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'Unlearning Liberty' Again, This Time by Self-Censorship at āThe Daily Targumā
The Soviet Union was said to operate on a system of āā: a judge would hold a trial and then call the local Communist Party boss to find out if the defendant should be found guilty or not. It appears that The Daily Targum, Rutgers Universityās student paper, operates on a similar system of ātelephone editorial policy.ā According to former opinions editor Amani Al-Khatahtbeh, , student editors defer to the paperās Board of Trustees for instructions on how to cover controversial issues, specifically the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
FIRE has no way of gauging whether Al-Khatahtbehās charges of bias against the Board are justified. But Skylar Frederick, who just finished her term as the °Õ²¹°ł²µ³Ü³¾ās managing editor, unwittingly confirmed Al-Khatahtbehās charges of censorship in what was supposed to be . Frederick revealed that the Targumās editors had handed over their editorial discretion on certain topics to the paperās Board of Trustees: a group of students, alumni, and university officials:
In the daily production of the paper, as of late, weāve been sending them anything thatās pro-Israel, pro-Palestine or [involving] Hillel. The Board has asked us to send anything even mentioning the word āIsraelā to them for their approval, just to make sure we as students arenāt going to have to deal with a bunch of backlash. So no, they donāt have a hand in daily production of the paper. They really only step in when thereās a problem and when we ask them to or when they see thereās a problem that might hurt the company and make us in turn lose our funding.
In yet another display of ā,ā Frederick not only freely admitted that the students abdicated their responsibilities as independent journalists but also argues that they were doing the right thing. As she put it: āThe Board has the power, the right [to make editorial decisions]. Itās not censorship. Itās the Boardās purpose.ā
Al-Khatahtbeh describes the Board of Trustees as āā and, accurately as far as I can tell, states that there is no description of the Board on the paperās website. In apologizing for publishing a letter to the editor expressing what it deemed to be anti-Semitic views, the Board asserted that The Daily Targum is āan independent, student-run publicationā and further stated:
The board is not involved in the day-to-day operations of the paper, but serves as an advisory group the students can turn to when they need assistance. In addition to the managing editor, editor-in-chief, business manager and marketing manager, the board consists of four alumni members, our comptroller and a Rutgers faculty member, staff member and student representatives.
The paperās describes the composition of the Board on page 4:
Targum Publishing Companyās Board of Trustees consists of the four student managers; the Editor-in-Chief, Managing Editor, Business Manager, and Marketing Director. Selected students who are not involved in the direct publication of The Daily Targum fill the remaining student positions. These student trustees are nominated based on their involvement in the Rutgers community and their ability to offer a varied perspective on the paperās reputation amongst the student body. Non-student positions include a University faculty member, Rutgers alumni, and a non-voting representative from the University administration.
So, according to The Daily Targumās own documentation, the Board has non-student members, members with potentially no background in journalism, and members whose responsibilities only concern the paperās finances.
As for the Boardās authority, says this:
Board members are meant to serve as the final authority on matters which come to their attention. Examples of this may include special personnel issues, final budget approval, advice on various matters of day to day business operations. Board members provide personal, professional experience as a means of suggesting a given course of action.
Although the first sentence is broad (Board members are āthe final authority on matters which come to their attentionā), the list of examples does not include editorial content but, appropriately, is limited to ābusiness operations.ā
, āwithout the Board of Trustees our paper canāt be independent. Itās required by the bylaws of the university that for us to be an independent paper we must have a Board of Trustees.ā I was unable to verify this statement since there do not seem to be any āuniversity bylaws.ā The have bylaws, as does the the , and the , to name a few examples. Even if such university bylaws exist, it seems paradoxical to say that the Rutgers could dictate ongoing terms to the paper in order for it to be independent.
Like the Soviet judges, the Targumās editors take comfort in having a higher authority tell them what to do so they donāt get in trouble. I thought the whole point of an independent press was to stir up debate by providing an outlet for differing viewpoints and that avoiding public discourse was contrary to journalismās basic purpose. At any rate, to quote : āWe donāt have the First Amendment so that we can talk about the weatherāāor, in the case of The Daily Targum, write an editorial about it.
Rutgers University is a public institution and thus is bound by the First Amendment. The University cannot constitutionally mandate the creation of a board that has the āpowerā and ārightā to decide what gets publishedāto use Frederickās . Just because the Board thinks that its āpurposeā is to control controversial content does not make it so. But there is something more insidious than poor editorial decision-making going on here. Targum readers think they are getting news on controversial topics from independent student editors, but instead they seem to be getting the perspective of unknown members of a Board of Trustees working behind the scenes. If exposes this arrangement and returns full control to the elected editors, she will have performed a tremendous service to student journalism.
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