Utah Valley State College’s former student body vice president of academics said he still thinks he made the right decision inviting Michael Moore to speak to the campus last fall.

In fact, Joe Vogel, 23, who recently resigned from his position in the student government, has been reflecting on the decision quite a bit, considering he will soon be finished writing a book on his experiences.

“It’s an exploration of the reasons why — why people reacted the way they did,” he said. Vogel said the book is an account of the entire controversy – from his perspective.

In the book, he explores back to when the decision to invite Moore was made and includes the events that followed the speech as well.

Because of conflicts with the book and the student government position, Jim Bassi, UVSC student body president, asked Vogel to step down from his position last month.

“It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my entire life,” Bassi said. “I think his book is a great idea. I’ll be the first out to read it and to buy it, but I found it a conflict of interest to promote his book while he was still in office.”

A national publisher has picked up his book, and it could take six months to a year to publish, he said.

Several months before the controversy exploded across Utah Valley, Vogel ran for his former position with Bassi. He said he had hopes of placing most of his efforts into supporting different levels of academics on campus. He and Bassi also wanted to invite speakers to the college that students would be excited about, he said. Previously, only a small number of students attended the speeches.

After much planning, Vogel and Bassi made their plans public to invite Moore to speak at the college Oct. 20, 2004.

“I knew that people would be upset,” Vogel said. “What we decided was that Michael Moore was a very important figure in the political scene and that he got students to think. Whether you agreed with him or not, he would be a really interesting and exciting speaker.”

Ironically, Vogel and Bassi could never expect the magnitude of response their decision would cause.

In the next month and a half, the two student government leaders received thousands of responses from members of the Utah Valley community and from people around the nation, explaining different opinions about the decision.

Among the responses, some said they would no longer support UVSC. Others claimed they wouldn’t even hire students that went to the school because of the controversy.

“It was kind of overwhelming at first,” Vogel said. “I was surprised just by the volume [of responses]. We got nonstop phone calls, e-mails and letters.”

He said although he received just as many positive comments as negative comments, he sometimes felt personally attacked by some responses.

“There was a lot of pressure,” Vogel said. “But I always felt that we had made a good decision and that we should stand by it.”

He said he recalled one specific threat directed to him that said he “should be tarred, feathered and run out of the state.”

“It was a tough time, but the decision to keep going wasn’t really that tough,” Bassi said, pausing. “Maybe that was because Joe and I were in it together and the student government backed it.”

Vogel attributed much of his own strength to the support he received from friends, family, faculty members and others from around the state.

“When you feel like you’re staying for principle, it helps,” he said. “I really felt like it became more of a symbolic issue and that certain principles that were crucial to a college and to any society were violated. We had to stand up and make sure that a minority viewpoint would be allowed.”

His brother Ryan Vogel, who works at UVSC, said although the experience was a challenge for the Vogel family, they always tried to show their support.

“Knowing his true intent, it was sometimes difficult to watch people,” he said. “He tried to make the best decisions possible in every situation. Honestly, I am proud of every decision he had to make.”

Although the two student leaders would continue to endure many difficult experiences in the weeks preceding the event, both said that it had all been worth it when they saw the excitement and support the day of Moore’s speech.

Even Moore commended the leaders for their continued efforts to stand up for what they believed in.

“I feel very bad for the students who have had to suffer through this because they believe in freedom,” Moore said about Vogel and Bassi during his speech at the McKay Events Center. “I’ve never seen a group more dedicated to the First Amendment than at Utah Valley State College.”

Immediately following this comment, the crowd burst into a thunderous applause.

“I got chills,” Vogel said, thinking back to the moment. “It was a great feeling. It really felt good to be appreciated after all we had gone through.”

But in the weeks following, the controversy continued. The student government leaders faced a lawsuit about possible violations of the school’s constitution. The lawsuit, however, was eventually withdrawn.

Vogel said around the same time, news of his book leaked to Deseret Morning News and KSL. After interviews with the two media outlets, readers in student government became concerned with what he was writing about, he said. Soon after, Bassi asked him to resign from his position.

“It happened really fast,” he said. “I was blind sighted by it.”

Although Vogel said he was upset by the request, he agreed to resign.

“I don’t think there’s any bitterness in student government towards Joe, and I think that people still love and respect Joe — not only in student government, but campus wide,” Bassi said.

Even though Vogel is no longer in the student government, he said he will take what he has learned and continue with his life.

“It’s really been a great experience for me to look back on everything that happened,” Vogel said. “Looking back, I feel proud of what we accomplished. I think it raised a lot of important issues that need to be discussed in this valley and in this state.”



Copyright Brigham Young University 25 Jan 2005