In the wake of an article published in the Georgetown Heckler that prompted protests and accusations of racism this past December, Georgetown administrators are planning to hold a discussion about satire and civility.
The upcoming event—originally described by University President John DeGioia as a “workshop,” but later characterized as a forum on the use and “boundaries of satire” in relation to a civil discourse in the campus community by Vice President for Student Affairs Todd Olson—will include faculty members, at least one student, and an outside speaker.
Olson wrote in an e-mail that the event will be an open discussion and wrote that it was not scheduled “in response to any particular event.”
Heckler writer Daniel Thoennessen said he had not heard about the forum.
“I haven’t heard anything about this particular event, so I’m afraid I don’t have any information to offer,” Thoennessen. “But it doesn’t seem out of the ordinary for the University to hold academic lectures, discussions, and/or forums about issues it deems important throughout the year.”
The Dec. 12 Heckler article entitled “The Hoya Holds Annual Holiday Cross-Lighting Ceremony in Dahlgren Quad,” which included an image of three individuals in the garb of the Klu Klux Klan standing in front of a burning cross, led to an outcry from minority groups and a heated town hall meeting.
Former Heckler Editor-in-Chief Jack Stuef (COL ’09) defended the article at the December forum saying, “The KKK isn’t funny. The article is not trying to say that this is funny. The point of the article is to take the situation to the extreme. To show what is maybe buried in this campus.”
