Talk:Alleged Campus Safety Misconduct

A page for baseless allegation?

It seems someone else edited this article before I could type this or make my own edit (and the editing needs to be worked on a bit, in fact--it's stylistically all over the place), but what's the point of this entry? Is there some justifiable reason to document a list of unsubstantiated, baseless allegations just to have "a different spin?" "Spin" is, of course, precisely the appropriate term, it seems to me.

For starters, this entry appears to exist contrary to the code of ethics that exists for this very site (emphases are mine):

Information should be of an objective nature. Even at a college as small as Knox, there are a wide variety of opinions regarding individuals, organizations, departments, events, and Knox in general. Therefore, your opinion is just that: your opinion. For this reason, subjective statements should be excluded, or at least rewritten to refer to facts instead of mere opinions.

Edits should be made to entertain or inform, not to cause harm. This includes information accusing an individual, group, or organization of illegal activities. Even if the allegations are true, take a moment to consider what consequences might arise as a result of your posting them here. The Wiki Fire isn't an exposé. If people start getting in trouble because of things on The Wiki Fire, it will only discourage people from using it.

Additionally, the nature of these "allegations" appears to be almost wholly without merit, with no corroborating information of any kind made available, and they are listed in such a way and in such a place to give them an added weight of "fact" that they simply do not deserve based on what is presented.

On Friday, May 16, just after midnight, a campus safety officer detained two students walking in the basement of SMC and accused them of removing signs from bathroom doors and demanded to search one of their bags. When the students refused the search on the basis of their 4th amendment rights, the officer lied to them, saying that those rights did not apply on private property, and called the police.

Is there any evidence of this presented other than the author's "say-so," probably based on what he or she may have heard from a partial party (but even that is not specified)?

Late Friday, May 16, after Girl Talk, Campus Safety called the police on an intoxicated student, violating the Good Samaritan policy.

Once again, am I to accept that it is right and proper for this allegation to be here just because the author decides to present it as accurate? I hope you are aware that--in the event that Public Safety is notified to provide medical assistance to an intoxicated individual--it is entirely at the discretion of the Public Safety Building as to whether or not they will dispatch a police officer with rescue and ambulance personnel, and they do so as a matter of routine. To document a bare assertion that Campus Safety "called the police" is specious.

Additionally, even if the basic facts behind this event were true, it is a fact that this is not a violation of the Good Samaritan Policy, as is declared to be fact in this allegation. Because Knox College or its Student Senate do not enact legislation for Galesburg or the State of Illinois, their policies can have no impact on the discretion of the Galesburg Police Department to enforce laws and ordinances.

In the early morning of Sunday, May 18, a student left belongings in Founders, while computers were restarting, and Campus Safety took the liberty of searching the students personal belongings, without the student present, or consent from that student.

This seems to fall into the "O.K., and..?" category. Unattended belongings are checked for identification by any security or law enforcement agency I can recall as a matter of routine in order to return said property to the owners. But regardless of that, we're back to the core problem of this being, once again, just sort of "thrown out there" without the support of anything, not even the brief and slanted little blurb in The Knox Student about the incident to which I believe the author refers.

Wednesday afternoon, May 21, Campus security was seen and over heard referencing the use of pepper spray on a student.

This one takes the proverbial cake. "My cousin's friend knew someone who once heard that Jimmy eats kittens." Really? "Seen and over heard[sic]" by whom? Referencing the use of pepper spray how? Are we to assume that Campus Safety was chatting over tea about how much they enjoy pepper spraying students, despite the fact that I cannot recall the last person of any kind to actually be pepper sprayed by Campus Safety? What happened, and where was the "misconduct?" It's a mystery, but apparently that doesn't stop anyone from running it up the flagpole to see who salutes it, anyway.

In the end, all that is here is a bullet point list of inappropriate and wholly useless finger-pointing allegations with dubious merit, at best. It appears to be written as a "revenge" of sorts, appearing just days after some of this alleged "misconduct." The entirety of it does not conform to the code of ethics proffered by this very site, and it seems like it would find a much more suitable home on the author's blog or social networking site of choice. Who can honestly defend this as appropriate to this site?

I'm recommending this article for deletion, and I urge you to strongly consider that recommendation.

Discussion on deletion proposal

Obviously this is going to require the weighing-in of more of the community than just me before any action is taken (Guys? Weigh in.), but I'll offer my perspective. The Wiki Fire has, as the original proposal noted, a goal of providing information to inform. The purpose of this page, as I understand it, was to act as a sort of clearinghouse for concerns about Campus Safety misconduct. As the original proposal for deletion (and the related comments added to the content page) suggests, some and perhaps all of the allegations lack firm evidence. The onus of providing that evidence rests on the original posters; that they did not provide it is not surprising, given the nature of the forum and of the institutional disadvantage at which those subject to institutional sanction by law enforcement are placed with regard to evidence of misconduct, but it is also not required. I think the contributor who proposed deletion rebutted the allegations with great vigor, and that is the sort of thing that this page, in my mind, should include: not merely allegations, but a critical reflection, both on the allegations and on those against whom these things are alleged. Indeed, the Code of Ethics from which the proposer quoted does not really handle this directly; but that document, like everything else on this site, is subject to critical reflection and reform (that's the point of a wiki format). I think it's obvious that the page in discussion here needs to be more strongly disclaimed to ensure that these are taken merely as the allegations of those who post, and not as claims substantiated through TWF or Knox College administration. I think also that it should be reformatted as a discussion-like page, where there is an existing position under each allegation for rebuttal, discussion, and the like. I do not think, however, that it should be deleted, because it provides precisely the kind of forum that Knox needs on issues that are difficult to discuss within the existing institutional framework. I also think that the Code of Ethics should be revised to incorporate this type of discourse and content page and provide guidelines for its management. What does everybody else think? Camozzi 20:56, 14 June 2008 (CDT)