Vegetarian Club Protests Action by College Administrators

Santa Monica College vegetarians are having a cow.

A controversy has been simmering for months between student vegetarians and campus administrators, but the dissolution last week of the Vegetarian Club as a student activity was the unkindest cut of all, said Ryan Flegal, who takes his meals politically.

Now the cows aren’t the only ones mad. On Tuesday, some members of the former club carried placards and demonstrated in the campus’ Free Speech Area. Next they’re going for the jugular with legal action, said club President Flegal.

“We are protesting the violation of our constitutional rights. We have not done anything wrong on this campus, but the campus administration chews away at us because they don’t like our opinions or the controversies that surround us,” he said. “If a group is unpopular, it should still be able to exist with the same rights, privileges and protections that any other student group enjoys.”

The Vegetarian Club has trod a rocky road since it was founded two years ago. Its free veggie meals caused campus administrators to see red about both contamination and commercialization. A flyer depicting a bikini-clad woman was deemed degrading. At the club’s Halloween bash, campus police arrested a member wearing only a G-string and a fig leaf.

Yet the latest imbroglio involving the Vegetarian Club stems from academic concerns about malnutrition and world ecosystems expressed privately by the chair of the life sciences department, Ruth Logan, after a departmental meeting in early May.

Apparently overheard, her remarks were addressed by Flegal in a flier circulated on campus. The student newspaper, the Corsair, then published an article on the debate, interviewing both molecular biologist Logan and vegetarianism promoter Flegal.

Logan considered the current controversy closed, but has suggested that the Vegetarian Club invite a broader range of speakers to its weekly Lunch ‘n Lecture series. “Expert” and “celebrity role model” speakers have included Ed Begley Jr. and Poison drummer Rikki Rockett.