Blog About W&M Spats Taken Down
By Shawn Day, Daily Press, Newport News, Va.
Jun. 22–WILLIAMSBURG — A blog that took to task websites supporting and opposing College of William and Mary president Gene Nichol is being shut down and replaced by another site.
A farewell message was posted to the site, WMReality.blogspot.com, on Thursday by Ethan Edwards, the graduate student who was running the blog. In the posting, titled “End of Game,” Edwards wrote that he got an e-mail from “a fellow alumni who asked me to close the blog today.”
“He tells me that my blog could make the situation worse. After reading what he had to say — I think he’s right,” Edwards wrote.
Edwards didn’t return e-mail messages Thursday. Todd Skiles, a 1992 William and Mary graduate, contacted the Daily Press and said Edwards had forwarded a message from the Daily Press seeking information about the blog’s demise.
“We’re going to continue what he started but we’re going to do it on the up and up,” Skiles said. He and about 15 others have established the SocietyForTheCollege.org, a site and group designed to heal divisions over university president Gene Nichol’s decision late last year to remove a cross from permanent display in Wren Chapel. Skiles also was involved in the SaveTheWrenCross.org campaign that demanded the return of the Wren cross.
Nichol said he removed the cross to allow the college’s chapel to be more inclusive of all faiths. In response to the ensuing controversy, college officials agreed earlier this year to restore the cross to permanent display in the chapel in a glass display case. The cross was always available upon request and during the chapel’s Sunday services.
On Thursday, Skiles said, “I don’t think there’s any doubt in anybody’s mind that we’ve got a pretty big fracture in the university community.”
“The goal has got to be to reunify,” he said. “We can’t have this kind of fracture in the college community.”
Skiles said he e-mailed Edwards and asked for the blog to be taken down, and Edwards agreed.
Skiles intends to send questions to leaders of the anti-Nichol site, ShouldNicholBeRenewed.org, and the pro-Nichol site, WMFightsBack.blogspot.com, and post leaders’ answers in a point-counterpoint format on a page on his society’s Web site. That page is active today. Supporters and opponents will send comments to the Web site administrator, who will vet them for profanity and other “destructive” comments before posting them, Skiles said.
The SocietyForTheCollege.org site includes links to pages that describe the society’s mission, goals and history. Skiles helped found the group a few months ago.
He said he plans “to put my opinions in my back pocket.”
Another leader of the society is Jean Zettler, a class of 1973 alumna.
Her letter to the university’s Board of Visitors regarding Nichol’s performance as president is posted on ShouldNicholBeRenewed.org.
The message, in part, includes this passage: “I fail to understand how people who really care about the College can support Nichol — he certainly has not helped the College’s reputation.”
Last week, a spokesman for ShouldNicholBeRenewed.org said that his organization may also include some members of the former SaveTheWrenCross.org campaign.
Zettler said on Friday that she was not part of the campaign.
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