BOWLING GREEN — A group of Bowling Green State University students were suspended from their fraternity this week after social media posts showed them dressed up as Mexican-American gang members on Halloween and mocking cultural appropriation.
University President Rodney Rogers announced this week that the students’ actions were protected by the First Amendment and the university’s free speech and expression policies, so they were not disciplined by BGSU.
“While their actions were inappropriate and counter to BGSU’s Core Values on diversity and inclusion, the reported behavior is protected speech under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, and our own policy on free speech and expression,” he wrote in a message to the BGSU community.