The arrest of Joe Mangrum, the artist who attempted to beautify the cement in front of the student union with his colorful designs, was a disgrace. It made me ashamed of my school's administrators.
A university should be a place of free speech and the exchange of ideas. It should not be a place where you have to get a permit from some bureaucracy any time you want to express yourself in an unorthodox way.
Once upon a time students believed this. They believed in it strongly enough to virtually shut down the UC Berkeley campus and launch the free speech movement that resulted in much greater student involvement in the running of universities in this country.
Mangrum was using removable paint. There is no reason he shouldn't have been allowed to create art in a public place.
[ Golden Gater Online October 17, 1995 ]
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