We're glad to say that someone noticed our post and investigated what happened. Below is an excerpt from Inside Higher Ed:
Brand Protection or Censorship?
Student filmmakers at UCLA were told not to identify their institution in a project about a 1991 campus demonstration, vexing the students and raising concerns about academic freedom.
By Liam Knox, 4-14-23
Chris Walsh was a senior at the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1991, when the world watched U.S. bombers litter Baghdad with a constellation of explosions during the first Persian Gulf War. Soon after, he joined thousands of other UCLA students and faculty in a massive antiwar demonstration. Three decades later, Walsh’s son Kyle, a current UCLA junior, is trying to turn his father’s story into a movie for the student-led Film and Production Society (FPS). But there’s one major difference: the film won’t technically be set at UCLA. While the students were granted permits to film on campus, the university prohibited them from mentioning UCLA as the setting, or portraying it identifiably at all. Even the central location of the narrative—Murphy Hall, where university administrators are housed and which played host to a large rally and sit-in in 1991—can’t be named.
UCLA’s decision greatly inconvenienced the filmmakers, said senior Sam Sparks, a member of FPS and the executive producer of the film. The denial was handed down just three days before shooting was set to begin, after locations had been booked and actors scheduled. The script was hastily rewritten to replace direct references to the university or its landmarks; instead of UCLA, it will be set at a nameless college campus, outside an anonymous administrative building. Editors will be required to mask or remove the UCLA name or recognizable campus buildings from all shots.
Beyond creating logistical challenges for the filmmakers, some say UCLA’s response has troubling implications for the freedom of creative and academic expression. “Saying that to make a film about an actual event that occurred at UCLA without ever saying this is UCLA, it certainly does raise issues about academic freedom,” said Daniel Mitchell, a former professor at UCLA’s Anderson School of Management. “At the very least, it’s teaching these students the wrong lesson.”
Joseph Bristow, the chair of UCLA’s faculty committee on academic freedom, was mystified by the series of events. “I wish I understood exactly what happened with the Film and TV Club,” he wrote in an email to Inside Higher Ed. He added that the chair of UCLA’s Faculty Senate, Jessica Cattelino, was in touch with administrators about the decision; Cattelino did not respond to a request for comment in time for publication. Mitchell said his main concern was that the doctrine of brand and trademark protection—which, in his mind, belongs to the realm of bootleg T-shirts and beer cozies—would be more frequently applied to student projects going forward. “It’s different if you want to make a T-shirt or hat and stamp ‘UCLA’ on it. They will try to prevent that sort of thing, but this is kind of in a different category; you’re not really making a statement about anything,” he said. “When content gets involved, that raises some other issues.”
Bill Kisliuk, UCLA’s director of media relations, said that all student projects using the UCLA brand—a category that he said includes “name, logos, seals or other distinguishing assets”—must be approved by both the Events Office and the administrative vice chancellor’s office. “In this instance, a student group sought to make a film that is fictional in nature and that was not part of a class project or assignment,” he wrote in an email to Inside Higher Ed. “As a general matter, UCLA does not allow use of building names or other marks in films that are commercial or fictional in nature.” ...
Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/students/free-speech/2023/04/14/brand-protection-or-censorship.
It might be noted that numerous people come on campus with smart phones or other devices and film videos which are posted on social media and which make it clear that the location is UCLA. Here, for example, is a screenshot of such a video from Twitter about the UCLA Lab School strike:
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| Source: https://www.tiktok.com/@shawntoneyy/video/7213836735862656302 |
You can be sure that neither video was approved by the UCLA "brand" czars. In this case, it isn't the students who need adult supervision. It's the adults. Here's what needs to be done:
- Reverse the decision regarding the student film.
- Apologize to the student filmmakers..
- Put arrangements in place so that such things don't happen again.
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