Debate over recent speakers is good for the campus
By Stacey Featherstone
Senior Writer
A little controversy is healthy. In the wake of speakers Ayaan Hirsi Ali and F.W deKlerk, I was excited to witness the arousal of the combined intellect of the University—faculty, staff and student—as people debated every aspect of the speakers: what they had to say, their invitation to speak at the University, what hidden agenda might underlie lectureship series such as the Forum, and what the fallout from these speakers would potentially be. Regardless of whether you agreed with their presence on campus or their stance, it is undeniable: These lectures upset us.
When we arrive at the University and select our majors, we limit ourselves to the range of subjects and people within our academic “sector.” We become increasingly specific in our intellectual pursuits and develop some degree of quasi-expertise in one or two subjects. We take classes with the same people and sometimes even repeat professors. Over time we become complacent as we hear the same viewpoints and start to forget there are others out there representing opinions far different from our own or our classmates’. The result of this is students becoming lazy about their ideas because they are so rarely challenged.
I want them to be challenged. For me, it is less a question of what deKlerk and Hirsi Ali had to say. Perhaps they were right, perhaps they were wrong—I do not aim to give you my opinion on their subject matter. But I defend their right to be here and my University for inviting them. The Forum is not a machine to indoctrinate or brainwash you. As scholars, we are above that. We can understand this is a belief like any other, and you, the listeners, have a choice as a person endowed with the capacity to formulate your own stance. All sorts of speakers should be extended an invitation to speak to the campus. There is merit and value to every viewpoint, and it is exposure to different opinions, however radical they may seem, allowing you to formulate educated responses to the issues facing the world.
A University education depends on critical thinking: the ability to actively process and reformulate information, reject some aspects of any one idea, keep others, or discard the theory outright. This is the crux of what we learn here. Being well-educated implies you have had contact with many opposing viewpoints and developed your own arsenal of ideas and thoughts as a free-thinking individual.
Following Hirsi Ali’s lecture, my mind was buzzing. People are still talking about it. This is the recipe for college: bring together a multitude of intellectuals and add their ideas. Mix vigorously. Simmer for four years and when your time is up, I would hope your viewpoints have been challenged and you have risen with reason to defend them.
I would like to qualify the above with one final comment: If the University plans to continue presenting speakers who import such a degree of complexity and controversy, I only hope they understand this decision implies a duty to invite the other side to share their viewpoint. To take the example of Hirsi Ali, although she spoke against the fundamental theology of Islam, I would hope the University would answer with another speaker who defends the faith. Or perhaps an individual who voices concerns about the underlying theology of Christianity. In fact, why not invite them both at once—I would find the debate electrifying.
