Hat tip Daily Californian
“It’s not an issue of freedom of speech, it’s a matter of campus climate,” Navid said. “The First Amendment gives him the right to speak his mind, but it doesn’t give him the right to speak at such an elevated platform as the commencement. That’s a privilege his racist and bigoted remarks don’t give him.”
-Marium Navid
In case you didn't know, Bill Maher is scheduled to be the commencement speaker at UC Berkeley. In the wake of his recent comments about Islam on his show, that has some folks in an uproar, specifically Muslim students. They want him dis-invited.
http://www.dailycal.org/2014/10/26/students-spring-opposition-bill-maher-announced-keynote-speaker/
As I have said before when I posted the original story of Maher's debate with Ben Affleck, I think Maher is a jerk. It is a mystery to me why anybody would want this guy as a commencement speaker. I mean is he the best they can do? Having said that, his critics must now challenge the truthfulness or falsity of what he said. There is now a larger issue at stake here. In addition, I would ask where all these people were when Maher was bashing Christians as he has done for years.
At any rate, I am copying my comment to the above reader thread.
“It’s not an issue of freedom of speech, it’s a matter of campus climate,” Navid said. “The First Amendment gives him the right to speak his mind, but it doesn’t give him the right to speak at such an elevated platform as the commencement. That’s a privilege his racist and bigoted remarks don’t give him.”
"And who decides that, Marium Navid?
Where were all the objections to Bill Maher when he was bashing Christians as he has done for years?
In fact, where were all the objections in the past years of anti-Israeli events on UC campuses in which Jews have been insulted by speakers? Has the UCB Muslim Student Association ever invited Amir Abdel Malik Ali to speak on campus? The MSU at UC Irvine, where I teach has invited him many times. He regularly takes names out of a hat and calls them "Zionist Jews", a term he spits out with contempt.
Bill Maher is a jerk in my view, but he pales in comparison to some of the speakers who regularly appear on UC campuses and bash Jews."
Gary Fouse
Adj teacher
UCI Ext
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(I always sign my name.)
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1 comment:
UC Berkeley has no obligation to invite him to be commencement speaker, but no political bloc is entitled to a veto over who is invited.
Whether he is racist or bigoted or by what criteria, or how exalted a lectern he is being offered has nothing to do with "rights."
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