Pride flags displayed “on an outward-facing window or door” at Boston University offices were removed during spring break when the offices were closed. University officials say they removed them to comply with university policy. Several BU faculty members say it’s all about free speech and anti-DEI backlash coming from the federal government.

Reports WBUR:

Several Boston University professors fired off a letter to the school’s administration Monday, after the university removed pride flags from public view.

According to the letter addressed to campus president Melissa Gilliam, the flags were pulled from windows in the women’s studies program and some professors’ offices.

These acts “suppress free speech on campus” and are “just one of a growing number of disappointing choices by the administration to contradict the values it purports to champion,” wrote associate professor Joseph Harris, who co-leads the BU chapter of the of the American Association of University Professors.

The pride flags were taken down over spring break last week. One was removed from a window in the main sitting area of the Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies program at 704 Commonwealth Avenue, according to its director.

Administrators also removed a flag from the BU Children’s Center, according to the faculty union chapter. And they took down the flag hanging from professor Nathan Phillips’ fourth-floor office window overlooking Commonwealth Avenue.

“I came in Monday morning to find that my flag was taken down,” Phillips said. “They didn’t confiscate the flag, they just took it down and put it in my office on a chair with a note,” adding it was the second time in a week that happened.

The note, which he photographed, said the “posting on an outward facing window or door” was taken down “per University policy” and that university affiliates are “welcome to display signs, posters, or flags on authorized bulletin boards or on interior walls of their private offices.”

In a statement, BU spokesman Colin Riley said the policy is “content-neutral” and that enforcement “is not an endorsement nor rejection of any point of view.”

“We remain committed to ensuring BU is an inclusive, welcoming and supportive community, and there are many ways to express and demonstrate our values consistent with policies,” he said.

But some faculty members believe university officials are unjustifiably suppressing free speech or expression around certain causes in direct response to the federal government’s crackdown on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

Read the complete WBUR story here.

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