9/10 and All Is Lost

Adding UFB insult to UFB injury, the staff of the Harvard Crimson declares today that Khatami Deserved a Forum.

"Though objectionable, Iranian leader Khatami added to Harvard’s intellectual climate"

They write:

.... Khatami, who was president of the Islamic Republic of Iran from 1997 until his resignation just over a year ago, spoke to a packed audience at the Kennedy School of Government (KSG) yesterday.

Though there was no shortage of objections to Khatami’s presence from both sides of the political spectrum, the invitation extended to him was at once appropriate and timely. The policies of Khatami’s administration were reprehensible, and Iran remains home to some of the most egregious human rights violations in the world. His invitation to speak did not excuse this nor did it endorse his twisted worldview. Instead, his invitation merely acknowledged that he has, for better or worse, profoundly shaped current events.

As did Hitler profoundly shape current events in his time. I can only assume that the staff of the Harvard Crimson would have said that Hitler, too, "deserved a forum" and might have "added to Harvard's intellectual climate."

Political differences should not determine who speaks to a university. Those decisions ought to be made with regard to what contribution a speaker stands to make to the intellectual community. With Iran dominating front pages around the world because of its deadly dance with the United Nations and nuclear arms, Khatami surely stood ready to make such a contribution to Harvard.

Khatami’s speech was itself an unexceptional mix of demagoguery and diplomacy, but what made yesterday’s event remarkable was the audience response to his presence. Some applauded when he was asked a tough question about Iran’s alleged financial support of the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah. Others were equally enthusiastic as Khatami towed the Iranian party line in soft-spoken Persian. Outside the KSG, a small crowd of protesters greeted queued-up ticket holders with placards. Hawkish demonstrators waved signs that urged the US government to “Bomb Iran Before They Nuke Us,” while the doves standing beside them were just as passionate in their sentiments: “Stand With Iranian Student, Stand Against War,” their banners read.

In other words, Khatami’s visit to Harvard accomplished exactly what speaker events at the John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum are meant to— aid and comfort for the enemy his presence provoked widespread interest in an important issue of foreign policy and sparked a discussion, both inside the venue and across the country, about Iran, its policies, and America’s relationship with it.

Thus they would have us believe that before this event at Harvard, there was no discussion, and without it, there would be no "widespread interest in an important issue of foreign policy." Pardon me for gagging. My gratitude got stuck in my throat.

.... A ramification of our liberties, however, is the sometimes difficult reality that we are obligated to give a fair hearing to those with whom we strongly disagree.

Outside of virulent anti-semitism, I think that last remark is one of the most vile statements I have ever heard come out of an American college campus. They are obligated ... to give a fair hearing ... to those who seek their destruction.

No such obligation exists, nor does Khatami "deserve" a podium and a microphone and a packed audience at Harvard. These arrogant-and-cowardly products of the academy at the Crimson are creating (or hallucinating) these notions ... and a la Banagor, I don't even care WHY anymore. I see them suck up to fascists; that's all the information I need. I don't need to know WHY they do it.

Not that it matters in the scheme of things, given that the world has gone mad, but what strikes me as the Very Creepiest bit in all this is that the audience was packed, they applauded, they were "enthusiastic." It produces a very unpleasant sense of deja-effing-vu for me: Hanan Ashrawi, that walking poorpalestonian propaganda machine (and spokesperson for the PLO) was invited to speak at CU-Boulder in the fall of 2002, the week between the very first anniversary of 9/11 and Yom Kippur.

I remember writing in 2003 (like it was yesterday, get it?):

.... Rather than listen and respond to the concerns of the local Jewish community, which centered around the timing of the event ... the University and the larger Boulder community went up in arms over the "issues" of free speech and academic freedom. It was a red herring, introduced to divert attention away from the insult being suffered by local Jews. It was an attempt to "win" the argument by changing the subject. And, sadly, it worked.

Following Ashrawi's visit, there was a spate of antisemitic activity in Boulder, including vile graffitti on the walls of a predominantly-Jewish fraternity house, the desecration of Jewish religious observance (sukkah) on campus with swastikas, and heightened activity by antisemitic hate groups such as the National Alliance. In the name of "free speech," Holocaust survivors who live in Boulder have had to witness swastikas in America. This summer has seen "Death to the Jews" chanted in Arabic in front of a Denver synagogue.

At that time three years ago, I was addressing Rutgers about a pro-Palestinian conference they were going to, and indeed did eventually, sponsor. It's a tad mind-blowing that I am still sitting here saying the same thing, watching university after university after university fall to the barbarians. Watch this:

Those who call for the destruction of Israel are free to do so, from any street corner or basement. When the state of New Jersey and Rutgers University Harvard lend[s] their prestige and their facilities to such a call, they nurture and empower the message, and should be held accountable for doing so.

Everyone knows that no ... university in this country would sanction a conference held by a student Ku Klux Klan organization. Such an event would simply not be allowed, "academic freedom" notwithstanding. If there's a different rule for Jews than for others, something's up, and it needs to be addressed.... [Rutgers] [Harvard] university officials need to concede that there is a line, somewhere, that they wouldn't cross. They need to explain why this conference Khatami falls outside that line.

In Khatami's country, in April of this year, it was boasted that "some 52,000 people have signed up to be involved in possible attacks."

The Sunday Times of London reported that Iran has 40,000 trained suicide bombers prepared to strike western targets.

Chanting "Death to America" and "Nuclear technology is our right," volunteers registered their names at the former American Embassy in southern Tehran.... Dr. Hassan Abbasi, head of the Centre for Doctrinal Strategic Studies in the Revolutionary Guards, said in a speech that 29 western targets had been identified.

Iranian men fill in the papers of registration indicating their readiness for martyrdom, or to carry out suicide attacks ... at the former U.S Embassy in Tehran, Iran, Monday, April 17, 2006.... (AP Photo/Hasan Sarbakhshian)

And so, let me get this straight if I can. Our own president is treated thus (Jeff Jacoby in the Boston Globe):

George W. Bush has been smeared by the left with every insult imaginable. He has been called a segregationist who yearns to revive Jim Crow and compared ad nauseam to Adolf Hitler. His detractors have accused him of being financially entwined with Osama bin Laden. Of presiding over an American gulag. Of being a latter-day Mussolini. Howard Dean has proffered the "interesting theory" that the Saudis tipped off Bush in advance about 9/11. One US senator (Ted Kennedy) has called the war in Iraq a "fraud" that Bush "cooked up in Texas" for political gain; another ( Vermont independent James Jeffords) has charged him with planning a war in Iran as a strategy to put his brother in the White House. Cindy Sheehan has called him a "lying bastard," a "filth spewer," an "evil maniac," a "fuehrer," and a "terrorist" guilty of "blatant genocide" -- and been rewarded for her invective with oceans of media attention.

What else can they say about Bush? That they want him killed?

They already say it....

When Natan Sharansky spoke at Rutgers, he literally got a pie in his face.

Senator McCain was booed and jeered last spring at the New School.

And when Condoleezza Rice received an honorary doctorate of law at Boston College, about 250 students and faculty alike turned their backs and held up placards in protest.

None of this, not a speck of it, in the audience for Khatami at Harvard. No, they listened politely, they applauded, they were enthusiastic.

I was speaking not too long ago with a fellow-blogger, and he said that "If America doesn't get it, all is lost."

Guess what, Allen? I don't think America gets it.

Comments

[matt walles]

Harvard’s intellectual climate = Evil Sworn to the Destruction of the Free World. How could any self-respecting parent encourage their child to attend this sewer pretending to be a place where people learn?

[Toby]

America doesn't get it. But that's only the first part of the problem. The second part of the problem is that we--those of us who get it--have to help them get it. Don't ask me how. I'm still working on that one. I can say that--while I agree with Matt that I'd never send my children there--I certainly don't think that attacks will get us the response we need. I don't know. I'm just saying we need to help them get it. It's the burden of being right.

[Yael]

It's not all that long ago that I would've been very pleased if one of my kids went to Harvard. And now, I wouldn't let them go if they wanted to. How could that have changed so drastically so quickly? It feels as if the world just suddenly went upside down. Plus, Toby, I understand your sentiment and I've tried for these last few years, but for the most part the response has been hostile. I wouldn't keep doing this if I didn't have any hope at all, but every day it diminishes.

[jy99]

Everyone is invited to view photographs I made of the protest outside the Harvard JFK School here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jy99/sets/72157594279739589/

[Toby]

It's me, again. And I'm not pretending to have the answers. It's just that, having held minority opinions my entire life (though I'm certain the majority of my minority opinions will be vindicated in the long run) I've learned that the 'frontal attack' method of communicating them: "Unions are the worst thing for America since Democratic party!" incites an instinctive counter-attack. Whether it's human nature, or American nature (not to distinguise Americans as being distinct from humans, but as a subset) to respond to an attack by attacking back, I don't know, but it's verifyable. The trick is to find a way to talk to people that encourages them to weigh and evaluate your arguments not as an attack, but as 'new evidence' or 'another way of seeing things.' The problem with this approach, is that it has to be individual. As a conservative, I don't go looking for evidence that necessarily debunks my beliefs, I don't look for 'new ways of viewing things,' as I'm pretty confident in my method of viewing the world. Instead, someone has to engage me in a conversation and say "You know, I'm for free markets, too, but I worry that, left to themselves, they'll reward selfisness and leave people behind." And then point the conversation in the direction of what they want to discuss. As equals. How to do that? I don't know. I mean, I move in conservative circles, my 'knucklehead liberal' counterparts move in 'knucklehead liberal' circles. We don't talk much. Instead, we talk to our compatriots and get ourselves so fired up that, when we actually meet someone we could persuade, we attack instead. And that's not healthy. They do the same thing, don't get me wrong, I'm just saying that we're right. We have an obligation to persuade the rest of the (thinking) world, not to beat them into submission.

[Toby]

Just for the record, I really did put paragraphs into that last comment, with the return key. Should I use the HTML tag, instead? That's a pretty intimidating block of text by itself.