Members of Penn State Hillel, other University students and administrators will gather at noon today on the steps of Pattee to protest the advertising policies of The Daily Collegian.

The protest is a result of objections to an advertisement that appeared Wednesday in the Collegian. The advertisement said the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum "displays no proof of homicidal gassing chambers, and no proof that even one individual was 'gassed' in a German program of 'genocide.' "

Rabbi David Sudaley, director of Penn State Hillel, said about seven or eight adminstrators and faculty members -- including Carol Herrmann, vice president for administration, Terrell Jones, deputy vice provost for educational equity, and Lynne Goodstein, associate professor of administration of justice and women's studies -- will give short speeches.

He said the rally will focus on the concern that the Collegian's policies are arbitary and decisions are not always made by the same people.

Sudaley said the Collegian's advertisement is not an issue of freedom of speech, but a question of ethics. Legally, the Collegian had the right to run the advertisement, but Sudaley said he believes it would not have run an ad depicting a nude woman.

Walter F. Gorba, the Collegian's business manager, said the business manager approves ads on a case-by-case basis, but he did not see this ad before it was published because the staff member who took the ad did not realize that there might be a problem with it.

According to the Collegian Inc. Rate Book for 1993-94, "Collegian Inc. reserves the right to refuse or to change advertising that is felt to be in poor taste or judgment . . . that maligns identifiable persons, races, religions or professions."

Gerry Hamilton, the Collegian's general manager, said the policy does not require the business manager to refuse an advertisement, but it is an argument that can be used for not publishing ads.

Gorba said he was on the defensive about running the ad at first, but he now realizes that he made a mistake by defending its publication.

"I asked myself the question, 'Would I run the ad?' I answered, 'No,' " Gorba said. "I'm taking full responsibility."

He said he plans to assemble a group of Collegian Business Division managers and professional staff members to revise the guidelines for accepting advertisements.

Hamilton said regardless of what changes are made to the ad acceptance guidelines, the final decision will always come back to the business manager. The guidelines were written with student input and students have the right to change them if necessary, he said.

Jan Gordon, former business manager of the Collegian, said a similar advertisement ran in the paper during her term in 1989. She received a few individual complaints after the second or third day from members of the Jewish community, she said.

Gordon said she decided to remove the advertisement after looking at the nature of the ad and what it was promoting.

Although the advertisement contains an individual opinion, Sudaley said this opinion is "ridiculous" and "is full of blatant lies."

Bradley Smith, director of the Committee for Open Debate on the Holocaust in California, has tried to get the advertisement into different newspapers across the country, but many of the school papers rejected it.

Jones said the issues suggested for the protest are ones with which everyone should be concerned. He added that such an advertisement cannot run without people being offended by it.

"What we're trying to do is develop a community that's caring and respectful of people's rights and feelings," Jones said. "We would speak out against similar activities of other groups."