The design of a t-shirt has raised a considerable amount of questions on a student organizations right to free speech and Iowa State’s right to protect their image under trademark laws. Yes, a student organization should have the right to free speech, especially political free speech. However, image and branding are everything in today’s society, meaning that the university should certainly be concerned over the use of their name and logo and have the right to protect that public image. Saying this, the situation can come down to not what each group can do, but what they should do.

The university has made it nearly impossible for Iowa State’s chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws to find any way to reasonably create a t-shirt for their organization. The group is advocating for the reform of current laws concerning the use of marijuana. There are multiple chapters of this particular organization, meaning that it is logical for them to define themselves as the specific chapter for Iowa State students. This, then, would mean that they would need to use the university’s colors, name or logo to designate who they are.

Iowa State’s Trademark Licensing Office guidelines state that a group that has been recognized by the university is allowed to use their name to show the connection to the university as long as it is in a “factual, critical or descriptive manner.”

However, if they are to use the full name of their group, instead of just NORML, they will fail to gain approval of the design every time because of the use of the word marijuana.

Iowa State’s Trademark Licensing Office changed its guidelines just last January to say that they would not approve designs using university markings to promote “dangerous, illegal or unhealthy products, actions or behaviors” and “drugs and drug paraphernalia that are illegal or unhealthful.”

This new language, which was clearly created in response to the new student organization, as it came after they began requesting approval for t-shirt designs, seems to be fairly broad. What is considered dangerous behavior? Gay marriage was an illegal action a few years ago in Iowa. If it still were today and students were advocating for the legalization of gay marriage, would the university accept their requests? With the new guidelines, it is truly hard to say. A person, or the university, can say “Of course it wouldn’t fit that” but the wording seems to leave a huge opportunity for interpretation by the very few individuals that get to make the final decision on what is permissible and what is not.

The only thing that can be said is that it is clear that the university has chosen their public image, which is hopefully strong enough to withstand a few t-shirts promoting controversial political activism, over the voice of their students. There will always be students who stand behind something that the university will not support. Finding tighter and tighter restrictions will only harm the university’s image as one of giving little room to encouraging students to find their political voice.

The university may have the right to protect their image at all costs, but it leaves a lot up in the air for the price of what they could lose in student individualism. The image of Iowa State is long-standing and well in-grained, an image capable of withstanding controversial free speech in the hope of a more open, public dialogue.