Tonight, Ayaan Hirsi Ali is supposed to speak at Yale University. I say "supposed" since it remains to be seen if the forces of leftist and Islamic fascism combine to prevent or disrupt the appearance. At the supposed home of free thought and free speech, the campus of a great university, the risk is real that a speaker who presents unpopular views will be shouted down or prevented entirely from speaking. For those of you who do not know, Ayaan Hirsi Ali was born in Somalia to an Islamic family. She was the victim of female genital mutilation as a child. She was sold by her family in marriage to a much older man she had not met. Then she escaped and fled to the Netherlands. Since that escape, she has been an outspoken critic of Islam and of mistreatment of women. She does not mince words, so some of her strongest statements are seen as condemnations of all of Islam. In fact, that is exactly what those statements are; Ali is now very anti-Muslim.
With all of the strong views expressed by Ali, one still must wonder why it is so threatening to Islamic students and to leftists on campus if she is allowed to speak. Surely, if her words are nothing but nonsense, these groups ought to be able to argue cogently in a way that will show Ali to be wrong. But that is not the accepted course of the opposition. Those opponents choose instead to prevent Ali from speaking. They attack free speech. Those attacks are truly un-American and wrong.
Recently, Fox News host Megyn Kelly had former professor Ward Churchill on her show. You may recall that Churchill is the professor in Colorado who penned an essay celebrating the attack on the World Trade Center on 9-11. He repeated his views celebrating the terrorists and denouncing America for months after 9-11, and he still holds those views today. Kelly questioned him on her show and made clear to the audience exactly what the hateful ideas supported by Churchill are. No one shouted him down. No one prevented Churchill from speaking. Churchill's views failed in that show as a result of the force of logic being employed against them by Megyn Kelly. So he is an idiot with despicable ideas, but he got to speak.
The contrast between the treatment by Fox News of a terrorist supporter and the treatment by Islamic students and the left of a women who was mutilated, sold into marriage as a child and generally oppressed by Moslem society in Somalia is startling. Why should the American left want to shout down opposition? Are their ideas so weak that they cannot logically oppose someone whose rhetoric they consider hateful?
I hope that nothing happens this evening to prevent Ali from speaking. Sure, she is anti-Moslem. Indeed, she is now an atheist because she considers religion to be at the root of her own oppression. But just being anti Muslim or anti Christian or anti atheist is not a good enough reason to stop people from speaking. Those who are anti Obama or anti Republican or even anti white or anti black get to speak in America. We don't have to listen, but they get to speak. It is one of the basic rules of American society. It needs to survive if America is to survive.
With all of the strong views expressed by Ali, one still must wonder why it is so threatening to Islamic students and to leftists on campus if she is allowed to speak. Surely, if her words are nothing but nonsense, these groups ought to be able to argue cogently in a way that will show Ali to be wrong. But that is not the accepted course of the opposition. Those opponents choose instead to prevent Ali from speaking. They attack free speech. Those attacks are truly un-American and wrong.
Recently, Fox News host Megyn Kelly had former professor Ward Churchill on her show. You may recall that Churchill is the professor in Colorado who penned an essay celebrating the attack on the World Trade Center on 9-11. He repeated his views celebrating the terrorists and denouncing America for months after 9-11, and he still holds those views today. Kelly questioned him on her show and made clear to the audience exactly what the hateful ideas supported by Churchill are. No one shouted him down. No one prevented Churchill from speaking. Churchill's views failed in that show as a result of the force of logic being employed against them by Megyn Kelly. So he is an idiot with despicable ideas, but he got to speak.
The contrast between the treatment by Fox News of a terrorist supporter and the treatment by Islamic students and the left of a women who was mutilated, sold into marriage as a child and generally oppressed by Moslem society in Somalia is startling. Why should the American left want to shout down opposition? Are their ideas so weak that they cannot logically oppose someone whose rhetoric they consider hateful?
I hope that nothing happens this evening to prevent Ali from speaking. Sure, she is anti-Moslem. Indeed, she is now an atheist because she considers religion to be at the root of her own oppression. But just being anti Muslim or anti Christian or anti atheist is not a good enough reason to stop people from speaking. Those who are anti Obama or anti Republican or even anti white or anti black get to speak in America. We don't have to listen, but they get to speak. It is one of the basic rules of American society. It needs to survive if America is to survive.
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