Campus security stopped my free speech table over a missing form

Last October I set up a table near the student union at Ohio State to hand out flyers about the new city ordinance. I had printed 200 copies and a friend brought a small speaker for a quick speech. Five minutes in, a security guard walked over and told me I needed a reservation slip that had to be approved 72 hours in advance. I asked where that rule was posted and he pointed to a tiny sign near the info desk that I had walked past a dozen times. He said, "We have to follow the policy or you're out," and he stood there until I packed everything up. The crazy part is that the free speech zone itself was only 20 feet wide, so even with the form I couldn't say much. Has anyone else dealt with rules that basically make it impossible to speak without weeks of paperwork?

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the_cameron19d ago

Wait, did they actually make you pack up mid-speech while you were already talking? That's wild because I remember once I was at a county fair trying to hand out those little fan-shaped schedules for the local farmers market and this guy in a safety vest came at me like I was selling illegal hot dogs. Turns out I needed a vendor permit just to stand near the food trucks, even though I wasn't selling anything. I ended up having this whole debate with him about how my flyers were technically "informational material" and he finally said, "Sir, you're blocking the cotton candy line," which honestly made me laugh so hard I just left. But the joke's on them because I taped the schedules to the port-a-potty doors and people actually used them, so I got my message out anyway.