Word: plo
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...surprising that embattled groups on this campus invoke "free speech" almost by reflex. When the scheduled panel appearance of a Palestine Liberation Organization members at a Law School conference came under fire two weeks ago, one professor, defending the invitation, argued. "The PLO like the Nazi Party, has an absolute right to speak...
...both instances, opponents responded by trying to curtail the comments they so detested. The chairman of the Harvard Jewish Law Students Association (HJLSA). Denine J. Karlam '80, chastised the Law School for partially funding the conference at which Deena Abu-Loghod, information coordinator for the PLO mission at the U.N., would speak. The reason, according to Karlan: the school's decision to fund the program "implicitly supports the PLO," because Abu-Loghod "has a reputation for hooking into these types of conferences and using them as a forum for PLO views against Israel...
...MORE important sense, however, supporters of the PLO appearance and of Pattullo's decision to speak out are right to encourage the expression of unpopular views within the University community. If the formal right to free speech is not at stake, the practical, utilitarian rationale for unimpeded expression certainly is in suggesting that the Law School should not have invited Abu-Loghod to the conference, the HJLSA was effectively trying to close the door to alternative views--seeking to exclude the PLO because it found that group's activities objectionable. The GSA, too, sought to corner the market of ideas...
What both Abu-Loghod and Pattullo's opponents full to realize is that nothing can be move dangerous to a University community than the exclusion of competing views. Except an educational issues, universities need not--and probably should not--have political ideologies, like support or oppositions to the PLO. They should, however, safeguard one set of values--that of pluralism, discourse and toleration. The gestures of the HJLSA and the GSA in trying to silence their critics, would undermine those values...
...their campus, probably a vast majority of students oppose the PLO. And if this year's GSA quiescence suggests anything, it is that much of this campus now supports its gay members drive for equality and toleration. The divergent views of a lone individual will not harm either came. Support for Israel's quest for peaceful existence without the PLO and gay students quest for normal lives without governments that discourage their lifestyles, are, in my view, correct. But the popularity of one view is no reason to silence competing ideas--only to seek to rebut them...