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Old February 29th, 2008 #11
Alex Linder
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'Asian hate' writer suspended

By Heath Urie, Daily Camera

February 27, 2008



Max Karson, who wrote the controversial column, listens to the rally proceedings.


CU students hold hands while singing We Shall Overcome during Wednesday's protest rally.


Torey Gannon, left, and Victor Hsu listen to speeches condemning an opinion column.

BOULDER — The author of an opinion column that garnered national attention for saying Asians "hate us all" and should be hated back was suspended from CU's Campus Press newspaper staff Wednesday.

"Max Karson's duties with the Campus Press have been suspended pending a restructuring of the opinions section," according to a statement posted on the student paper's Web site Wednesday.

Karson ignited a firestorm last week when his piece titled "If it's war the Asians want ... It's war they'll get," infuriated some students and past members of the Campus Press staff who said the piece was inflammatory and a failed attempt at satire.

The statement goes on to say that the publication's editors are in the process of organizing an "open, public forum to address diversity sensitivity in our news coverage" and are rewriting their ethics policy.

The announcement came the same day university officials said they're close to announcing major changes in the way the paper is operated and overseen.

Faculty members within the CU School of Journalism and Mass Communication met behind closed doors for more than two hours Wednesday to discuss how to best change the management structure of the Campus Press, a class that operates within the school, so that offensive content doesn't get published.

The Campus Press already has agreed to establish a Student Diversity Advisory Board, invite student organizations to meet face-to-face with the editors, adopt an "opinions policy," schedule a series of diversity-awareness workshops for the entire staff and host a series of workshops for opinion writing and editing.

More than a dozen student members of the Campus Press sat outside the faculty meeting room Wednesday waiting to hear what decisions were made about the fate of the publication, but no announcement was made when the group emerged.

Paul Voakes, dean of the journalism school, did release a statement from the faculty group that served equally as an apology.

"This (column) is the antithesis of what we're trying to teach in our school," Voakes said. "The faculty and I take responsibility for the offense that the Campus Press obviously has caused."

He called Karson's column an "editorial mistake" that should have been caught.

Meanwhile, Karson's column continued to spark anger Wednesday.

Boulder City Manager Frank Bruno released a statement saying, "Discrimination is not what Boulder is about."

Also, about 150 students gathered on the University Memorial Center south plaza for a rally and demonstration against the Campus Press.

Chris Choe, a 21-year-old senior and member of the Korean American Students at Boulder group who led the rally, said he hopes the university's administration fundamentally changes how content is reviewed before it's published by the class.

"I want to see responsibility," Choe said. "I want to see that this isn't being marginalized."

Later, the group migrated to a large auditorium on the campus for a forum among Campus Press representatives, CU officials and student leaders.

Federal mediators brought in by student organizers from the U.S. Department of Justice moderated the public meeting, in which students continued to call for changes at the online student paper and in which Campus Press editors offered apologies for any pain that Karson's column caused.

"The mistake that I made when I published the article was thinking that my reactions spoke for everyone," Editor-in-Chief Cassie Hewlings, who sat somberly through the meeting, told the crowd. "I am so incredibly sorry. I didn't want to hurt anyone.

"I've learned more this past week than I have my whole 22 years of life."

EARLIER STORY

Student leaders at the University of Colorado on Wednesday demanded the resignations of the online student newspaper editor and a faculty adviser for publishing a column that has created a furor among Asian Americans and other minority students.

A diverse audience of nearly 200 people attended a rally outside University Memorial Center before meeting with CU-Boulder Chancellor Bud Peterson.

The students carried signs that read "Stop the Hate" and "Responsible Journalism Now."

Several rejected the idea that the Feb. 18 column - written by student Max Karson - was meant as a satire and instead called it hate speech. It was titled "If it's war the Asians want . . . It's war they'll get."

The students also were upset about a column published a day earlier titled "No hablo Ingles," or "I don't speak English."

"The editors at the Campus Press should rename that opinion section as 'racist viewpoints,' said David Chiu, a CU senior. "Once again, the reputation at CU has been tarnished. The publication of these articles embodies institutional racism."

He called for the resignation of Cassie Hewlings, Campus Press editor-in-chief, and faculty adviser Amy Herdy.

Both Hewlings and Herdy apologized directly to the audience after they were prompted by the student government's diversity director.

"I am sorry, it was no one's intent to be hurtful," said Herdy, who noted that the paper also had published an apology.

When someone asked Hewlings what she was apologizing for, she replied, "I am so incredibly sorry. I didn't want to hurt anybody. . . . It was a mistake for me not to see how more people would take this. I've learned more in this last week than I have in my entire 22 years of life."

After the meeting, Hewlings said she did not intend to resign.

Charles Gilford III, one of the three leaders of the CU student government, said he respects freedom of speech but that it was no excuse for publishing the column.

"You have no right to isolate and marginalize certain people," he said. "You have no right to attack a member of our family, and that's what's happened."

Gilford suggested that campus officials evaluate the column in light of federal anti-discrimination laws.

Peterson listened and took notes during the meeting.

At the end of the 90-minute session, he said he would direct students and staff to examine if anyone's civil rights had been violated. He noted that he has directed the journalism department's chairman to re-evaluate the structure and supervision of the Campus Press. He also vowed to re-examine some measures that the campus promised to take two years ago after another student leader received a racially charged death threat.

--John Ensslin, The Rocky

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/new...demonstration/