Stop the public-spectacle bandwagon

By The Gazette Editorial Board

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By now, you've likely heard about a University of Iowa professor's profane response to a campus Republican group's mass email to the university community.

Most everyone has, thanks in no small part to the attempts by some Republicans to keep milking the issue.

UI professor Ellen Lewin was out of line last month  when she fired off an email that read: “F--- you, Republicans.” She admitted as much in a statement shortly after the event, writing that she had lost her temper and done something “very regrettable.”

Lewin, Anthropology and Gender, Women's & Sexuality Studies professor, was irked by College Republicans' appropriation of the term “coming out” for a weeklong event designed to boost the group's profile and drive membership.

“It was not appropriate, let alone professional,” she wrote of her response in a statement - one of the apologies Lewin made after College Republican leaders complained about her language.

Lewin also apologized to the group, the group's adviser and her own department chairs.

“The apology was sincere,” her statement read. “I hope those apologies and my commitment to not repeat such behavior can put the matter to rest.”

But that wasn't good enough for Natalie Ginty, the UI student and chairwoman of the statewide Iowa Federation of College Republicans, who now has filed a complaint with the provost and the Office of Equal Opportunity and Diversity. Her request for a university investigation into the incident has been backed by the Republican Party of Iowa.

“I think it's become such a public spectacle that it needs to be a public apology and the public needs to know,” Ginty said.

It's become a spectacle, at least in part, because Ginty's group and others have made it so.

Now Bob Vander Plaats, once a candidate for governor, has jumped on the bandwagon, calling on Gov. Terry Branstad and the state Board of Regents to take action against Lewin. Enough.

Lewin was wrong, she's admitted as much. That's more than can be said of the Campus Republicans for the wording they chose for their initial email.

But both that language and Lewin's response are essentially matters of free speech that should be handled by the UI - not micromanaged by Regents or state lawmakers.

It's time to stop beating this dead horse.

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