Andy Matarrese (The Beacon)
By Andy Matarrese, Guest Commentary
That the University of Portland's administration employed such obtuse reasoning behind booting the Log and Beacon from their offices is no surprise. I can appreciate that a chapel is not a place of labor, but Christians have found a way to pray in much worse places, and Campus Ministry is far from pulling 16-hour shifts running jackhammers in the pews.
That the school did it in such a deceitful way - without any transparency and fully aware there were only two issues of the paper left - was no surprise either. None of this surprises me, you see, because this kind of dirty pool was familiar to most students, and I still remember what that was like.
Full disclosure, I spent three years on the paper's staff. Doing the work we did without that space is inconceivable, and while I know the ever-resourceful staff will always find a way, an eviction will hurt the product and with that, the reading community. Perhaps most importantly, the educational value of working there will lessen. I can't speak for The Log, but I'm sure the outcomes would be similar. That experience probably colors my opinion, but it also let me feel school's pulse.
There was widespread fear of authority at UP, among both staff and students. Not even, at least, grudging respect, but an unfounded distrust of the administration's motives as the plots of bottom line-focused oligarchs. Even in my time, there was an old and untrue rumor that kissing on The Bluff was a citation-worthy trespass.
We'd find that distrust in sources who'd act like they risked reprisals for talking to us, even about innocuous things. Distrust would morph into resentment, and then apathy, and you could see it in every low-turnout school election or undergrad who'd rather retreat to a drunken house party than participate in anything extra-curricular.
Now, UP is no police state. It's a nice place with good people and I saw the school react responsively and effectively to community issues many times. My education was top-notch, my time there invaluable and my relationships with staff and faculty were, almost to a one, wonderful. But that this toxic attitude exists in the slightest is enough proof that enough people, enough times, have identified with it and that it continues to fester.
Cloak-and-dagger maneuvering that appears to put administrative goals before students only picks at the scab and, with the credibility gap described before, causes any good will from beforehand to disappear. The message everyone hears with this shuffle is: Student media (and student activities and interests) are a prized and valued part of UP's community until it becomes inconvenient.
It's like there are two Universities of Portland. At one, the first lesson is to shut up and accept your place. That I feel so little surprise over this and have little hope there will be any real compromise, that I doubt student media will win this fight, shows I am a graduate of this school.
Then there's the school of all my happy memories, loyal friends, great teachers and good times. There's the school where I learned to think. Hamstringing student media with these relocations would do disservice to all these good qualities I remember. It would exacerbate the trust issues above, limit students' educational opportunities and dampen community discourse.
Yet that I write this today, that I have any hope my long-separated comrades have a chance, shows, I think, I'm a graduate of this school as well.
