Different Oswego State student organizations have petitioned for the addition of flags in Marano Campus Center representing other groups and countries to represent diversity and inclusion on campus.
The flags, hung since 2007 usually above the student media hallway, have been taken down for maintenance since fall 2018. Their re-introduction to campus has received backlash from many different clubs and organizations over what each believes is acceptable to fly.
According to the Student Association resolution, the flags petitioned to be added are the new Philadelphia pride flag, transgender pride flag, Black Lives Matter flag, Pan-African flag, Palestinian flag and the Iroquois Native American Tribal flag.
The proposal for these flags was scheduled to meet on Tuesday at the weekly SA meeting, but due to the weather, the meeting will take place next week.
Student Association President Omar van Reenen is welcoming comments, questions and concerns from all students and organizations, and he said, along with the senate, he speaks on behalf of students and gives them a voice.
Some of the students voicing their concerns about the flags are those from the Young Americans for Freedom association.
YAF President Tyler Toomey sent out an email Tuesday morning saying that adding the aforementioned flags serve as a dangerous precedent to allow several other flags to be displayed for no reason other than politics.
The email, which was sent to the Young Americans for Freedom email list along with the Student Association president and vice president, dean of students and the president’s office, highlighted the ideas that news of the impending legislation from Student Association to hang the flags is “horrifying and wrong” because of the messages the flags carry with them.
“The Palestinian flag has no place in an academic setting,” Toomey said in the email. “The hanging of the several other symbolic flags amongst the respected flags of several great nations does nothing but take away from the respect and honor of those flags.”
While YAF represents students from one side, van Reenen objected to much of this, stating that the flags represent campus diversity and flags of countries with conflict, such as Palestine or Israel, are purely symbolic of the students’ cultures and do not represent any political motives.
“It shows the campus’s values of staying true to its mission of embracing cultural competence and respect for one another and forces that environment of inclusivity,” van Reenen said. “It’s a statement of solidarity.”
While students are addressing their thoughts on both sides, it is important to understand how this process will unfold. After next week’s senate meeting, if the bill is approved and passed, it will be taken to the administrative level where the chief diversity chair Rodney King will look it over and adjust as necessary. The legislation currently has the second-highest number of signatures to it in SA history, but it is ultimately up to the students who will decide what is passed.
Weather permitting, the legislation will be brought up at the next Student Association assembly meeting at 6 p.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 19, in Lanigan room 104. In the meantime, van Reenen encourages any student to speak their mind to him either in person or through email.
“My door is open to anyone,” van Reenen said.
Photo by Maria Pericozzi | The Oswegonian
