CAMPUS

Conservative Paper Stolen at UMass Amherst

FIRE reports that the conservative paper at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, the Minuteman, had its latest issue stolen off the racks. Worse, campus security and the the university administration did nothing to stop the theft. Just another case of tolerance and understanding at a fine institution of higher education.

From the FIRE blog post:

According to one eyewitness, he discovered a woman standing on a stack of issues, refusing to allow community members the opportunity to grab a copy. When he approached her, “She and others [said] that they have taken the papers and that they will be distributing them instead of us.” After notifying the campus police, the detective who arrived let the eyewitness take back the papers from the thief. As the eyewitness attempted to take the hostage issues back to where they belonged, “the woman and others then forcefully grab[bed] handfuls of them from my arms – IN FRONT OF THE POLICE DETECTIVE – who had displayed her badge.” Perhaps most troubling was that the police officer reportedly did nothing to intervene in this scuffle.

FIRE also reports that the university administration, exercising some remarkable jurisprudence, told the paper that it was perfectly fine for people to steal their issues, since they were free anyways. I’ll keep that in mind next time I want to eat a whole tray of free samples at Costco. In the meantime, let’s hope that UMass Amherst reverses this horrible, stifling decision. There is no excuse for such activities in a country that supposedly values freedom of speech.