We stumbled across this posting in the (former) OUT and PROUD home page. The entire flap is rather remarkable, and we're passing it on to interested readers.

"On September 17th, 1995, OUT and PROUD was sent a 'gay bashing' letter from a student attending Virginia Tech University in Blacksburg Virginia. O&P decided to pursue the perpetrator of the deplorable letter by alerting Virginia Tech officials of this incident. After a three week investigation, Virginia Tech officials concluded this incident and charged the student with violating university communications policies. For legal reasons, the name of the student and the punishment which he received was never disclosed.

Mark Shear, a reporter for the Washington Post wrote a story about this incident. The story appeared in the Washington Post on October 23, 1995."

La Parola suggested reading the entire (unavailable in 1998) Washington Post Article, and our thanks to OUT and PROUD for posting it.

Everybody agrees the posting was in poor taste. The student was disciplined. The real issues are bifold: does explicit advocacy of violence constitute "free speech", and can there be preferred classes of target groups?

What's scary is that educators, the press, and civil libertarians have evidently become confused over the difference between Free Speech and advocacy of random, life-threatening violence. But we do not think the issue is as clear-cut as die-hard advocates on both sides seem to believe.

Those of us who dimly recall the McCarthy witch-hunts of the early 50's will remember that this nation concluded somewhat reluctantly that mere membership in the laughable old communist party, USA did not constitute a crime, and was protected under a variety of constitutional guarantees -- including freedom of speech, and of association.

Even though most of us were aware that promotion of the old soviet "ideals" could in some vague way aid and assist in some future move to take over the whole world (probably by catastrophic war), America firmly resisted the notion that mere association with people who idealized such forced collectivism could "subvert our nation's moral fiber".

It doesn't take a lot of smarts to figure out that people who harbor and fan an intense broadband hatred of others have a secret agenda of their own, whether they be Joe McCarthy, or Pat Buchanan. The agenda inevitably revolves around the acquisition of personal and political power by exploiting the fear and ignorance of others.

The danger we see in the student's infantile e-Mail flame lies chiefly in its detractors and defenders. There is no crime in hating gays, communists, rednecks, or liberals. We don't care if the kid hates Queers or not. As a matter of fact, better that he openly reveals his actual confusion about his own sexual identity, than pose as a "respectable" spokesperson for a political action group where the identical sentiments are merely closeted.

That hatred crosses the line into impermissibility when it selectively identifies and targets individuals or groups for violence solely on the basis of the group they "belong" to. Ask yourself two "litmus" questions:

1. Would posting of such a letter in an open forum promote and sanction gay-bashing by other homophobes? Could it endanger others?
2. Would substitution of a racial epithet, such as the "n" word, have made the letter either more or less permissible?

We think the answer is that this letter crossed that line. We don't normally trust anything done in the state of Virginia to remedy injustice to the gay community, but Virginia Tech officials seem to have acted responsibly. As far as the student and his letter are concerned, that matter should probably be closed.

As for protecting freedom on the Net, if people cannot vent their hostilities and work out their obvious confusion there, then the right of others to air any opinion whatsoever is also jeopardized. Then, we're all in trouble, no matter how distasteful some of these remarks may seem (anyone who's perused the old AOL gay forums has seen them all). But when educators themselves cannot distinguish venting from advocacy of violence, we're in even bigger trouble:

... Goree said. "The big issue is where do we draw the line? Well, we don't know right now."

Campus administrators have a big problem in the '90's with political correctness, and isn't it nice we don't all have to sort out the interests of each of the offended parties? Some of the issues are serious. Most are best handled on a case-by-case basis between the principals. When open advocacy of violence goes out over the Net, that's another story. It was stopped without resorting to the courts, but, if it could not have been stopped, it should have gone to the courts.

Did this student yell "Fire!" in a crowded theater? We think so, but sooner or later, the courts are going to have to face this issue once and for all. If the courts don't apply both the "litmus" questions, we're all going to lose. Freedom was on the line. But so were human lives. If a right to life isn't a freedom, we'd like to know what is.

© Alex Forbes , La Parola ONLINE exclusive