Butler Students Defeat Measures to Censor Palestine

“Boycott! The Art pf Economic Activism” poster exhibition, created by American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) and the Center for the Study of Political Graphics.

Students at Butler University in Indiana mounted a successful campaign against two resolutions cracking down on the right to advocate for Palestine on campus. The resolutions had been proposed as retaliation against an event featuring protest art from around the world.

Palestine Legal wrote to Butler earlier this week after an administrator boosted the censorship campaign in a campus-wide email. The letter explained that Butler had failed its students by giving a stamp of approval to a widespread harassment campaign targeting advocacy for Palestine on college campuses.

Backlash Against Boycott Events

From October 6 to 8, Butler Student Government Association (SGA) in partnership with Butler Students for Justice in Palestine hosted the Boycott and Safe Protesting 101. The two-part event on economic activism featured a Know Your Rights training, with Ashley Toruno of the American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana and Dalit Baum, director of economic activism at the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC). The training accompanied an art show, created by AFSC and the Center for the Study of Political Graphics, displaying posters about celebrated social justice boycotts from around the world. 

The display sparked a swift chorus of backlash from Zionist students and off-campus groups for including posters about boycotts for Palestinian rights. The harassment campaign resulted in cyberbullying, turmoil on campus, retaliatory bias complaints against organizers, and right-wing Twitter personalities directing followers to complain to Butler about the event.

Student organizers were forced to limit the general public’s access to the exhibit over concerns that off-campus groups would interfere with the event.

The student government stood by the event in a statement explaining the importance of including Palestine. “The exhibit aimed to showcase a wide array of political artwork from across different social movements in history,” wrote SGA amidst the attacks.

Emboldened by the censorship calls, Israel advocates used the opportunity to introduce an “emergency” resolution condemning boycotts for Palestinian rights. Despite this, the resolution failed at an October 7 hearing. 

Members of SGA then attempted to introduce a second resolution condemning BDS and a resolution adopting a distorted definition of antisemitism. At these hearings, members of SGA established procedural hurdles preventing the only two Palestinians in student government from participating in the discussions.

SJP organized allies to write to the school and speak out against the resolution.

On October 21 the sponsors withdrew the resolutions. The sponsor encouraging adoption of the IHRA definition pulled back the resolution after hearing members of SJP and the Indiana Chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace speak about the silencing impact these measures have on Palestinians and their supporters, and SGA passed a resolution suspending defining antisemitism for the rest of the term.  

Butler’s Complicity

As pro-Israel groups attempted to enlist student government as a censor of speech in support of Palestine, Butler’s Vice President of Student Affairs sent a campus-wide email to students bolstering false Zionist claims about the event and implying that the resolutions were a solution. 

Student organizations and Indiana community groups condemned the resolutions in a solidarity statement the next day, stating that, “across our country, boycott and divestment resolutions, and even educational events about BDS have been viciously, and deceptively, attacked by campus administrations and others, who seek to suppress the political expression of Black, Brown, Indigenous, and other marginalized communities who advocate for Palestinian rights.”

Palestine Legal also wrote to Butler’s Vice President deploring his encouragement of resolutions that reinforce a weaponized definition of antisemitism aimed at censoring Palestine advocates, and called on him to apologize to student organizers: 

“Instead of encouraging students to learn more about the impact our consumer choices can have, you have, perhaps unintentionally, put your thumb on the scale to lend approval to a resolution that condemns this form of economic activism and a resolution that adopts a distorted definition of antisemitism that has long been used by the Israeli government and its allies around the world to try to impede calls for justice and equality.” 

You can read the solidarity statement in full here. 

You can read Palestine Legal’s letter here.