The Office of Student Life held a public discussion on Thursday, Oct. 1 at 7 p.m. in the Forum Theater in response to the recent debate over fliers depicting President Obama in the likeness of the Joker from the 2008 film, “The Dark Knight.”

St. Joe's students and faculty participated in last Thursday's forum on race and the political process. (Photo by John Mullany, '11)

The discussion, entitled “The State of Political Discourse in America Today,” featured a panel consisting of Jim Boettcher, Ph. D, of the Philosophy department; Rob Moore, Ph. D, of the Sociology department; Chris Moser, ’10, treasurer of the College Republicans; and Alyssa Ryan, ’11, president of the College Democrats

The discussion was intended to address questions about political and racial discourse in America, and not focus solely on the flier in particular. A common idea mentioned by the faculty was that the issues raised by the flier should be part of regular discourse and not only discussed in response to an event like the posting of the flier.

Speaking for the College Republicans, Moser said that only a few members of the organization quickly previewed and approved of the flier before it was distributed around campus. The College Republicans did not know that the image received accusations of racism prior to the organization’s use of it, nor did they realize that students might perceive the image as racist, Moser said during the discussion.

“People had questions and we wanted to clear the air about some misconceptions people have had about our motives of not only the poster, but about this whole issue of political discourse,” said Moser. “In the future, we definitely should consult our members for approval on posters.”

Ryan spoke about the political apathy she perceives from St. Joe’s students and said political discourse should center around policies and politics, not personal attacks.

“If you want to open a dialogue for people to talk about how they feel about politics, you can’t necessarily separate people as ‘D’ or ‘R’ and attack,” Ryan. “Politics should be about the issues, it shouldn’t be about political banter, it should be about open discussion.”

After all four members of the panel spoke, the floor was open to questions from the audience. Many of the questions audience members posed referred back to the flier.

At the end of the panel discussion, moderator Lisa Baglione, Ph. D, chair of the Political Science department, stressed the importance of continuing the conversation about political discourse and other topics touched upon during the meeting.

-Sarah Quain, ‘12 (Luigi Condina, ‘12, contributed to this report)