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Historian Shouted Down at Cal State Northridge

Last week, historian and Baylor University professor George Gawrych was prevented from delivering a lecture at California State University, Northridge (CSUN) when students in protest until he left the room.

According to the student newspaper, , Gawrych鈥檚 planned lecture was to focus on a book he had written about Turkish army officer Mustafa Kemal Atat眉rk. As The Sundial reported, 鈥淢any Armenians feel that Gawrych鈥檚 book 鈥楾he Young Atat眉rk: From Ottoman Soldier to Statesman of Turkey鈥 praises a leader who played a role in the Armenian genocide.鈥 The protesting students of Armenian Youth Federation and the CSUN Armenian FIREAssociation. A of the incident was posted on AYF鈥檚 Facebook page.


As we鈥檝e written many times before, shouting down speakers with whom you disagree is not appropriate conduct in a setting that is meant to be the 鈥.鈥 To do so deprives others of the chance to hear from the speaker and to challenge his ideas more directly鈥攁nd perhaps more effectively鈥攂y asking questions for the whole audience to hear. The marketplace of ideas is best served when members of the campus community add their voices to an ongoing conversation, not when some community members silence others.

Unfortunately, both Gawrych and students who may have wanted to hear about his book or engage in a public conversation with him were denied the opportunity to participate in the event as planned.

University of California, Los Angeles law professor and Washington Post contributor Eugene Volokh earlier this morning and relayed the university鈥檚 response. CSUN expressed pride in the school鈥檚 鈥渟trong ties with the Armenian community鈥 but also noted, 鈥淸I]t is important for our university to be open to a wide range of visiting speakers and scholars, even those whose ideas we may disagree with.鈥 FIREis glad to see this statement from the university.

CSUN鈥檚 response also characterized the lecture as being 鈥渃ancelled in the interest of public safety鈥 and said that, with respect to the protesting students, 鈥渋nformation about student conduct is still being gathered.鈥 The university may, consistent with the First Amendment, punish students who effectively force the cancellation of events through disruption, and it should strongly emphasize to students that the best solution to speech with which one disagrees is more speech, not censorship.

In , Volokh remarks on the ramifications of students鈥 increasing intolerance to disfavored views on campus. Quoting a statement from the objecting students, he writes:

So let鈥檚 see: The university is supposed to exclude historians who want to speak positively about important historical leaders, based on students鈥 ideas about which views are not 鈥渁cceptable or appropriate.鈥 Indeed, the university is not supposed to 鈥渁llow[]鈥 such a talk 鈥渢o take place on campus.鈥 That鈥檚 not just true of talks that themselves disagree with the position that the Ottoman Empire engaged in genocide; as best I can tell, there was no indication that this was the purpose of Gawrych鈥檚 talk. It鈥檚 also true of a talk that praises a leader who disagreed with that position (and who did other bad things).

Moreover, the theory goes, the university鈥檚 policy of 鈥渮ero tolerance 鈥 regarding hatred鈥 means that scholars who want to express favorable views about such leaders must be excluded. That鈥檚 the new suppression ideology in a nutshell.

Enforcement of this 鈥渟uppression ideology鈥 would preclude presentations by a wide range of scholars who could provide valuable insight into innumerable topics and spur important conversations among students and faculty. It is disappointing to see CSUN students choose to respond to Gawrych in this way, and we hope CSUN will clearly and vehemently discourage such acts in the future.

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