The debate about students and free speech has flared up again. NUS LGBTQ officer Fran Cowling refused to share a platform with veteran human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell, acusing him of racism and transphobia.
Many people have pointed out that refusing to speak alongside someone is not the same as denying them a platform; others argue that it can amount to the same thing.
The standard argument against No Platform is that we should debate people we disagree with, because we will win the argument. This is a point I have made in many contexts. But there is a collary to this which is often glossed over: No Platform just makes the bigots someone else’s problem.
No Platform is just a clever form of NIMBYism. When students refuse to engage, the people with unsavoury views are not discredited to the extent that they fall out of the discourse. Instead, they double-down. Although they may be prevented from speaking in a particular place, they usually take their speech elsewhere. Continue reading
Category: Diary (Page 50 of 301)
Things that happen to me, or things I do
Ever since the hideous massacre of journalists at the Charlie Hebdo newspaper, I’ve been relaying a pair of juxtaposed facts about the media coverage of the incident. I am preparing a talk to some media studies students about the coverage, and I have just realised I have never properly blogged about what I noticed.
Better late than never, I’m doing that now. Continue reading
For the past few weeks I’ve been playing The Room series, a set of three games for mobile devices by Fireproof Games. This week I completed The Room Three, and thought I’d write a quick review.
The premise of all three games is simple. The player is presented with an ornate contraption, and the task is to unlock the secrets contained within. Do you pull this lever, or press that button? What combination of switches must you flick in order to open the door? How do I make that panel slide back? Where is the key that fits that lock? Continue reading
Ordinarily, I am a couple of degrees removed from the people who are persecuted for standing up for free speech. But an e-mail that was sent to me over the weekend brought the perils a little close to home.
On 2nd February 2016, the offices of the Kurdish PEN Centre in Sur Amed (Diyarbakir) were attacked. Photos provided by my colleagues at Kurdish PEN show the door to their office was bashed in, and the abstract statues in the courtyard were decapitated. Continue reading
Not a week goes by, it seems, without a mass shooting in the USA. The world’s oldest democracy also has the highest rate of gun related deaths in the developed world. It’s a shocking public safety problem, and it’s caused by the fact that the Constitution of the Unitied States says that the government cannot curtail its citizens’ right to bear arms.
Many constitutional scholars say that the 2nd Amendment does not really mean that individuals can arm themselves. Rather, they say, it simply stops the Federal Government from preventing the formation of militia. The authors of that text were, after all, mindful of tyrannies, dictatorships and unchecked state violence. Continue reading