A new University policy gives school officials the power to restrict student eligibility for extra-curricular activities if they fail to represent the University with "honor, dignity and integrity," on and off campus.
"What is a violation of honor, dignity and integrity?" is a question we all should be asking ourselves. The short answer is, anything the administration wants to be a violation, is one.
When Brian Buck acted within his legal rights and participated in the filming of a pornographic movie on campus, he was apparently in violation, since the University usurped the power of ASASU and forced him out.
When Professor Ralph Backhaus pleaded "no contest" to charges prompted by his use of University laboratories in the production of Ecstasy, he was apparently not in violation of the code, as the administration has failed to take any action against him and may very well reinstate his professorship after his sentencing this week.
Of course, that might have something to do with the fact that Backhaus is not a student. This new code of conduct is not only vague and destined to be implemented in extremely selective ways, but it unfairly targets students as the sole representatives of ASU.
Where is the code of conduct for administrators and professors? That code never made it to square one because workers would never stand for a similar code. A code that regulated the off-campus behavior of employees at ASU would soon be exposed for the constitutional travesty that it is.
But we students are an easy bunch to pick on, and our rights can be taken away whenever they shine a negative light on the University.
Of course, the administration isn't going to penalize every little thing they feel violates this code. Instead, they will target those individuals who have been thrust into the public limelight, like Buck, and knock them out. That way, precious alumni contributions won't be in danger.
If the administration wants to punish students who engage in illegal activity, they would have our support. If they could even give us some specific guidelines as to what constitutes a breach of dignity, at least we would know what we're dealing with.
But all we can see right now is an administration that wants unadulterated power to punish students whose behavior they disagree with.
So far, the only person to give us any sense of what counts as integrity is Buck's lawyer, Dell James, when he said in response to the implementation of this code, "I have never been so offended at the lack of integrity of an administration."
It suddenly makes a lot more sense why the code of conduct doesn't apply to administrators.
