Exiled from Vanderbilt: How Colleges are Driving Religious Groups off Campus

Featuring Larry Gatlin and Jonathan Rauch!

Religious and political groups in the United States have traditionally been free to choose their leaders and members without interference from authorities. That's no longer true at Vanderbilt University, where the school banned belief-based groups from making belief-based decisions about their members and leaders and drove 13 religious student groups off of campus. In this video, FIRE talks to Vanderbilt students and faculty about how this decision is affecting them. Country music legend Larry Gatlin and author and scholar Jonathan Rauch also explain why Vanderbilt has done both its students and the idea of pluralism itself a profound disservice.

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Directed by Ted Balaker. Camera by Hawk Jensen, Kyle Laffey, Benjamin Gaskell, and Dustin Oakly. Music by Larry Gatlin ("Don't Tread on Me"), and Myles Cochran ("Something Pretty," "Getting Stronger," "Another Dream in Blue," and "Gold and Rose"). Cochran recordings courtesy of Magnatune.

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[TheLordmep]

I'm not a member of a Christian group, but I'd still protest with them.

[Darryl Williams]

I suggest Vanderbilt adopt an "all comers policy" in its admissions office and in all its classes. That should shake things up.

[John Shine]

The most ridiculous "cause" I've seen at VU in the past 30 years. These groups want to use campus resources at no charge, and claim this policy will lead to such things as Muslims taking over the Baptist and Catholic student unions. Get real, or even , better, if you don't like it please transfer to a place like Bob Jones, Oral Bob, or Liberty U. You'll get your "freedoms" there, along w/ much less personal freedom.

[LeftoverJedi]

I'm an atheist, and I would still support them. Carol Swain in correct, when you take away freedoms from one group, you harm everyone.

[Roberto DiCheeso]

I'm not a Christian, and I'd stand with them.

[Cecil Henry]

Multiculturalism is worse than murder, being more akin to genocide.

Westerners have become the ultimate refugees, lost at home, refugees in their own countries, wanderers in their own cities.

DIVERSITY is just a codeword for anti-white.

Diversity means Genocide. Anti-racist is just a codeword for anti-white.

You can target a race for genocide by selecting every community of that race for immigration and assimilation.

All it requires is that you suppress anyone who points it out.

[oilhammer04]

Most colleges have become Leftist bastions. Don't support them, and have your children either go to the few colleges that are institutions of freedom, or learn a trade.

[repsac3]

Previous comment aside, I agree that belief groups shouldn't be punished for excluding folks from their groups who don't share their beliefs. But it is a hard sell for me, because there is bias based on belief, too. (Like i said, this "all comers" rule is itself an example of that.)

But in the end, it's like trying out for and making the football team, and then showing up to every game ready to play lacrosse. Would anyone argue against tossing that guy off the team?

[repsac3]

This one took some rational and ideological soul-searching, but I think I'm on board. The viewer comments about discrimination helped.

I don't completely get why rules about exclusion are necessary, in that I can't see why anyone would want to join a group they don't agree with. But then, I also remember the Reform Party before Pat Buchanan's coup.

And i agree with the point about status v. belief--but then, isnt the college is doing what the groups are fighting to--exclusion based on belief?

[IDNeon357]

What's wrong with a group being exclusive? What's next? Fraternities can't exclude women? Sorrorities can't exclude gay men? Anyone who supports this is a fascist piece of pigshiit

[maniacalmania]

If leaders are elected by democratic process, then why would it matter who can join? To be elected to lead one of these groups one must be expressly motivated to hold that position and well-liked and well-known enough in the group to gain that position. It seems that the fear these groups have is that some heathen will come in and wreck everything. Someone sociopathic enough to do that would just lie about their beliefs anyway. Don't kick them off campus but don't change the rule. Bad handling.

[praapje]

I guess every Christian group has basic rules like any other group. If you abide by those rules you're ok. When they have their rules on paper, how can they argue about that?