The University of Wisconsin Badger Herald reprinted one of the infamous Danish cartoons on Monday. The student publication chose the cartoon which depicts Prophet Muhammad wearing a turban shaped like a bomb with a lit fuse.
As WISC-TV, Channel 3 reported there was immediate criticism ranging from claims this isn't about "freedom of speech but rather freedom of dignity" to "pure racism."
Some people will never get it. Free speech is there for the best and the worst of critics and commentators. Everything is fair game from religion to children, presidents to prophets. Dignity trumps free speech? Not today or tomorrow. If every comment someone considered undignified was to be banned and censored, there would be nothing left in the newspapers except the weather, baseball box scores, and the funny pages.
I regularly come across anti-Semitic rantings and cartoons some of which are recent publications and some of which predate Hitler. I am in far greater danger from a society that would ban those publications to protect my "dignity" than I am from one that promotes free and open debate.
The University of Wisconsin Chancellor, John Wiley , issued a statement which said, in part:
This is not the first time that the swords of speech and controversy have clashed on this campus, and, most assuredly, it will not be the last. Most often, the disputes have involved charges of racial, ethnic or religious insensitivity, even hostility - not unlike the situation today. But any review of these disputes demonstrates a common finding: that the public controversies which ensued represent, together, a perfect embodiment of unrestricted speech in a free society, in which all views on a given subject were given equal weight and attention, aired so that every individual could form his or her own opinions. Then, as now, it should never be routine to recall that this university has for more than 100 years championed the cause of free and open debate, the "fearless sifting and winnowing by which alone the truth can be found," and that an increasingly complex world requires this standard more than ever.
Let's hear it for the Chancellor. In the meantime:
- WISC-TV refused to show the cartoon, displaying a page of the Badger Herald with the offending drawing blanked out
- The Herald's, competitor, my college newspaper, the Daily Cardinal, disappointingly ran an article about the Chancellor's comments headed: Wiley Chastises Local Student Newspaper
- The Chancellor's statement was covered by the Duluth News Tribune, Chancellor Defends Campus Paper's Right to Reprint Cartoon
Mr. Soglin,
Thank you for your support. Allies willing to speak out publicly have been tough to come by of late - your comments are greatly appreciated.
Cheers,
Mac VerStandig
Editor in Chief
The Badger Herald
[email protected]
www.badgerherald.com
Posted by: Mac VerStandig | February 24, 2006 at 01:11 AM