The University of Georgia arrested and suspended nine students for protesting the genocide in Gaza on April 29, 2024. Six of those students contested their suspensions in a conduct hearing on July 30.
They were found guilty of multiple student conduct violations. What does this mean for protest on UGA campus going forward? Is UGA taking a political stand here in opposition to peaceful protests for justice?
APN would like to thank the Atlanta Community Press Collective for recording video of the July 30 student conduct hearing. We would also like to thank UGA Students for Justice in Palestine and protesters everywhere for standing up against the genocide in Gaza.
Photo of Minneapolis educators on strike by Chad Davis Photography [CC BY-SA 2.0]
Photo of US capitol building by Raul654 [CC BY-SA 3.0]
Photos of anti-segregation protest at UGA by Freedom U Georgia
Transcript
The genocide in gaza has been ongoing for almost a year now, claiming 40,000 lives with another 10,000 missing and presumed dead. And those are just the ones we know of. The Lancet estimates the true death toll at 186,000 or more. The devastation is so widespread that even if the war stopped now, rebuilding would take decades. Those responsible will probably never face any consequences, but you know who will? UGA students. Because, sure, genocide is bad but protesting it is where we draw the line.
On the morning of April 29, about 25 to 30 UGA students and supporters set up an encampment on the north quad complete with tents, a fenced-off perimeter and a bullhorn, similar to protest encampments around the country at the time and to those in the 60s and 70s which helped bring the Vietnam War to an end. These students, some of whom are Palestinian or have other very personal reasons to be disgusted by the slaughter, demanded that UGA administration meet with them as they had with Jewish students after the horrible massacre of October the 7th. UGA refused and called the police.
UGA administrator: “This event is being held in violation of the university’s freedom of expression policy.”
Most protesters left when asked, but six UGA students stood their ground and were physically dragged off. They were immediately suspended, and prevented from graduating a few days later, with no chance to tell their side of the story until a student conduct hearing on July 30.
[CORRECTION: Nine students stood their ground, but three did not contest their suspensions.]
The ‘UGA 6’ were accused of: ‘intentional disruption of UGA activities,’ so, protesting, basically. ‘Failure to comply with law enforcement,’ that’s civil disobedience, aka protesting, and finally, ‘acting in concert to violate the code of conduct,’ which is another way to say, planning the protest.
[They were also accused of other conduct violations which they were not found to have violated by the panel of conduct judges.]
Let’s listen as one of the protesters gives her opening statement at the student conduct hearing on July 30.
Ezra Lewis: “And I deeply resonated with this atrocity as I began to draw ties between the subjugation of the Palestinian people and the subjugation of Black and indigenous Americans…The act of protest is inherent to American values. It has been essential throughout history to uplift the voices of marginalized communities to achieve their rights promised to them by the American dream. These rights are also enshrined in the Constitution…Because of being placed under interim suspension, I have lost my housing,I have lost my employment as an RA, my study abroad trip to Cuba and the scholarship covering it which amounted in $1,500 and I’m not currently able to participate in the sorority that I chartered. And despite all of this, nothing I’ve lost is comparable to the amount of loss, trauma and destruction that has been inflicted upon the Palestinian people.”
And this is what the prosecutors had to say:
Student advocate: “We acknowledge the importance of difficult conversations on issues such as this one, and we are not objecting against any personal beliefs. Regardless, as advocates in this case, we’re not here to discuss or debate the ongoing situation in Palestine, but rather here to show violations of the code of conduct in this demonstration. The encampment breached established university policy by incorporating tents, affixing signs to nearby trees and the Baldwin statue and erecting construction-style fencing that obstructed the entryway in front of Old College. Individuals in the encampment also used amplified sound. These activities also caused disruption to the academic environment around north quad, the administrative buildings around north quad and the operations of UGA PD. These students continued to disregard and failed to comply with the direction of law enforcement and administrative individuals.”
The UGA 6 were found guilty of violating the UGA code of conduct, but what’s really shocking here are the extremely harsh punishments they received.
Disruptive protests happen on UGA campus sometime. Former UGA student Emma Krass was involved in a protest against the ban on undocumented students at UGA back in 2016. These students took over a classroom – that’s trespassing – and they refused to leave when instructed by police. Krass ended up with a black mark on her conduct record and had to write a two-page paper summarizing the key points of UGA’s freedom of expression policy.
When former UGA student Adam Veale was arrested at the state capitol for protesting the lack of medicaid expansion in Georgia, he was found not guilty of violating the code of conduct and he wasn’t punished at all.
The UGA 6, on the other hand, were prevented from graduating, they were put on probation for the rest of their academic careers, banned from campus and suspended for fall semester, costing them thousands of dollars and putting their lives on hold.
Student protester: “UGA’s actions constitute a flagrant violation of our right to protest and the kind of civil disobedience that UGA only praises in a display in the library hallway lobby when it took place 60 years ago.”
Crowd: “Shame!”
Look, I understand the need for order on campus to maintain a safe and healthy learning environment for all students. There have to be rules, and some of these rules make sense, like the need to comply with law enforcement. The protesters definitely violated that one.
But the arrest and the black mark on their records is bad enough. Why did they need to be suspended or put on probation? According to UGA’s decision, “Suspension is assigned to provide a heightened sense of both the significance of these violations and accountability for the adherence to the Code of Conduct.”
And “Probation is assigned to provide a heightened motivation for adherence to the Code of Conduct for the remainder of [their] time at the University of Georgia.”
Probation and suspension were not necessary. They chose to do that.
Black lives matter! Black lives matter! Black lives matter! [chanting from 2020 black lives matter rally in Athens]
Protest is a vital part of UGA history and American history. Institutions, even the ones we love, can be corrupt. They can be oppressive. Sometimes protest is the only effective way to fight back. It was protests and strikes got us the weekend. Health and safety regulations. Living wages. They’ve ended wars. And they secured for us all the right to vote.
Would UGA have suspended someone like MLK or John Lewis?
[Footage from the “Bloody Sunday” attack on March 7, 1965 outside Selma, Alabama]
Alabama Police Officer: “This is an unlawful assembly. You have to disperse. You are ordered to disperse. Go home or go to your church. This march will not continue.”
Why are you not dispersing, John Lewis? That’s a conduct violation.
Rules are important. They need to exist. But sometimes, it’s also important to break them. It’s up to the judiciary, in this case, the panel of conduct judges, to determine whether the protesters were in the right or if they were being disruptive for no good reason. Protesters would have welcomed that discussion, but UGA didn’t allow it. The hearing wasn’t about the genocide, and it wasn’t about whether UGA had a role in it. It was only about the technical question of whether protesters obeyed police or not. That’s not justice.
And if these protesters are being treated more harshly than others in similar circumstances, if the administration is issuing statements of support for one group and not another, then UGA is taking a political stand here even if they don’t want to admit it.
My feeling is that, in time, even those who support the harsh punishments now, will turn around and try to claim that they always supported peaceful protests for justice. But we’ll know the truth. We’ll know who was on the right side of history [showing the protesters], and who wasn’t [showing a UGA administration building and UGA logo].
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