Staff Editorial: Protests are Supposed to be Disruptive

Last Thursday, Loyola’s Ramblers Analyzing IDEAS hosted a Know Your Rights Panel: Student Activism event to educate and empower students. 

The event followed changes made to the university’s Community Standards Handbook prior to this semester which introduced restrictions on how students can protest, The Phoenix reported. 

In the meeting, members of the panel said these policy changes were implemented based on feedback from the community. They also said discussion surrounding First Amendment rights is a moral and political issue instead of being something Loyola is legally required to respect, due to its status as a private institution. 

Many students rightly expressed frustration over the recent changes. Actions such as limiting advocates to a so-called “free speech zone” and restricting the hours when protests are “allowed” are nothing more than thinly veiled efforts to stymie pro-Palestinian demonstrations on campus.

By definition, protests are supposed to be disruptive. The changes to the community handbook place limitations on how students can organize and voice their views, subverting the entire point of campus protest and undermine their historical importance — not to mention directly contradicting Loyola’s professed Jesuit values. 

From America’s involvement in the Vietnam War to Apartheid in South Africa, college students promoting social justice and galvanizing change through on-campus mobilization have been an integral part of modern U.S. history. 

Through the years, Ramblers have been no exception to this country-wide campus culture. In the 1960s, students and clergy held demonstrations advocating for the desegregation of a pool in Lewis Towers. Anti-War protests in the 1970s led by both students and faculty prompted Loyola’s then president to sign a letter urging President Richard Nixon to take students’ concerns seriously, according to Loyola’s digital exhibit on protest and activism. 

The exhibit also chronicles Loyola’s history of protest in the 21st century, commending relatively-recent Ramblers who protested against an incident of use of excessive force on a racial basis by police on campus in 2018 and following the murder of George Floyd in 2020. 

The exhibit praises Loyola students for “continuing a decades-old tradition” and advocating “for positive change in their school, their communities and the world around them.” 

These issues hit close to home here at The Phoenix. As a forum for student thought and expression, these restrictions strike against the core of everything we value as a student newspaper. Restrictions such as these raise the nerve level in our newsroom, especially considering the history of The Phoenix name. 

In May 1969, university administration attempted to seize editorial control of the paper — then called The Loyola News — after it published articles critical of both Loyola and the Vietnam War. The university’s actions forced the paper to shut down, while the staff resurrected the organization as an independent business. They called the new paper The Phoenix — in hopes it would rise from the ashes of The Loyola News. 

And rise it has. Today The Phoenix is 100% editorially independent, something which is unaffected by our status as a sponsored student organization. Our commitment to free speech is and forever will be unwavering. It’s disheartening the university doesn’t share the same zeal.

With this rich history of protest — and Loyola’s seeming praise of student demonstrators’ historic success — it seems counter-intuitive to Jesuit “cura personalis” to implement policies which actively stifle the potential impact of protests. 

While the First Amendment may not apply within the bounds of a private institution, as an institution of higher learning, the university shouldn’t lean into this liminality to further student censorship. 

There’s no disputing this is a moral and political issue. Loyola administrators need to ask themselves — what side are they on?

The Editorial Board of The Loyola Phoenix consists of Griffin Krueger, Catherine Meyer, Lilli Malone, Hailey Gates, Brendan Parr and Andi Revesz.