Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad spoke this past Monday at Columbia for the university’s annual World Leaders Forum.

Ahmadinejad’s scheduled speech at a United States academic institution immediately caused disagreement. Columbia University students, parents and alumni were outraged that Columbia would invite the president of Iran to their alma mater. Ahmadinejad also requested to visit Ground Zero. In response, signs read, “Our message to Iranian madman: If you even think of setting foot near Ground Zero, you can go to hell!”

Before his speech, some Columbia students said that although they disagreed with the Iranian president’s views, they still defended the administration in bringing Ahmadinejad to Columbia.
“What is better than to send…Ahmadinejad back to Iran with the opportunity for him to learn about our freedoms and the opportunity that in an academic institution such as this one, we are allowing him to come and debate these ideas of his,” said a Columbia graduate student.

“That’s why students come to universities: to discuss differences of opinions and ideologies.”
College is a time for us to speak freely and listen to others under the U.S. belief of freedom of speech. Columbia University President Lee C. Bollinger agrees. “[F]ree speech asks us to exercise extraordinary self-restraint against the very natural but often counter-productive impulses that lead us to retreat from engagement with ideas we dislike and fear,” said Bollinger in his opening remarks at the forum on Monday. “In this lies the genius of the American idea of free speech.”

Ahmadinejad is known for denying the Holocaust, saying Israel shouldn’t exist, involving his country in terrorist activities and allowing people to be executed in public. President Bollinger said at the ending of his caustic introduction, “Mr. President, you exhibit all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator.”

Through all of Bollinger’s accusations and questions, Ahmadinejad either denied or did not answer them. “President Ahmadinejad failed to respond to literally any of…Bollinger’s statements,” said Austin, a Columbia University student who saw the speech live, in an interview on Fox News. “All in all it was a very bizarre experience.”

And it was. Ahmadinejad said, “In Iran we don’t have homosexuals like in your country…In Iran we don’t have this phenomenon. I don’t know who has told you that we have it.”
Common sense alone reveals the absurdity of Ahmadinejad’s comments. According to CBC Canada news, “Many homosexuals live under the fundamentalist regime in Iran.” They are now trying to fight back. One Iranian, after fleeing from Iran, started a Web site titled the Iranian Queer Organization at irqo.net.

But it is not Ahmadinejad speaking at Columbia University that bothers me. It is the complete hypocrisy by this ultra-liberal institution.

The Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC), a training program to prepare college students to become commissioned officers, is not allowed on Columbia’s campus, yet this known sponsor of terrorism was. Columbia’s reasoning for not allowing ROTC on campus is because of their protest against the “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, which was instituted during Clinton’s administration. At the same time, Ahmadinejad completely denies the existence of homosexuals in his own country.

Some people at Columbia are outraged at this contradiction. “I will never donate to the university until the ROTC programs are brought back to campus,” said Austin from the Fox News interview.

This hypocrisy does not end there.

Last October, Columbia University College Republicans invited the Minuteman Project leaders to speak. This anti-immigration, all volunteer organization helps guard our borders against illegal immigrants. As one of the leaders of the Minuteman Project started to speak, a group of students ran on stage with a banner that read, “No one is illegal.” Applause erupted as a mass of students from the group and the audience began to run on stage. People began to chant, “Racist bastard! Go back!” and “Racist Nazis! Go away!” as the leader was silenced and mayhem began. It was out of control, and the Columbia police stood by and did nothing. This was not the encouragement of debate or discussion; it was chaos.

Bill O’Reilly, whom I know most of you absolutely adore, said, “Columbia University is a disgrace. It’s not interested in free speech. It’s a place of indoctrination.”

The student radicals responded a week later to defend their reasoning for storming the Minuteman Project speech. “We are proud to send the message to the country that racist organizations and fascist groups are not welcomed at Columbia or in New York City,” said one female protestor. “Like Hitler in pre-Nazi Germany, Gilchrist and the Minuteman attempt to demonize foreign born poor people by blaming illegals for society’s problems.”

One wonders why this girl didn’t rush the stage Monday in protest of this racist, homophobic president? Is hypocrisy selective in its outrage?

One statement made by Ahmadinejad all could agree on, “In university environment, we must allow people to speak their mind, to allow everyone to talk so that the truth is eventually revealed by all.”

Too often conservative speakers are stopped from speaking at college and university campuses. Some of you might believe bringing Ahmadinejad was a golden opportunity to engage with “the other,” but do you stand back and do nothing as we watch US: our fellow U.S. citizens: get disrespectfully thrown off the stage when they are only stating their beliefs?
The Minuteman Project at Columbia University isn’t the only example. It gets worse. On Oct. 21, 2004, columnist and conservative author Ann Coulter dodged custard pies thrown by two men at the University of Arizona in Tucson. Bill Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard and Fox News contributor, was hit in the face with an ice cream pie while speaking at Earlham College in Richmond, Ind., on Mar. 29, 2005. Pat Buchanan, former presidential hopeful, was splashed with a bottle of salad dressing on Mar. 31, 2005, at Western Michigan University. An audience member at Butler College threw a pie at author and editor of FrontPage Magazine David Horowitz on Apr. 6, 2005.

I am glad blatant acts of intolerance such as these have not happened at Whitman: yet. But what would you do if Ann Coulter came? David Horowitz? Bill O’Reilly? Would you be heading to the bakery or would you be willing to open your mind for just a few hours after spending months in Whitman’s hyper-liberal atmosphere?

America is noticing these blatant inconsistencies within liberal institutions and their half-baked commitment to diversity. We are not fools. If Whitman wants to become a college in the forefront of promoting diversity, it should practice what it preaches and demonstrate a true tolerance for ALL ideas

Could it be the reason why liberals hysterically prevent conservative speakers is because they fear they can’t compete in the arena of ideas? Does not “tolerance” demand an understanding of all sides of an argument?

Enough is enough. Indoctrination promotes and coerces only one idea; education freely examines all ideologies. Education, which tolerates a free look at the whole spectrum of ideas, is what I believe Whitman should stand for. This is the kind of education I want; how about you?

I hope the Whitman administration considers my observations and responds to my pleas for a just and balanced education. Silence would only signal an unwillingness to be fair to ALL students and a bias toward certain select groups. I also hope that Whitman administrators have been reading Ms. Avila’s and my articles on diversity. We will not let up on our discussion, and I will not surrender my fight for intellectual diversity.