As The Daily Illini reported last week, the Suburban Express bus company recently entered into a tiff with University of Illinois graduate student Jeremy Leval. Leval claims he stood up for an international student that a bus driver allegedly berated in an offensive and unnecessary way. Suburban Express disagreed, stating that Leval was a “meddling, self-aggrandizing student” trying to promote his own agenda. Leval was subsequently banned from riding on its buses. Both Leval and Suburban Express have different accounts of what happened that day, but that isn’t what we have a problem with. What we do take issue with is Suburban Express’ handling of the allegations. 

Suburban Express responded to Leval’s claims with a haphazard statement that lacked formality. In the statement, the company lambasts Leval for “calling as much attention to himself as possible to promote his own competing business.” The “competing business,” College Rides, was never launched and never will be, according to Leval. 

If this incident did indeed occur, the driver should have simply offered assistance to the student who did not understand the verbal directions. But instead, the driver supposedly responded with, “If you don’t understand English, you don’t belong at the University of Illinois or any ‘American’ University.”  

What we know as fact, though, is that Suburban Express filed 44 lawsuits this year in Ford County against passengers for tort or contract damages. 

It doesn’t matter whether Leval’s specific case is true because Suburban Express has clearly made it a point to silence customers who have made complaints against them. 

If Suburban Express’ agenda is to transport passengers from one destination to another, that is all it should do. 

We would like to assume some member of the Suburban Express public relations team would have the good sense to counsel against an allegation of a verbal attack toward a member of its primary customer base. Is there any question who would look worse in this situation: University students trying to travel using the bus company or the bullying behemoth bus company? We think not. America’s distaste for bullies is strong. 

Had the company simply taken the high road, making a public acknowledgement regarding the allegation and apologizing for any misunderstanding, nobody would have to lose any face. The company’s chosen course of taking a petty defensive stance or filing lawsuits against customers just makes the company itself look bad. 

With the demise of LEX, Suburban Express may think it has earned the latitude to push students around. But let there be no mistake: We’re more than just little dollar signs on your spreadsheets, we’re real people that deserve respect.