The random political thoughts thread (Part Deux)

[Alex]

Originally Posted by Moonliner

Universities are not government agencies. They don't need to be consistent or even fair in their decision on speakers.

Most large universities (such as the University of California) are government agencies. But you're still right.

However, that also means that they can't honestly claim that letting one controversial speaker speak is a matter of intellectual or academic freedom, or offered in the spirit of exposing people to different ideas while denying others the venue because of similar controversy. They should just say "we find these ideas more acceptable to us so we give them more of a platform" if that is the case. Or "Berkeley feminist groups are politically more powerful in the UC system than Jewish groups at Columbia" or whatever the various real reasons are.

The shame I feel for universities is that they ever cave to blocking speakers (and they do it all the time) because some group doesn't like what the speaker will say. Or, even worse, has said some time in the past.