“In the fight against extremism and the spread of misinformation, we need more voices, not less.”

Hearing the word ‘student’ inevitably gives rise to a number of well-established stereotypes. These range, of course, from old-standards (the trouble-makers, the militant-politicos, the overachievers etc) all the way to the fledgling breed of privately-educated ‘rahs’ and North London Princesses. But what many may not appreciate, or indeed acknowledge, is that students in this country enjoy a privileged position relative to the residual population (hint: it’s not that they don’t pay income tax.)

Surprisingly, in spite of the constraints of their course and the pressure to attain that proverbial 2:1, UK students are, in a fundamental sense, freer than everyone else. Under the status-quo, the free flow of ideas within UK campuses is rendered mostly unmitigated and uncensored by the forces which modulate external debate. But these rights and principles, when dealt into the wrong hands, are susceptible to exploitation. When faced with the presence of extremist or radical speakers on our campus, should we respect their same rights to freedom of expression, or should they face censorship?

Universities can be said to warrant an exceptional circumstance in the tired ‘first amendment’ debate. For even within the most reactionary communities, they play an invaluable role as centres of progressive and liberal values. In the 1950s, former Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, in a rare instance of hyperbole, remarked of Oxford’s venerable debate chamber as “the last bastion of free speech in the Western World”. Accordingly, like no other institution, universities operate within an academically-assured walled-garden which protects them to some extent from extraneous political influence, and engenders an equitable, non-intrusive learning environment. Even outside the towers of academia, the campus milieu serves as a free-market forum for the mutual exchange of ideas and beliefs. A cursory glance at the wide variety of networks, groups, and societies that operate under the banner of the S.U. shows the benefits we reap from this inalienable right to free-expression.

So, on matters of society speakers this issue of freedom of speech invariably comes into play. But with such an abundance of free speech comes the potential for misuse, and there are arguments to impose stricter regulations on who is or is not granted a platform for their ideas on university grounds.

The Nottingham University Secular Society has criticised religious groups on campus for their unsavoury choice of speakers and scabrous publications. I asked President Geraint Thomas if he thought religious groups, in particular those with social and political agendas to push, would exploit the university’s policy of tolerance, and even use it to defer criticism against them. “Yes, there is a danger of that”, he says, “and I believe any trend in that direction should be fought to the nail.”

In recent years, critics have focused their attentions upon university Islamic Societies, noting their particularly poor track record for radical speakers. In 2008, the Centre for Community Cohesion released a comprehensive study on radical Islam on UK campuses. The document was immediately marred by controversy. Representatives decried it as a fallacious work intended to pathologise the Muslim community. Granted, the study did not mince words, pronouncing that “students [...] active in their university Islamic society were twice as likely as non-members to hold extreme views”, and that Islamic societies had become breeding cultures for radicalism.

Within the C.f.C.C.’s “comprehensive list of extremist speakers who have addressed audiences on British campuses”, London universities came out worse, amassing twelve separate incidents of radical Islamic speakers at University College London (UCL) alone. Nottingham came out better by comparison with only one notable incident occurring in the past decade:

In 2003, Al-Qaeda recruiter Anwar al-Awlaki served as a “distinguished guest” for the Federation of Student Islamic Societies’ annual conference; other speakers included Azzam Tamimi – a known exponent of terroristic martyrdom – and Ismail Patel, chairman and co-founder of the ‘IslamExpo’. Patel’s bizarrely-titled event has been described by many as facilitating the legitimisation of Islam by providing a platform for both moderate and radical speakers.

But are Nottingham and other universities doing the same? Or are we, in the words of Macmillan, the “last bastions” of free expression?

An incident surrounding the Nottingham Christian Union (C.U.) however, demonstrates that societies cannot always control what speakers say at their behest. During their series of lectures held last semester, the C.U. invited Leeds University Professor Andrew McIntosh to speak on the subject of science and religion. It suffices to say the salient points Prof. McIntosh’s speech would bear little resemblance an anthropologist’s textbook, stating that the earth has existed no more than 6,000 years, that human beings and dinosaurs co-existed peacefully, and that millennial-aged fossils can be explained away by the intense pressure exerted by the Biblical Flood.

Prof. McIntosh’s intransigence knew no bounds when, afterwards, he contended that the field of science is by nature conspiratorial, that everything is decided by researchers in advance, and that the Bible, in fact, is the most direct route to scientific truth.

I spoke to the former C.U. committee member who chaired that discussion, Peter Grier. He told me that the C.U. had no consensus on creation, adding that, two weeks following the incident, a speaker, who was an “open advocate of Darwin’s theory”, was invited to chair a meeting in the Physics Building. So embarrassed were the C.U. by McIntosh, a representative felt obliged to add a postscript to the event distancing the organisation from the opinions expressed.

What this incident serves to show is how certain speakers who opine on the fringes of reason will often exploit the munificence of the S.U. and student-run societies to secure an unregulated rostrum for their libellous misinformation and radical ideals.

Interestingly, both the society representatives I spoke to didn’t object to inviting speakers who hold controversial beliefs on principle, only that they should not be permitted to digress onto certain contentious topics. When questioned about the appropriateness of having a creationist like Prof. McIntosh speak at an academic institution, Geraint from SecularSoc conceded that he doesn’t expressly object to the presence of people like McIntosh; he just believes that they shouldn’t be allowed to talk about creation (or whatever pseudo-academic field they ‘specialise’ in).

Perhaps, in the wake of this, the particular mode of free speech permitted within an academic institution should be more concentrated, providing scope only for ideas which adhere to the conventions of the academic process. Geraint adds dryly, “Perhaps, someone needs to explain to these people how science works.”

But this response is only applicable when speakers are voicing ideas that are intellectually subversive, not morally or ethically so. The question of racist and radical speakers cannot be dismissed as blithely.

But still I feel that out-and-out censorship isn’t the answer. Part of me can’t shake the conviction that no matter how scurrilous the argument, it should have a right to be expressed. Across the threshold of faith and disbelief, I found in people a shared, fundamental agreement that freedom of speech ought to prevail in most, if not all, circumstances. And, while the beneficence of this right is open to abuse and maltreatment, this has always been so and unlikely to change.

Intellectual freedom is ranked among the pantheon of Enlightenment values because its principle function is to allow reason to prevail. In this same spirit, to conquer the malignant forces of radicalism and extremism, we need more voices, not less.

Be it in response to the spreading of intellectual misinformation or that of supremacist dogma, as students, our responsibility is to speak up in support of our principles, not to silence those that oppose them.

Izzy Scrimshire

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