If you’re going to be insane enough to invite the President of Iran to make a speech at an eminent university in New York City, you might as well let the man talk without slandering him beforehand.
On Mon., Sep. 24, Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad waded through a throng of protestors to speak at Columbia University. His reward for doing so was to be referred to as exhibiting “all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator” in an introduction given by Columbia president Lee Bollinger–the same man who invited him. It is hard to understand why this would happen. Fair enough, Ahmadinejad has given voice to many questionable and indeed blatantly disturbing ideas. That, however, does not make it reasonable to insult him in a forum you have personally invited him to speak at. In an attempt to make the situation a little bit more absurd, when the event came under attack from critics alleging it provided a platform for hate, Bollinger defended Columbia’s invitation by arguing that it was done in the interest of free speech and academic freedom. How the hell can this be the case when you deride the man before he has the chance to open his mouth?
Not only is it grossly inappropriate to treat a guest speaker in such fashion, but it is unnecessary as it undervalues the ability of the audience to make their own judgment. The Iranian president said as much when he responded to the malicious introduction by suggesting it insulted the knowledge of the audience. The very concept of free speech is based on the idea that a person may say what they wish, regardless of how ridiculous it may seem, and it will be left up to the audience to ignore or appreciate as they will. Indeed, the audience demonstrated this ability as it broke out into laughter when Ahmadinejad made the ludicrous claim there are no homosexuals in Iran. The preposterousness of this statement was certainly matched by his questioning of the Holocaust’s reality. The audience can again be assumed to posses the requisite intellectual faculty to dismiss this on their own.
Bollinger defended his introduction by stating “a critical part of freedom of speech is that we do not honour the dishonourable when we open up their views for debate.” This is a difficult idea to tender. Ahmadinejad was invited to speak and to answer questions, not to debate. If that was what Columbia wanted, then that is what should have been explicitly set up. This was not the case, so a certain degree of respect must be accorded. Academic freedom demands a forum liberated of institutional bias, a forum in which the student is able to exercise their own intellect and in which ideas–even unpopular ones–should at least be heard before they are dismissed. The actions of Columbia’s president clearly do not engender this type of environment. There is no sense in letting a man speak if you begin by saying you think him “either brazenly provocative or astonishingly uneducated.” It is far more effective to let the ideas stand alone; that way, they can fully bask in their shame, unimpeded by the shameful display that preceded them.
The way things transpired makes Columbia seem cheap. Indeed, it suggests the school is either suffering from some institutional self-esteem issues, unsure its students posses the ability to recognize nonsense when they hear it, or that it is disturbed in some way and takes delight in picking easy targets for its intellectual bullying. If Columbia felt itself incapable of providing an environment free of hostility, it should never have invited Ahmadinejad to lecture.