October 15, 2006
Thugs and Free Speech II Posted by John Steele Gordon at 02:30 PM EST Let’s go back to the beginning here. My original request was: “There has been a disturbing pattern of leftist threats and violence against campus speakers they [the leftists] do not approve of, followed by an anemic reaction from college authorities, in recent decades. I would be genuinely interested in learning instances in which right-leaning students have sought to prevent leftist speakers from having their say. I know of no examples. Examples of the opposite abound.” That seems a reasonable question to me: Are there any instances where right-leaning students have silenced speakers, or is this behavior characteristic of left-leaning students only? Mr. Zeitz didn’t respond to that question, however. Instead he wrote about the difference between 1983 and 2006, dismissing the events at Smith College in 1983 as “a dated story” (whatever that might mean on a history blog). So I then wrote, “I again invite Mr. Zeitz to provide a list of instances over the last 25 years when thugs of the right have prevented free speech, such as thugs of the left have frequently done over the last quarter century.” Here was my mistake. I should have just quoted my original inquiry or made it totally clear that I was, still, referring to events such as the ones that took place at Columbia recently and Smith College in 1983. By my not doing so and my using the perfectly apposite word “thug,” Mr. Zeitz was able—in the best college-debate-team style—to evade my question for a second time. Instead of answering my question, he “provided Mr. Gordon with several cases of state-sponsored, anti-free-speech thuggery . . .” He writes, “John Steele Gordon has a funny way of changing the terms of debate when the debate doesn’t quite go his way.” Then he writes, “I made the case—conditionally seconded by Fred Smoler—that state authorities who trample on the First Amendment rights of their citizens are no less “thuggish” than mobs of left-wing college sophomores who shout down visiting conservative speakers. What could have ensued was a nuanced discussion about state power and political repression, but Mr. Gordon doesn’t do nuance.” Just who is changing the subject here? That state authorities are quite capable of acting thuggishly is perfectly true. It is equally true that the sun rises in the east. Just what have those two facts to do with my original question? Not much. No, let me rephrase that. Nothing at all. I asked, originally, for instances of right-wing threats and violence against liberal campus speakers, and Mr. Zeitz would rather have a nuanced discussion about state power and political repression. I bet I know why: Mr. Zeitz can’t find any instances of right-wing threats and violence against campus speakers. Does any reader of this blog think that were he able to find any he would not have produced them instead of changing the subject? He writes, “In November 2000 a mob comprising GOP Hill staffers and political operatives, but posing as grass-roots Floridians, interrupted the proceedings of the Miami-Dade County Canvassing Board, causing such disruption and civil disorder that the board was forced to halt its manual recount of presidential ballots. Mr. Gordon will no doubt issue a lame retort—something along the lines of, “counting ballots is not the same as giving a speech”—or again change the terms of debate.” Translation: Mr. Gordon will point out that an apple is not an orange but pay no attention, that’s lame.” Who’s being lame here? I asked for an instance where a right-wing mob prevented someone from speaking, and he gives an instance where GOP Hill staffers interrupted, but did not prevent, vote counting. (I hasten to add that I do not remember the details of the incident and I am not about to concede that Mr. Zeitz has correctly described what happened. But the details are not relevant as, by Mr. Zeitz’s own admission, no speech was prevented.) Again, had Mr. Zeitz been able to produce a genuine instance of right-wingers suppressing the free speech of left-wingers, forcing a speaker to stop speaking (or not even start, as at Smith College), he would have done so and not have needed to resort to preemptive denigration of my inevitable reply. He writes, “So I’ll preemptively challenge him to do a little better than that.” Fine, how about this: Answer my original request for information: “I would be genuinely interested in learning instances in which right-leaning students have sought to prevent leftist speakers from having their say.” If Mr. Zeitz can’t find any such instances, how about him saying so and—dare I hope?—beginning a nuanced discussion about why student (and other) mobs that silence speakers always seem to be left-wing mobs. That still strikes me as an interesting, perhaps important question. The fact that Mr. Zeitz has been trying so very, very hard to avoid answering it makes it seem only more so. Could it be because he doesn’t like what the answer is?
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