Although the Pacifica Forum presents itself as an informational organization that seeks to clarify issues surrounding "war and peace, militarism and pacifism, violence and non-violence," a look at their website and list of past speakers belies this facade. In fact, the Southern Poverty Law Center identifies the forum as a white nationalist hate group.
From the forum's homepage, one finds links such as the article "A Jew Speaks" in which a writer identified only as "Barry" defends the organization's right to host an American National Socialist leader on Oregon's campus to discuss the symbolism of the Swastika. On a previous occasion the same speaker repeatedly gave a Nazi salute and shouted "Seig heil!" at protesters. On this occasion a crowd of 300 protesters entered the hall and disrupted the proceedings with signs and apparently some foot stomping. Discussing this protest "Barry" compares the protesters themselves to Nazis and event to Kristallnacht:
"Free speech was supposed to be on display that night but I felt as if it was 1938 Germany. The students and protesters, when they were in the midst of their foot-stomping, profanity-laced tirade became, for me a precursor to Kristallnacht, that infamous episode where Jewish businesses, and their owners faced the wrath of Nazi prejudice and hatred. This meeting/debate was nothing more than a Nuremburg rally held on UofO campus."During the previous week's forum titled "“Everything You Wanted to Know About Pacifica Forum But Were Afraid to Ask,” a speaker who described himself as a “white separatist and racialist,” insisted that Andrea Dworkin a feminist "known for her views that pornography can lead to violence against women, was 'too ugly to rape.'"
So, we return to the question at hand: what are the appropriate limits of free speech on college campuses? First, it is important to clarify that colleges and the learning spaces they contain and the newspapers they publish, even if they are "public institutions" are not obliged by any law, including of course the constitution to provide a platform for all speech. Just as college newspapers can and must select what content is appropriate for them to publish, universities can and I argue must select what types of speech they allow within their buildings. Not giving someone a forum is not the same thing as stopping them from speaking.
As one commentator phrased it in a blog comment "People on the left and right have a tendency to think that the free speech is some sort of right to convenience, which it isn’t."
Is it reasonable that the right to spread hate on college campuses should usurp the right of students to feel safe?
** UPDATE: At a meeting last night (Jan. 20th) University of Oregon administrators announced that the "Pacifica Forum is no longer allowed to hold meetings within the EMU for the rest of the year....The new resolution stated that the Pacifica Forum should remove themselves from the UO’s campus."
