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A campus cop in Columbus told me my debate table looked like a riot waiting to happen and I rebuilt the whole thing
Last semester I ran a free speech wall on the oval at Ohio State, just a folding table with a big sign that said ask me about banned speakers. I had a clipboard and a stack of flyers for a talk we were hosting on the 1990s campus speech codes. Around noon a campus officer walked up and said the table setup looked confrontational, quote, like a riot waiting to happen. I was mad at first because I had done this exact setup at three other events. But then I looked at it from ten feet away and he was right. Everything was red and black, the sign was huge, and I was standing behind the table instead of beside it so it looked like a barricade. I moved the table against the wall, went with a plain white sign, and stood in front of it holding a clipboard instead of hiding behind it. Signups went from 4 people to 31 in two hours. Has anyone else had a school staffer tell them their event setup was the problem, not the message?
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the_cameron27d ago
Four signups to 31 in two hours is a real number, and it flipped my view on table setup.
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