Review Representatives Ousted From Freshman Dorm

When I first came onto the Review staff a year ago, I wrote about the leftist intolerance I experienced while distributing copies of the paper throughout my freshman dorm, Clara Dickson Hall. An entire year later, although new freshman were much more receptive, our peaceful and unintrusive distribution entourage (of 2 people) on Monday evening came to a startling end accompanied with arrest threats and acerbic tones.

Apparently, walking through dorms as a non-resident is a high-profile offence. While I acknowledge that this is in fact a rule, we were unaware at the time and were under the impression that any Cornell student could visit other dorms. Given the numerous different club and sport representatives that knocked on my door and attempted to recruit me and my hall mates freshman year (including textbook buy-back, religious groups, charity, etc.), I did not think that such an act was a regularly enforced one that warranted such intense and volatile enforcement.

Regardless, our excursion ended on the fourth floor with hard-nose RA Pat Noonan. As we spoke with students sitting in hallways about our publication, Mr. Noonan listened in from his room and observed until stopping us in the hallway. Mr. Noonan then asked if we were residents in the hall, to which we politely replied, ‘no.’ Without ado, he told us to “then get out.” In an extremely unfriendly and cold manner, RA Noonan reiterated that we must leave immediately and threatened to call the police. As we were escorted out of the dormitory, Mr. Noonan refused our offer of a free copy of the Review, saying, “I am a senior, I’ve been here for four years. I know what the Review is.” Just before leaving, Review representatives and Noonan decided it would be best to take up the manner with the RHD. After finding out the RHD was not in the building at the time, Review reporters left quietly and returned home.

While we now understand that entering a dorm as a non-resident without an escort is against policy, we cannot grasp any idea why we were met with such unwarranted hostility, anger, and threatened arrest. Had he kindly informed of us of dorm policy and asked us to leave we would not have to take issue with his behavior. However, this was clearly not the case and his apparent aversion to the Review organization makes it seem like this could possibly have been a politically-motivated action.

Members of the Review are now aware of dorm policy that was made clear by Mr. Noonan and sincerely apologize to anyone who was offended or unhappy with our unescorted presence in the dorm.