Selective Freedom Of Expression...

...not only on many, many campuses, ask Christie Blatchford, Ann Coulter, but public venues where a Toronto citizen (David Menzies) was verbally and physically "assaulted" but police took no action.

Expect the Expected

Just over a week ago Anne Marie Waters, a Council Member of the National Secular Society, was scheduled to give a talk at Queen Mary University of London as a Co-Spokesperson on behalf of the anti-Shariah group One Law For All. You'll never guess what happened next:

Before (the talk) started, a man entered the lecture theatre, stood at the front with a camera and filmed the audience. He then said that he knew who everyone was, where they lived and if he heard anything negative about the Prophet, he would track them down. The man also filmed students in the foyer and threatened to murder them and their families. On leaving the building, he joined a large group of men, apparently there to support him.

Campus security to the rescue!

He said: 'If you have these discussions, what do you expect?'
Well, in any country anywhere in the world with a substantial Muslim population you can expect to be hung out to dry by politicians and law-enforcement officials. Would-be speaker Ann Marie Waters - who is courageous by virtue of even attempting to speak out against Islamist censorship and threats - seems just a half-step away from understanding that in the relativistic, equivocating West, front-line defenders of free speech are essentially on their own:

I am left wondering what exactly we could have done. I would love to say that we stood up to him and carried on bravely in a valiant defence of free speech, but it was a frightening experience and I know that people felt genuinely threatened and upset. In any case, is it the role of speakers and students to face off against potentially violent Islamists in defence of our free speech, risking our safety in the process?
Posted by EBD at 12:04 AM Comments (24)