This past November, the Student Government Association tabled a bill that would change policy within Auburn's Jordan-Hare Stadium. The policy, which would make Jordan-Hare Stadium a No-Hate Zone, aimed to address concerns of offensive speech and slurs within the stadium.
At this senate meeting, many students spoke out on the positive effects of making the stadium a No-Hate Zone, citing beliefs that hate and disconnection poison the lively Auburn community. Many of the students who spoke said passing the bill would bring Auburn together as a whole.
While I do believe hate and disconnection do indeed harm the Auburn community and we should stand together as one student body, I do not think making Jordan-Hare Stadium a No-Hate Zone will solve the hate and discrimination within the stadium. There are many reasons why this policy would not work.
First, I do not think we should implement a policy to fix an on-campus moral problem. If there is hate or discrimination happening on campus, the University needs to look for a way to bring its student body together. Students should be able to walk through campus without the thought of being discriminated against crossing through their heads or even the thought that another student might want to say something hateful.
Although the policy has good intentions, the University should focus on fixing a problem if there is one present, rather than just implementing a policy and sweeping the problem under the table.
The second reason I do not think we should implement a No-Hate policy within the stadium is because many of our chants and battle cries are host to a curse word or two. If we implement the No-Hate policy within the stadium, we are throwing away years of tradition, something Auburn is known to value.
I'm not saying hate and discrimination are a part of Auburn's tradition; rather, I am saying that Auburn values tradition. If we rid our stadium of the chants and battle cries that have been screamed in there many times a year for many years, we are throwing away part of Auburn tradition. Other than parents with small children and sometimes not even those parents, I don't see many fans getting upset over the curse words used in our chants such as "War damn Eagle" or "Weagle weagle," so why throw them out?
On any given Saturday, if you ask a fan from an opposing team what they think of our fan base, they typically respond with words similar to "very respectful." What kind of message would we be sending opposing fans if they hear about the No-Hate policy prior to arriving in Auburn? They would more than likely think that Jordan-Hare, and maybe even Auburn as a whole, are hate-filled places with hate-filled people, possibly causing them to cancel their original plans. What happens when less people visit the campus? Odds are that the number of student applications and possibly even enrollment will go down.
The third reason I do not believe Jordan-Hare should be a No-Hate Zone is because it would take University dollars to fund some sort of No-Hate police or security. While this is a good idea, I find that it would be quite difficult to monitor every mouth inside the stadium - 87, 451 mouths to be exact. Also, what kind of message would Auburn be sending if it only took action on some of the reports, as the University would probably receive more reports in one day than it could handle during one game.
For example, let's say someone reports that a fan made a discriminating remark towards another fan and then a second person reports that a fan made a hateful remark towards the other teams fan base as a whole. What if the No-Hate police were unable to respond to the hateful remarks towards the other fan base but are able to handle the discriminatory remarks made in the first report? Auburn would be sending a message that we only care about certain remarks.
Overall, it would be a very difficult task to stop hateful speech or remarks within Jordan-Hare Stadium and if the policy comes as a way to curb hateful speech on campus, the university should find a way to bring its students together rather than making them act like they are together.
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