On Tuesday, Nov. 12, I skipped class to attend a town hall discussion on “Free Speech, Tolerance and Social Justice.” The title also promised the event would be centered around “Critical Perspectives.” I was excited to hear a panel of staff, ASUN reps and others answer the tough questions I’m sure many of us have about the recent issues regarding diversity on the University of Nevada, Reno campus. What I sat through instead was a disappointing lip-service event where I left feeling less knowledgeable about the university’s specific feelings on the problems and less hopeful they were taking student complaints into account. 

On Tuesday, Nov. 12, I skipped class to attend a town hall discussion on “Free Speech, Tolerance and Social Justice.” The title also promised the event would be centered around “Critical Perspectives.” I was excited to hear a panel of staff, ASUN reps and others answer the tough questions I’m sure many of us have about the recent issues regarding diversity on the University of Nevada, Reno campus. What I sat through instead was a disappointing lip-service event where I left feeling less knowledgeable about the university’s specific feelings on the problems and less hopeful they were taking student complaints into account. 

People attend town halls to ask questions. At least, this has always been my impression of the purpose of a town hall. Otherwise, what separates it from just being an opportunity for panelists to deliver speeches? A good town hall forces representatives to be accountable to the public’s questions, to think on their feet and respond to queries born of the organic passions of the community. The panelists at this town hall did answer questions, but for the majority of the event the questions did not come from the public. In what was scheduled as a one hour event, the panelists didn’t answer a community question until the 50 minute mark. While the event did extend an extra 20 minutes-or-so after the hour, the ratio of time spent actually engaging what the community wanted to know compared to answering the university’s own questions was maddening. 

Speaking of which, the entirety of the first 50 minutes was spent on introductions and the answering of only two questions, neither provided from the community. The first question was simply for each panelist to define the terms in the title of the event: “What is free speech, tolerance and social justice?” I can’t imagine what interest a question as mundane as defining terms would hold to a student angry about swastikas or the presence of white nationalism on campus, but they spent a lot of time going over it anyway. The second question concerned safety, and it was a better question with more interesting answers, but still letting each panelist deliver their prepared response soaked up time and rarely did it feel like they were answering the questions we actually wanted answers to. 

Sure, some of the panelists provided vaguely insightful answers, but other answers felt canned and passionless and sometimes the tone of certain panelists bordered on flippant. Many of the panelists pressed the importance of these events to discuss uncomfortable topics, yet it struck me as ironic how comfortable most of the panel was answering the first two questions. I was very happy when the panel’s faculty member opened up about their personal experiences dealing with hate on campus, then got very worried about the possibility of a trap door opening up beneath them because they dared to express any passion for tackling these issues. One thing was clear to me, the people on the panel seemingly closest to ground with these issues were the ones whose answers felt the least detached from the issues, and their presence on the panel was greatly appreciated. 

When the panel finally got to the community questions, the discussion simply didn’t have time to develop into something fruitful. One of the first questions they took from the crowd was a rant about book publishing and it definitely wasn’t on topic. These sort of things are inevitable at town halls, which is why it is important to have surplus time for community questions so a single question can’t derail everything. Answers to community questions were brief, not particularly conductive and did not enlighten much of anything. Passionate questions about important topics like the treatment of protestors at the Culture War event didn’t get the time they deserve. Questions asked anonymously through texts came through as confusing and when the organizers couldn’t get through them they all suggested contacting them through email afterwards as the best alternative.

Ultimately, I learned nothing about what the university is doing to change campus culture. If policy changes were discussed at all, they must have been obfuscated through the confusing presentation. Panelists repeatedly suggested confronting intolerant ideas head on, starting dialogues and so forth, but then closed out the presentation saying students shouldn’t feel the need to do this, and making it clear the university wasn’t going to do this either. So basically, I hope they do more of these events, but next time make sure the town halls actually function as town halls, because the community has a lot of questions needing lots of answers. 

People attend town halls to ask questions. At least, this has always been my impression of the purpose of a town hall. Otherwise, what separates it from just being an opportunity for panelists to deliver speeches? A good town hall forces representatives to be accountable to the public’s questions, to think on their feet and respond to queries born of the organic passions of the community. The panelists at this town hall did answer questions, but for the majority of the event the questions did not come from the public. In what was scheduled as a one hour event, the panelists didn’t answer a community question until the 50 minute mark. While the event did extend an extra 20 minutes-or-so after the hour, the ratio of time spent actually engaging what the community wanted to know compared to answering the university’s own questions was maddening. 

Speaking of which, the entirety of the first 50 minutes was spent on introductions and the answering of only two questions, neither provided from the community. The first question was simply for each panelist to define the terms in the title of the event: “What is free speech, tolerance and social justice?” I can’t imagine what interest a question as mundane as defining terms would hold to a student angry about swastikas or the presence of white nationalism on campus, but they spent a lot of time going over it anyway. The second question concerned safety, and it was a better question with more interesting answers, but still letting each panelist deliver their prepared response soaked up time and rarely did it feel like they were answering the questions we actually wanted answers to. 

Sure, some of the panelists provided vaguely insightful answers, but other answers felt canned and passionless and sometimes the tone of certain panelists bordered on flippant. Many of the panelists pressed the importance of these events to discuss uncomfortable topics, yet it struck me as ironic how comfortable most of the panel was answering the first two questions. I was very happy when the panel’s faculty member opened up about their personal experiences dealing with hate on campus, then got very worried about the possibility of a trap door opening up beneath them because they dared to express any passion for tackling these issues. One thing was clear to me, the people on the panel seemingly closest to ground with these issues were the ones whose answers felt the least detached from the issues, and their presence on the panel was greatly appreciated. 

When the panel finally got to the community questions, the discussion simply didn’t have time to develop into something fruitful. One of the first questions they took from the crowd was a rant about book publishing and it definitely wasn’t on topic. These sort of things are inevitable at town halls, which is why it is important to have surplus time for community questions so a single question can’t derail everything. Answers to community questions were brief, not particularly conductive and did not enlighten much of anything. Passionate questions about important topics like the treatment of protestors at the Culture War event didn’t get the time they deserve. Questions asked anonymously through texts came through as confusing more often than not and when they couldn’t get through them all suggested contacting them through email afterwards as their best alternative.

Ultimately, I learned nothing about what the university is doing to change campus culture. If policy changes were discussed at all, they must have been obfuscated through the confusing presentation. Panelists repeatedly suggested confronting intolerant ideas head on, starting dialogues and so forth, but then closed out the presentation saying students shouldn’t feel the need to do this, and making it clear the university wasn’t going to do this either. So basically, I hope they do more of these events, but next time make sure the town halls actually function as town halls, because the community has a lot of questions needing lots of answers. 

Vincent Rendon can be reached at vrendon@sagebrush.unr.edu or on Twitter @VinceSagebrush.