Under pressure from school administration, students in charge of the Bijou Theater—located on the University of Iowa's campus—decided not to show a 3-D pornographic film this weekend.
 
Bijou's Executive Director Evan Meaney said it was ultimately the students' decision to acquiesce to UI interim vice president for Student Services Thomas Rocklin's request to cancel the showing. Rocklin said the film, "Disco Dolls in Hot Skin," did not serve an educational purpose.
 
Rocklin was not in his current position when the film was shown at the Bijou three years ago.
 
Though the theater's staff could have fought Rocklin's request, they decided not to stir up a controversy about a film which was intended to be shown as a “joke.” Meaney said it would not bode well for when the theater, which is partially funded by the school, decides to show a contentious movie that the organization genuinely stands behind.
 
The University of Maryland recently dealt with a similar issue, but students took a rather different approach.
 
In April 2009, University administrators at UMD canceled an on-campus screening of a hard-core pornographic film after state legislators threatened to cut funding to the institution. Legislators then passed a resolution asking the University of Maryland Board of Regents to create a policy to regulate the screening of obscene films on campus.

Students called any such policy a free speech infringement, and launched a campaign to get administrators to abandon the proposed policy. In November 2009, the Maryland Board of Regents officially dropped the proposal.

UI students are not on the same page, a point underscored by Associate Professor of Journalism and Mass Communication Lyombe Eko.
 
"The political climate is not conducive for experimentation with ideas of free speech," said Eko.


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