Thursday, August 20, 2009

Freedom of speech? Not at Yale


Shame on Yale!

Remember the faux outrage that swept across Europe when a Danish newspaper published cartoons like the one above? I am deliberately calling this rage fake, since I proved that it really had less than zero to do with disrespect to ANY religion. What was disrespectful of the muslim faith was the manufactured violence and mayhem that erupted across Europe. Now comes this:

From Israel National News comes this:
Academic Freedom: Yale Bans Book on Mohammed Cartoons
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu

Yale University Press has banned the scheduled publication of a book that includes 12 cartoons spoofing Mohammed which appeared in a Danish newspaper four years ago. Its decision also affects any future pictures of Mohammed after consultations with Muslim clerics, diplomats and counterterrorism officials.

After the initial appearance of the cartoons, which are available on the Internet, violent Muslim protests resulted in several deaths and widespread riots. The book, authored by Brandeis University professor and Danish native Jytte Klausen, originally was entitled “The 12 Little Drawings that Shook the World: The Danish Cartoons and the Clash of Civilization."

The Yale Press rejected the title as being too sensational, and afterwards it ruled that the book could not include the cartoons or even pictures of Mohammed, in deference to some Muslim clerics who rule against the practice....(read the rest of this article here)

So let me see if I have this correct? An academic institution, supposedly a place of higher learning and scholastic debate; a place to encourage critical thought, where minds are supposed to be open to the study of civilisation, is afraid to debate and study what is surely a pathetic attempt by one(minority) faction of 'civilisation' to enlighten prevalent attitudes.

What next? Are we going to ban books on other areas of history that might threaten/offend a minority? Shall we now be burning all the books just because the minority finds them offensive.

May I suggest that next all universities should be checking ALL books in their libraries. I am SURE that there are - and have been - many books that over the centuries some have found offensive. Should we burn them all? If Yale really means to not offend anyone, surely that is the only logical conclusion?


"Everyone is in favor of free speech. Hardly a day passes without its being extolled, but some people's idea of it is that they are free to say what they like, but if anyone else says anything back, that is an outrage."

--Winston Churchill

"The books that the world calls immoral are the books that show the world its own shame."
--Oscar Wilde

"We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people."
-- John F. Kennedy. Remarks made on the 20th anniversary of the Voice of America at H.E.W. Auditorium, February 26, 1962

Shame on you, Yale. I think your 'reasoning' is glaringly false, hypocritical and has NO place in a university.

The world depicted in Farenheit 451 continues unchecked, as even institutes of "higher" learning cave to the "religion of peace."

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