section editors, news writers, sports writers and even copy editors for God’s sake – THAT is what freedom of speech is truly about.

I see people applauding the paper’s bold practice in free speech, and that’s fine. But I hope that these same people also realize that just because our government gives us the right to say what we want does not mean there will not be other consequences for our words, especially when those words are so poorly chosen.

Michael Denton and The Daily Reveille have faced these consequences. Of course, I can’t say that the paper’s reputation is damaged or that they will lose advertisers. But, slightly fewer people will want to read the paper. Slightly fewer people will respect the publication, and a few more people will dislike Michael Denton.

It doesn’t sound like devastating repercussions, but from a business standpoint, how did Denton’s article benefit the pre-existing reputation of The Daily Reveille? It simply did not.

Since Michael Denton was able to use the ever-so-soft free-speech security blanket, I will now exercise my right to use it as well: Denton, next time you decide to write – and I mean write anything at all – please do us all a favor and let Jesus proofread it.

E-mail the author at editor@tigerweekly.com or post your thoughts on www.tigerweekly.com.

Originally Published: Issue 580 - September 19, 2007

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