Let me start off by saying that when I first read this article, I was struck by how frighteningly satirical it seemed. After a while, however, I was just plain frightened. Yet not for the reasons some of you may think. It was not solely the words of President Ahmadinejab which caused me distress. As a matter of fact, there were quite a few things that made me uneasy.
Truth is rarely dealt with in politics or press.
The author of this article was obviously quite biased. Perhaps rightly so, but it just stuck out to me. Maybe I’m just bitter about that ’he said Iran could not recognize Israel… and conciliatory — he said he wanted to visit ground zero.’ which links the U.S. and Israel as though they are one and the same, thus confusing me into having to read the same sentences over and over.
It also bothered me that President of Columbia University invited Ahmadinejab to speak and then excoriated him. “On the one hand, yes, come and speak freely. On the other hand, I hate you and you’re terrible.” It just seemed like a crafty move to stay safe from the criticism of both the left and right to me.
But on to the real substance of the article: Ahmadinejab’s claims. Super-elevated into international importance beyond his actual power as President of Iran, he espoused a bizarre mix of logical historical truth (such as the displacement of Palestinians from their homeland) and blatant lies and anti-Semitism (as shown in his not believing that the Holocaust truly happened, claiming there were no homosexuals in Iran, and claiming that women had it just fine in Iran). He played both the part of a victim oppressed by the U.S., and the part of a narrow-minded lunatic. I think he’s a nutjob, but I think the U.S. government is making him into a figurehead (besides, I guess we can’t be the only ones with a nutjob in the office). This is something of a tangent, but I’ve ceased to believe the U.S. government. It claims that Iran has an aggressive nuclear weapons development plan, but it also said there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and there weren’t. But anyway, I guess that’s between the IAEA and the U.S. government.
It also struck me as odd that Bush said the fact that Ahmadinejab’s being allowed to speak at C.U. really spoke to the freedom of the country, and then said he wouldn’t have done the same. I’d also like to bring up that though Bush and Bollinger called Ahmadinejab out as a sponsor of terrorism, Ahmadinejab and the government of Iran are not the first countries to accuse the U.S. of being the greatest worldwide sponsor of international terrorism. One has to take into consideration, after all, the recent coup in Haiti where U.S. forces kidnapped the Hatian President, the CIA-led overthrow of a democratically elected President of Chile, Salvador Allende, and the airline bomber who downed a Cuban passenger jet now living freely in Florida.
But I digress. President Ahmadinejab’s speech did not, in my opinion, do him any good. He was too obviously bigoted.
Really, what this article enforced in me was the importance of diplomacy. It is encouraging that Columbia University allowed Ahmadinejab to exercise freedom of speech, even if he is the face on the country towards which our hostilities are being turned. It is a good sign that many of our institutions are open-minded enough to capitalize on an oppertunity to let their students think and judge for themselves, even if the speaker is widely disliked.
I admire and respect Columbia for inviting opinionated and controversial speakers to their campus. However, I personally feel that they may have gone too far in extending an invitation to President Ahmadinejad of Iran. Allowing him to speak gave him more acknowledgement and increased public awareness of this man who obviously has the nature of a terrorist. Giving him this publicity just makes him feel more powerful and acknowledges to all Americans that he is a world leader regardless of his oppressive views. With Iran posing a great threat to our country, why would Columbia invite the leader to openly speak and be highly critical of the United States and our international affairs? He accuses us of supporting terrorist groups and says we have no right to interfere with other nations who want nuclear power.
In regard to some of his remarks I don’t understand how he could say that the Holocaust is just a theory. There is substantive evidence (Nazi documents, concentration camps, etc) of the persecution and murder of 6 million Jews and other “inferior” people as well. Ahmadinejad’s remarks regarding homosexuals is absolutely absurd. It is well documented that since the beginning of civilization homosexuality exists in all cultures. He blatantly ignores the facts and possesses a skewed perspective on the issues and history, and denies that any homosexuals exist in Iran.
When asked to answer specific questions, he dances around the answers. For example when questioned if he wanted to destroy Israel, he says Iran is friends with Jews. However, we know for a fact that this man believes that Israel should not exist and would initiate its destruction if he could. His answers to the questions posed by Mr. Bollinger were evasive, and/or blatant lies.
Welcoming Ahmadinejad to Columbia University is a unique learning opportunity for their students. However, I strongly believe that showcasing Ahmadinejad has more negative consequences for our country than benefits for Columbia students.
When I first started reading this article, it seemed almost unreal to me. What president of a University where thousands of our future generation learns and lives invites the leader of a threat to our country to speak?
Inviting controversial speakers to campuses is a great idea. It encourages deeper thinking and requires students to choose and argue a side.
However, inviting Ahmadinejad was not the greatest of ideas. I try to understand where Bollinger is coming from: this could have been (and it probably was) a interesting experience for Columbia students, but it was executed terribly.
The thing that jumped out at me the most was Bollinger's switching of sides. He first invited Ahmadinejad, but before the president even spoke, Bollinger verbally attacked him. He emphasized his encouragement of freedom of speech, which is something the US is known for. However, the lack of manners he showed to Ahmadinejad (however "uneducated" and "petty and "cruel" this leader is) embarrassed me. Especially when Bollinger showed signs of trying to welcome him to the university and then blatantly attacking him. There is a difference between offering strong differing opinions and out right insulting (“You are either brazenly provocative or astonishingly uneducated.”) someone.
Even though I disagree with the way Bollinger handled the situation, I still disagree with what Ahmadinejad said. He cannot claim that the Holocaust is merely a theory. There are mountains of evidence proving that the Holocaust did happen and it was as terrible as we [don't want to] believe. I feel that his ignorance of this major historical event shows that he does not respect the Jews (and he did dance around that question). 9/11 was a devastating event for us. It is NOT A THEORY, it happened. If he believes the Holocaust was a theory, I can't believe that he respects the enormity of 9/11, when the refuses to accept the Holocaust, an even bigger event
Also, he cannot say that there are no homosexuals in Iran. Homosexuality has existed for many, many years. In the US, 1 in every 10 males is gay. How can he say there are no homosexuals in his country truthfully? How can he guarantee this "fact?" Did he ensure that no one in Iran is homosexual through fear/force?
Even though the experience is something that Columbia students will remember and def. think about, I feel that there were more cons to inviting Ahmadinejad than pros.
The fact that Columbia invited Ahmadinejab to speak is a testament to this country's openness and emphasis of free speech, something Iran surely would not do for President Bush. However I found myself surprisingly frustrated to almost agree with Ahmadinejab's statement on how Columbia's speaker and moderator spun the arguement in a way where there was only one thing he could say, for example yes or no. I thought this almost defeated the purpose of an invitation because it showed that Columbia brought him here just to have him say disgusting, awful and ignorant things that we already know. Because of the way the debate/ arguement was delivered, it did not really allow the audience to see the reasoning (though it is probably dumb reasoning) behind Ahmadinejab’s policies. Though I completely, 100 percent do not agree with anything the Iranian president says, I still think the whole invitation idea was flawed because it was just a way for Columbia and the audience to jeer and yell at statements we already knew he was going to say, what did America LEARN from this? Nothing. We know he is a bad guy and arguably a sick man, but how did America progress by listening to his ranting on American soil? I don’t think we learned, frankly.
The statements of the Iranian "President" are sadly not out of line with the often jaded views of Ideological dictatorships. He runs the country based not on facts, but rather on beliefs. He believes that there are no homosexuals in Iran, which is just shy of a statistical impossibility. He also states that the Holocaust is a theory, and that further investigation was needed to legitimize the claim that the Holocaust ever happened. He says this despite the mountains of evidence staring him in the face, from burned down concentration camps in Germany, to written documents by both Germans and Allies referring to the atrocities that were occurring in Germany. We all seem surprised by his comments, but really; can we expect anything else from the leader of a rogue nation that openly funds terrorism? Regardless of the President's blunders, I feel as if Columbia put him at an unfair disadvantage. It seems to me that Columbia only took such an aggressive stance towards him after they saw the uproar that inviting him to speak caused, and they felt they had to save face.
I believe the action of the Columbian President, Mr. Bollinger in inviting Mr. Ahmadinejad, the president of Iran was both bold and intriging. This daring idea of allowing the President to speak freely, permiting the students and faculty of Columbia to form their own opinions of Mr. Ahmadinejad and his country was a very different way of teaching. Another controversial part of the article was the attacks from the President of Columbia. Although i completely agree with them, and accept the accusations, i do believe it was disrespectful to MR. Ahmadinejad. But the most astonishing was the constant dodging of the straight forward questions by Mr. Ahmadinejad concerning Iran's feeling toward Israel. THis speech will present many protests and critizime to come.
I find myself deeply moved by your thoughtfulness and the depth of your insights. thank you for taking the time to reflect so carefully and to feel passionately about things. this gives me hope. what I especially enjoy is hearing your thoughts about "off" topic ideas. even though we are talking about the puritans of all things --the world around us is moving and shaking and spinning every moment. this makes me feel like we can both go back into the past AND be present. thanks. and I fully support writing these blogs without an emphasis on spelling or grammar -- do your best, but let's assume we'll all be writing at times without our spell checkers.
I believe that many of the outrageous ideas believed by Ahmadinejab, including the fact that there are no gays in Iran, and his belief that the Holocaust did not occur, are rather self-explanatory. Any American, brought up with a proper moral-compass and some knowledge of History will understand the absurdity of these statements. I will therefore not spend too much time explaining my thoughts on these because i don't think anyone in our class will question the validity of history of the Holocaust or the incorrectness in removing Gays from your Country. I therefore move on to a few comments of Ahmadinejab that struck me as accurate and possibly true. One of them is the idea of US being a hypocrite in the War against Terror. After learning last year about WWII and it's aftermath, i understood why, to Americans, we should take over as the world's Peace keeper. However i do find it a little bit hypocritical that we, are going out accusing people of having nuclear capabilities and trying to disarm them, when we have thousands of nuclear and biological weapons. I'm not saying that we are a terorrist country by any standards, but I'm just seeing the other side of this spectrum. I'm playing Devil's advocate, and realizing that i could see the other side's idea, that we are perhaps a little hypocritical. I understand that the US has shown no sign of evil or corruption and that Iran has; however, just in general, who made us boss? I know, i know there's the UN, but Iran is part of it, and it seems as though they should disarm any weapons that they have. Why don't we. also i found Ahmadinejab's comment to the mediator rather interesting and right on. The media and citizen's do want to see white and black. They don't want to see any gray. Although Ahmadinejab's comment mat not have been truthful (why would he not believe in the Holocaust then say that he loves the victims that he doubts), his reply to the mediator's demand of a yes or no answer was brilliant. In all, i do disagree with Ahmadinejab's comment's and principles, however i just thought that i would mix up the conversation and throw out some different ideas.
Also on the other hand, i agree that Bush is going against the US's and UN's principle of "Free speech". Bush is biased that Ahmadinejab is a criminal, otherwise why is Bush so reluctant to allow him to speak. Would Bush allow me a microphone to speak to a crowd with, yes because t him i have doen nothing wrong. I'm sure that Ahmadinejab's speech was screened, so why not let him speak his free will and thoughts? Isn't Bush then just being one-sided.
Also i disliked the amount of bias of the author. It kinda forced you to think in Black and White (as i said before) and it forced you to think that Ahmadinejab is a horrible man and a terrorist.
Nick said something that caught my attention: the US has shown no sign of evil or corruption and Iran has. I'm pretty sure that Nick and you all understand this, but I just want to reinforce the idea that we have to be careful about making statements like that. I'm pretty sure the U.S. definitely has shown signs of corruption, even if only looking at what we've learned so far in history (though, I guess it was not technically today's independant America yet in those times). Still, I reference my "U.S. terrorism" segment in my first comment.
I think it's important, as the generation that will hopefully take it to heart to make a change in the world for good, to not assume that we are the tried and true lifelong good-guys. As it is right now, a good many people in foreign countries think of us as "arrogant Americans." We'll have to acknowledge the darkside, so to speak, of our country as well as the good parts in order to keep an open mind and deal with problems. If we're convinced that we're the best, how are we going to improve?
I definitely agree with everything you said Angela. I really liked how you brought up that Bollinger switched sides by inviting him to speak freely, but then verbally attacked what he said. It seems to me the Bollinger only invited Ahmadinejad for not just a learning experience for students, but also to stir up controversy. He wanted to make the president of Iran look bad and degrade him (“I doubt that you will have the intellectual courage to answer these questions”). Although Bollinger was correct in his statement and I completely agree with them, his comments had a malicious intent. Since Bollinger invited Ahmadinejad to speak freely at Columbia, he should not have handled the situation the way he did. It was necessary to state how Ahmadinejad never answered a question (yes or no), but the way Bollinger constantly attacked him was unnecessary.
When I first read the headlines of the paper that said "Ahmadinejad, at Columbia" I was sure I was "seeing things." The idea just seemed so peculiar, a terrorist coming to speak in one of America's most prestigious universities. Unreal!
I believe that it was very daring and almost admirable for the President of Colombia to invite Ahmadinejad to speak. After all, freedom of speech is the foundation upon which our country is build, and a terrorist being given a stage at a US university is the epitome of this right.
I am critical however of how Lee C. Bollinger behaved. Allowing Ahmadinejad to speak was a bold move, which could have greatly benefited the students of Columbia, but starting off with a diatribe completely defeats the purpose of this educational experience. I assume that the President of Columbia was tense from all the severe criticism he was bombarded with, but since he had already given Ahmadinejad the stage, he should have been more resistant to the censure, and maintained his calm. The whole point of inviting Ahmadinejad to speak was to hear his true beliefs and possibly the reasoning behind them. Ahmadinejad is a staunch believer of his inhumane doctrine, and there was no way that the President of Columbia could sway him. Calling Ahmadinejad a "cruel and petty dictator," therefore, although true, was completely uncalled for. I see two ways the President of Colombia should have behaved: He either should have saved himself from the reproac hhe is now receiving by not granting Ahmadinejad a stage OR he should have adhered to American's right to freedom of speech and given Ahmadinejad the microphone without any preceding insults.
There is not a doubt in my mind as to the extreme evil of the leader of Iran. To deny the Holocaust and 9/11 and to claim no homosexuals exist in Iran are all inexcusable statements in my mind. Although in this speech he evaded straightforward talk regarding Israel, I will never forget how not so long ago he wished the whole Israeli population destroyed and drowned in the ocean. As optimistic as I try to be, it is great evil we are dealing with, and world peace seems very far in our horizons. :-(
Phoebe, how can you judge the Us and say that we're corrupt and evil from acts that were committed BEFORE the Us was even created. You can't really look centuries back, even before the creation of the Country, to judge its morality. If you look back in History you could say that the US are very racist and had laves; however, we are now the most diverse country and probably the least racist. So you can't really look very far back into our past to judge. I would say look back to WWII on since that is when we became the "keeper of peace: Remember i don't necessarily find us arrogant or anything of that matter, i just found that point of Ahmadinejab's rather interesting and provocative
I think it was a very bold and daring move for the President of Colombia to bring in the very controversial Mr. Ahmadinejad. This was interesting because it allowed the students and faculty to be able to address "the problem" directly; something that they are probably not able to do. This allowed the students and faculty to get the truth directly from the source which also made it very interesting due to the many differences between us and Israel. Such a agathering like could never have been done in Israel. This is also intriguing because it slighlty hints us about his upcoming UN meeting.
Molly, you said that you thought that Columbia let their students think freely and make their opinions. Did they really? To me it seems like, with Bollinger's "white and black" questions, that he was trying to elude to pre-destined assumptions of Ahmadinejab, as Ahmadinejad eluded to after being asked a yes or no question. I really feel like Columbia invited Ahmadineab to Columbia so that they may shoot him down and display ideas that they want to be displayed. Also with the writer's bias, i also get this impression.
Nick although I understand what you mean about Mr. Bollingers introduction if you can call it that. It was a very indirert if that was his approach, i felt he was just stating many ideas some times corralated with Mr. Ahmadinejad and Israel. Even so they said that the crowd was not entirely against Mr. Ahmadinejad.
Take it easy, Nick. I already acknowledged that it's somewhat unfair to look that far back into history, so I once again reference you to the terrorism section of my very first post. I promise I wasn't attacking you, and I'm still not, but I still don't feel that our country is a prime example of morality, even if you want to take a more recent point of view. Currently 600,000+ Iraqi men, women and children are dead. Iraq had no ties to Bin Laden nor any weapons of mass destruction.
Columbia's bold move to invite President Ahmadinejab to speak seems to have been a bad idea. The President of Columbia may have invited him to speak freely about his ideas, but before President Ahmadinejab even had a chance to talk, Bollinger immidiately started showing his hate for him, calling him uneducated or just merely stupid. Although these may be true statements, it wasn't the smartest way to introduce the President of a country. By doing this Bollinger only made Americans look hostile and mean rather than willing to look into others opinions and ideas. President Ahmadinejab is going back to Iran looking like a hero who came and talked to Americans who were rude and acted completely wrong towards the president. While I believe all of this, I also know that what President Ahmadinejab said scares me. The fact that this man couldn't even answer questions directly shows his incompitence and inability to lead a country with a straight and clear mind. He wasn't even able to recognize Israel, nor did he think there are any homosexuals in Iran. This president is acting completley insane in saying women in Iran are treated fine and saying the Holocaust is just a theory. I believe that inviting President Ahmadinejab to Columbia was a good idea to prove America's beliefs in freedom of speech, however I believe the way Bollinger introduced him was a bad idea. I think introducing him this way may have just sparked even more anti-American feelings in the middle east and could even lead to more fighting. President Ahmadinejab is clearly widely disliked and for good reasons, however I believe that people who were there should've had a chance to judge the President's speech before Bollinger completely discredited him in his introduction.
Exactly Phoebe, and that ties into my idea as to why those Iraqis are dead; Why? Because we felt as though we were the negotiator and we had to go and fix the world's problems. We assumed violence and terrorism which led to unprovoked deaths.
To Nick, Nick, i found myself asking the same questions when i was reading this article also. What gives us the rihg to be the world police? I mean, on the surface it sounds extremely hypocritical to say that we are allowed nuclear weapons and tell another country it is not. They are their own country, they should be able to do what they please one would assume. However i concluded that we possess the right to have nuclear weapons for the sole reaosn that we use it only for the defensive, while Iran, an insecure country that has not only proven it is not remotely close to an ally, but also a threatening enemy to the western world, especially nearby Israel and of course us, the United States. If Iran got hold of nuclear weapons, being the aggressive nation that it is, they would almost surely go on the offensive and attack nearby Israel, and possibly lead us to a World War III. The bottom line is that Iran cannot be trusted, and i think we can all agree on that. If they cannot be trusted, why should we provide them with the permission to create somethign that can come back and harm us and our ally countries?
Thanks allison. Phoebe brings up a good point. We are definitely not a perfect country and in order to improve we do need to acknowledge our faults, and try not to act like the best country in the world.
I wonder if you guys watched the video on the page with the article. If you felt the article was biased, watch the video. There is reporter who filmed Columbia students, so you can see their reactions to Bollinger vs. Ahmadinejad.
I also would like to point out how ahmadinejad reacted to bollinger's yes or no question. Though I might not agree withthe content of Ahmadinejad's answer, bollinger, as an educated adult, should know you cant answer such a question wiyh simple yes or no. If our world was black and white, there would be no intnse political debate. its something to think about.
Alright, Nick. Then I think we're both onto the same page as to America not being a prime example of morality.
Maybe the U.S. shouldn't presume so much.
And, Angella, you're right! I didn't watch the video provided there, though I remember watching clips on the TV... and somehow I don't remember the filmer's responses being so noticable on the television.
I think the decision to allow Ahmadinejab to speak at Columbia was a terrible decison. I understand the United States believes in free speech but, I think this act was going to far. He is a direct enemy of the United States. He funds terrorists and I do not think he should even be allowed to step on American soil.
The one positive to the appearance may have been everyone hearing Ahmadinejab's crazy ramblings. He made some insane claims. How can he state that there are no gays in Iran. But, what is even more frightining is his views on the Halocaust. How can it be considered a theory. The Halocaust is a fact. There is no arguing that. I think it that Columbia made the wrong decision and that they should not have let him spoken.
Adding to my views of US being the "world police" is the arising issues in Myanmar. For those that don't know, the monks and citizens are revolting against the government in hope for a revolution. In turn, the government is sending troops in to gun down monks and citizens. In Russia, or any other country that had a revolution, no restrictions occurred and it happened as it should have; however, now the US is putting economic sanctions on th Myanmar Government and telling them not to use cruel methods to stop the riots. We should let whatever will happen happen there. Because thats the way civilizations change. Hardships lead to revolutions which lead to restrictions and so on. We're trying to make everything better and no one put us in charge.
Nick, while I do agree that nations have a right to autonomy, I don't understand how you can take the position that it is alright for a government that is disliked by its people to use violence and wholesale slaughter as an imtimidation tactic to remain in power. One of the reasons we supposedly went into Iraq was to halt the use of violence as a political tactic within the country. We have no right to impose our political structure or social beliefs on any other society, but we do have a responsability to discourage the ruthless killing of innocent civilians.
Alex that makes sense, all i'm trying to point out is why us. I definitely agree something must be done during extreme violence (like darfur genocide), i question why us. Who put us in charge of that? Isn't it the UN's job? Why does it then seem like were the ones doing all the work and why do we have nuclear weapons?
Alex, I agree with what you are saying in that there are times when we SHOULD step in and help a country whose leader uses "violence and wholesale slaughter as an imtimidation tactic to remain in power." Nick, I see where you are coming from by bringing up our over involvement in world issues. You brought up the current example of Myanmar but I don't think that the process of a country revolutionizing can be simplified to such plain terms. The process is much more complex than people suffering hardships, people rebelling, and countries reforming. People don't always rebel soon enough, many factors are involved in what sort of riots populations can bring about, and in the meanwhile many people's lives are the line. Reform is also a much more complex and time consuming process than you made it seem. We also must remember that in an instance like Iran, not only Iran's population is in jeopardy due to Ahmadinejab's terror regime, but Iran also poses a threat to many other countries e.g. Israel and our own US!!! At this point it is not about us being the "world police," but rather it is about us protecting ourselves and our ally countries from terrorism.
I am greatly disturbed by the extreme power that the so-called "Israel Lobby" seems to hold over the US. How can we continue to support blindly a country that is so hated by all its neighbors, and instead of dealing with them diplomatically, takes increasingly agressive military action against them. The key term here is blindly-- I think that Israel has a place in this era, but I worry that our unthinking support of Israel has gone far to erode US foreign image as well as Israel's image as its own country. i want to stress here that I am not in any way anti-Israel, I just think that if we as the US ever hope to reclaim our image as the fair arbiter of world issues, we need to actually critically consider Israel's actions, rather than give them carte blanche. 90% of the time we will still side with them, maybe even 99, but that 1 % where we set the boundary will go a long way towards a better world image of both the US and Israel.
Moving on from that little rant (I hope I didn't offend anyone), I am sadly not terribly surprised at Ahmadinejad's rejection of the Holocaust. The middle east has largely reconstructed itself over the past 50 or so years, with the rise (and fall, and possibly rise again) of pan-arabism, and they are increasingly trying to separate themselves from western influence. Iran, as the leader of the middle-eastern "revolution" right now, will obviously be at the forefront of separating themselves. A key part of such a separation is questioning the facts on which the West is based. This is always true-- for instance, the discovery of a round earth and a non-earth centric universe helped to separate people from the church towards the end of the middle ages and into the renaissance. It is also strategically advantageous for him to question the holocaust, since that was the primary impetus for the creation of Israel. I actually agree on one point. Although the Jewish people are well deserving of Israel, a)The palestinians do not deserve to lose so much of their land, and b)The creation of Israel in a den of muslim states was simply asking for trouble in the immediate future. However, Ahmadinejad is clearly biased on this point.
As bad as Ahmadinejad in m opinion is Bollinger, who at the beginning of the article I felt a deep respect for and by the end almost a sort of loathing. Universities are supposed to be places of learning and thinking, where people can consider and make decisions for themselves, independent of popular opinion, and Bollinger violated that. He invited this man, then gave a hateful speech, which, as Ahmadinejad said, was making the students decisions for them. In essence, he was politicizing what should have been an apolitical talk. I am deeply worried by the fact that so many people nowadays, even in this blog, have called him a terrorist. Let me make clear one thing up. Ahmadinejad is not a terrorist. He leads a radical country, but in fact, nowadays, so does president Bush. America is in many ways as radical as Iran right now, and I am deeply worried by the near-propaganda level smearing of Iran and Ahmadinejad that is appearing in the media today. He is most certainly a bigot. I will give you that. But he had more grace than the president of one of the greatest universities in the world. I am worried because people again and again talk about Iran's evident ties with terrorism and creation of Nuclear weaponry, but I have never once heard someone cite any hard evidence about anything to do with this. We are raring to go to war with a country that has less evidence of WMD's and terrorist organizations than Iraq did, and we are going to fall into that hole again I fear. Ahmadinejad is no worse than Saddam was, and we put Saddam into power!
In the end, I am deeply disturbed both by Ahmadinejad's speech but also by his hostile reception at what is supposed to be the most tolerant place in the country.
I can't even begin to understand why mr. bollinger invtied ahmadinejad to columbia. The students and faculty of columbia did not gain anything from ahmadinejad's visit. No one even really wanted him there. mr. bollinger even showed hostility toward ahmadinejad before his speech. I mean, he was SO unwanted here that the government put a boundary as to where he could go. Why would anyone want to bring someone so unwanted like him into america? i just cant grasp why bollinger would invite ahmadinejad if all his visit was gonna cause was anger among the students and faculty. When ahmadinejad said that there were no homosexuals in Iran, it frustrated me that he could make such an outlandish statement like that. Doubting the factuality (is that a word?) of the holocaust is just plain ridiculous. Also, ahmadinejad should have expected an enormous amount of hostility in america. However, when bollinger directed a harsh comment towards him, ahmadinejad pointed out the absense of respect towards him as though he were surprised that he was faced with such hostility in america. finally, accusing america of supporting terrorist groups is just so ridiculously ridiculous. He doesnt even have evidence to support his thoughts, so he shouldnt even say them. wow, ahmadinejad should just go back to iran on the next flight and not come back until he has evidence that can bolster his statements (not that there would be any evidence to support him). --Nina
ithink that its pretty cool that he spoke at columbia, but i also think that columbia went a little too far by inviting him. this is a guy that probably wants to destroy america and was likely involved with 9/11, so i don't think he should have the honor of an invitation to speak at one of our top universities. i think he showed the public that hes a total wacko with his comments on how the holocaust is just a theory despite all the evidence, including video evidence, and on how his country is gay-free, which as Alex said, is a statistical impossibility. Although most of the things he said were stupid, i did find some truth in his comments on how israel is based on ethnic descrimination, occupation, and usurpation. the law of return in isreal guarantees citizenship for all jews, but not for anyone else so its a lot harder to get citizenship if you aren't jewish. they also have taken lands that arent theirs like the west bank. although having the west bank as a buffer does seem necessary for the safety of the country, it still isnt their land, so i can see why that would bug presiden ahmadinejab. Unfortunately israel seems like a place taht will be fought over as long as religion exists.
Lian, I agree with your opinion of Bollinger, but I worry about your description of Ahmadinejad as evil. Surely he is a harmful Bigot, but indeed I would not call him evil. Try thinking from his point of view. The middle east has been arab land for hundreds of years. In Iran, the Shah embezzled billions of dollars until he was run out of office, and he truly hurt the country. Israel is given a blank check to do as they wish in the middle east, and it is created on Palestinian land, displacing millions of Palestinians with a rightful claim to their land. The US is becoming more and more prejudiced and less unbiased when it comes to dealing with the middle east, and it is the overpowering hegemon in this day and age. To him, what we call terrorism, which he has never been Directly associated, might be akin to the petite guerre tactics of the colonial americas, or the guerrilla tactics used in Vietnam. Terrorism is in his essence leveling the playing field, balancing out the US's overpowering strength to impose its will. The english may have thought us evil for using petite guerre tactics to balance their overpowering numbers, but to us, it was fighting back any which way we can. I know that this may seem horrifying, to compare modern terrorism to American roots, but the only major difference between the two is scale. Ahmadinejad is certainly not bin Laden. He did not plan the killing of 3000 Americans to send a message. He is a leader of a mainly third world country, trying to give his country more sway in world politics by going nuclear. He is a bigot, he is misguided, he is at this point our enemy, but he is not Hitler. It may seem like that from the way he is depicted, but he simply isn't. To term him evil would be to make the early americans evil, to make the vietcong evil (lets not even go into that...), would even make Elizabeth evil for using the weather as an advantage to defeat the overwhelming force of the spanish armada. He is a threat to Israel indeed, but that does not immediately make him evil, just as not all threats to the US are evil. To term him and them so would be to give up our discerning intelligence and become just as the fascists of the 1930s, rallying behind our country without thinking for ourselves.
Lian, i agree that no revolution r civil unrest is that simply; however, had to simplify to explain it without going into hours of detail I understand that people are dying and so on and i'm not saying that any sort of mass murder should be tolerated, but my more important outlying point of bringing up Myanmar is that we're the ones sanctioning their government. Why s it us? That's all i wanted to ask. And that sort of thing ties into our quest to disarm Iran and our continuing storage of our bombs.
brandon, i totally agree with what you said. ahmadinejad shouldnt even be here in the us, let alone be able to speak at an extremely prestigious university. basically, this was the stupidest decision that bollinger ever made. period. --Nina Kim
Well Nina, saying that Ahmadinejad shouldn't even be here doesn't really act upon the principles that our country is based upon. Yes he is the president of a Terrorist nation, and yes his principles are outrageous, but if we refuse his request to give a speech, wouldn't we just be doing the exact thing he hoped for. We would be giving into his beliefs. His stereotypes of America and the minimal examples of our Country having Free Speech. HYes Ahmadinejad is not a citizen, but shouldn't we give him a chance to speak, otherwise we're just one sided and have already made up opinions and stereotypes of Iranians and their president. I think that Bollinger made a very patriotic and impressive move to invite Ahmadinejad (even when our President said that he wouldn't), however Bollinger went into the questioning with a mindset of displaying the terrorism and evil in Ahmadinejad.
I wish I could respond to each of your posts....again I find myself deeply in thought about them. I wanted to comment on Lian's post, largely because Phoebe mentioned earlier that what we think of as "American" is perhaps not something the founding fathers designed or even thought necessary. I think freedom of speech is an interesting topic to contemplate. are we as a nation founded on this ideal? or was this fought for and won from those in power who consciously did not want everyone to speak the truth?
I appreciate Nick's comments on "looking back," but I'm not convinced that it's harmful to do just that and to do it often. Aren't we the product of what came before us? even if it's the colonists -- and not the United States? I think, especially, as we begin to talk about what "america" is, what are "founding fathers" created -- that we think critically about it. I don't want us to romanticize the past and I don't want us to judge it without context, but I do think we should never ignore it.
40 comments:
Let me start off by saying that when I first read this article, I was struck by how frighteningly satirical it seemed. After a while, however, I was just plain frightened. Yet not for the reasons some of you may think. It was not solely the words of President Ahmadinejab which caused me distress. As a matter of fact, there were quite a few things that made me uneasy.
Truth is rarely dealt with in politics or press.
The author of this article was obviously quite biased. Perhaps rightly so, but it just stuck out to me. Maybe I’m just bitter about that ’he said Iran could not recognize Israel… and conciliatory — he said he wanted to visit ground zero.’ which links the U.S. and Israel as though they are one and the same, thus confusing me into having to read the same sentences over and over.
It also bothered me that President of Columbia University invited Ahmadinejab to speak and then excoriated him. “On the one hand, yes, come and speak freely. On the other hand, I hate you and you’re terrible.” It just seemed like a crafty move to stay safe from the criticism of both the left and right to me.
But on to the real substance of the article: Ahmadinejab’s claims. Super-elevated into international importance beyond his actual power as President of Iran, he espoused a bizarre mix of logical historical truth (such as the displacement of Palestinians from their homeland) and blatant lies and anti-Semitism (as shown in his not believing that the Holocaust truly happened, claiming there were no homosexuals in Iran, and claiming that women had it just fine in Iran). He played both the part of a victim oppressed by the U.S., and the part of a narrow-minded lunatic. I think he’s a nutjob, but I think the U.S. government is making him into a figurehead (besides, I guess we can’t be the only ones with a nutjob in the office). This is something of a tangent, but I’ve ceased to believe the U.S. government. It claims that Iran has an aggressive nuclear weapons development plan, but it also said there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and there weren’t. But anyway, I guess that’s between the IAEA and the U.S. government.
It also struck me as odd that Bush said the fact that Ahmadinejab’s being allowed to speak at C.U. really spoke to the freedom of the country, and then said he wouldn’t have done the same. I’d also like to bring up that though Bush and Bollinger called Ahmadinejab out as a sponsor of terrorism, Ahmadinejab and the government of Iran are not the first countries to accuse the U.S. of being the greatest worldwide sponsor of international terrorism. One has to take into consideration, after all, the recent coup in Haiti where U.S. forces kidnapped the Hatian President, the CIA-led overthrow of a democratically elected President of Chile, Salvador Allende, and the airline bomber who downed a Cuban passenger jet now living freely in Florida.
But I digress. President Ahmadinejab’s speech did not, in my opinion, do him any good. He was too obviously bigoted.
Really, what this article enforced in me was the importance of diplomacy. It is encouraging that Columbia University allowed Ahmadinejab to exercise freedom of speech, even if he is the face on the country towards which our hostilities are being turned. It is a good sign that many of our institutions are open-minded enough to capitalize on an oppertunity to let their students think and judge for themselves, even if the speaker is widely disliked.
Sorry about grammar mistakes. I didn't look it over after I wrote it.
I admire and respect Columbia for inviting opinionated and controversial speakers to their campus. However, I personally feel that they may have gone too far in extending an invitation to President Ahmadinejad of Iran. Allowing him to speak gave him more acknowledgement and increased public awareness of this man who obviously has the nature of a terrorist. Giving him this publicity just makes him feel more powerful and acknowledges to all Americans that he is a world leader regardless of his oppressive views. With Iran posing a great threat to our country, why would Columbia invite the leader to openly speak and be highly critical of the United States and our international affairs? He accuses us of supporting terrorist groups and says we have no right to interfere with other nations who want nuclear power.
In regard to some of his remarks I don’t understand how he could say that the Holocaust is just a theory. There is substantive evidence (Nazi documents, concentration camps, etc) of the persecution and murder of 6 million Jews and other “inferior” people as well. Ahmadinejad’s remarks regarding homosexuals is absolutely absurd. It is well documented that since the beginning of civilization homosexuality exists in all cultures. He blatantly ignores the facts and possesses a skewed perspective on the issues and history, and denies that any homosexuals exist in Iran.
When asked to answer specific questions, he dances around the answers. For example when questioned if he wanted to destroy Israel, he says Iran is friends with Jews. However, we know for a fact that this man believes that Israel should not exist and would initiate its destruction if he could. His answers to the questions posed by Mr. Bollinger were evasive, and/or blatant lies.
Welcoming Ahmadinejad to Columbia University is a unique learning opportunity for their students. However, I strongly believe that showcasing Ahmadinejad has more negative consequences for our country than benefits for Columbia students.
When I first started reading this article, it seemed almost unreal to me. What president of a University where thousands of our future generation learns and lives invites the leader of a threat to our country to speak?
Inviting controversial speakers to campuses is a great idea. It encourages deeper thinking and requires students to choose and argue a side.
However, inviting Ahmadinejad was not the greatest of ideas. I try to understand where Bollinger is coming from: this could have been (and it probably was) a interesting experience for Columbia students, but it was executed terribly.
The thing that jumped out at me the most was Bollinger's switching of sides. He first invited Ahmadinejad, but before the president even spoke, Bollinger verbally attacked him. He emphasized his encouragement of freedom of speech, which is something the US is known for. However, the lack of manners he showed to Ahmadinejad (however "uneducated" and "petty and "cruel" this leader is) embarrassed me. Especially when Bollinger showed signs of trying to welcome him to the university and then blatantly attacking him. There is a difference between offering strong differing opinions and out right insulting (“You are either brazenly provocative or astonishingly uneducated.”) someone.
Even though I disagree with the way Bollinger handled the situation, I still disagree with what Ahmadinejad said. He cannot claim that the Holocaust is merely a theory. There are mountains of evidence proving that the Holocaust did happen and it was as terrible as we [don't want to] believe. I feel that his ignorance of this major historical event shows that he does not respect the Jews (and he did dance around that question). 9/11 was a devastating event for us. It is NOT A THEORY, it happened. If he believes the Holocaust was a theory, I can't believe that he respects the enormity of 9/11, when the refuses to accept the Holocaust, an even bigger event
Also, he cannot say that there are no homosexuals in Iran. Homosexuality has existed for many, many years. In the US, 1 in every 10 males is gay. How can he say there are no homosexuals in his country truthfully? How can he guarantee this "fact?" Did he ensure that no one in Iran is homosexual through fear/force?
Even though the experience is something that Columbia students will remember and def. think about, I feel that there were more cons to inviting Ahmadinejad than pros.
The fact that Columbia invited Ahmadinejab to speak is a testament to this country's openness and emphasis of free speech, something Iran surely would not do for President Bush. However I found myself surprisingly frustrated to almost agree with Ahmadinejab's statement on how Columbia's speaker and moderator spun the arguement in a way where there was only one thing he could say, for example yes or no. I thought this almost defeated the purpose of an invitation because it showed that Columbia brought him here just to have him say disgusting, awful and ignorant things that we already know. Because of the way the debate/ arguement was delivered, it did not really allow the audience to see the reasoning (though it is probably dumb reasoning) behind Ahmadinejab’s policies. Though I completely, 100 percent do not agree with anything the Iranian president says, I still think the whole invitation idea was flawed because it was just a way for Columbia and the audience to jeer and yell at statements we already knew he was going to say, what did America LEARN from this? Nothing. We know he is a bad guy and arguably a sick man, but how did America progress by listening to his ranting on American soil? I don’t think we learned, frankly.
The statements of the Iranian "President" are sadly not out of line with the often jaded views of Ideological dictatorships. He runs the country based not on facts, but rather on beliefs. He believes that there are no homosexuals in Iran, which is just shy of a statistical impossibility. He also states that the Holocaust is a theory, and that further investigation was needed to legitimize the claim that the Holocaust ever happened. He says this despite the mountains of evidence staring him in the face, from burned down concentration camps in Germany, to written documents by both Germans and Allies referring to the atrocities that were occurring in Germany. We all seem surprised by his comments, but really; can we expect anything else from the leader of a rogue nation that openly funds terrorism? Regardless of the President's blunders, I feel as if Columbia put him at an unfair disadvantage. It seems to me that Columbia only took such an aggressive stance towards him after they saw the uproar that inviting him to speak caused, and they felt they had to save face.
I believe the action of the Columbian President, Mr. Bollinger in inviting Mr. Ahmadinejad, the president of Iran was both bold and intriging. This daring idea of allowing the President to speak freely, permiting the students and faculty of Columbia to form their own opinions of Mr. Ahmadinejad and his country was a very different way of teaching. Another controversial part of the article was the attacks from the President of Columbia. Although i completely agree with them, and accept the accusations, i do believe it was disrespectful to MR. Ahmadinejad. But the most astonishing was the constant dodging of the straight forward questions by Mr. Ahmadinejad concerning Iran's feeling toward Israel. THis speech will present many protests and critizime to come.
I find myself deeply moved by your thoughtfulness and the depth of your insights. thank you for taking the time to reflect so carefully and to feel passionately about things. this gives me hope. what I especially enjoy is hearing your thoughts about "off" topic ideas. even though we are talking about the puritans of all things --the world around us is moving and shaking and spinning every moment. this makes me feel like we can both go back into the past AND be present. thanks. and I fully support writing these blogs without an emphasis on spelling or grammar -- do your best, but let's assume we'll all be writing at times without our spell checkers.
I believe that many of the outrageous ideas believed by Ahmadinejab, including the fact that there are no gays in Iran, and his belief that the Holocaust did not occur, are rather self-explanatory. Any American, brought up with a proper moral-compass and some knowledge of History will understand the absurdity of these statements. I will therefore not spend too much time explaining my thoughts on these because i don't think anyone in our class will question the validity of history of the Holocaust or the incorrectness in removing Gays from your Country.
I therefore move on to a few comments of Ahmadinejab that struck me as accurate and possibly true. One of them is the idea of US being a hypocrite in the War against Terror. After learning last year about WWII and it's aftermath, i understood why, to Americans, we should take over as the world's Peace keeper. However i do find it a little bit hypocritical that we, are going out accusing people of having nuclear capabilities and trying to disarm them, when we have thousands of nuclear and biological weapons. I'm not saying that we are a terorrist country by any standards, but I'm just seeing the other side of this spectrum. I'm playing Devil's advocate, and realizing that i could see the other side's idea, that we are perhaps a little hypocritical. I understand that the US has shown no sign of evil or corruption and that Iran has; however, just in general, who made us boss? I know, i know there's the UN, but Iran is part of it, and it seems as though they should disarm any weapons that they have. Why don't we.
also i found Ahmadinejab's comment to the mediator rather interesting and right on. The media and citizen's do want to see white and black. They don't want to see any gray. Although Ahmadinejab's comment mat not have been truthful (why would he not believe in the Holocaust then say that he loves the victims that he doubts), his reply to the mediator's demand of a yes or no answer was brilliant.
In all, i do disagree with Ahmadinejab's comment's and principles, however i just thought that i would mix up the conversation and throw out some
different ideas.
Also on the other hand, i agree that Bush is going against the US's and UN's principle of "Free speech". Bush is biased that Ahmadinejab is a criminal, otherwise why is Bush so reluctant to allow him to speak. Would Bush allow me a microphone to speak to a crowd with, yes because t him i have doen nothing wrong. I'm sure that Ahmadinejab's speech was screened, so why not let him speak his free will and thoughts? Isn't Bush then just being one-sided.
Also i disliked the amount of bias of the author. It kinda forced you to think in Black and White (as i said before) and it forced you to think that Ahmadinejab is a horrible man and a terrorist.
Nick said something that caught my attention: the US has shown no sign of evil or corruption and Iran has. I'm pretty sure that Nick and you all understand this, but I just want to reinforce the idea that we have to be careful about making statements like that. I'm pretty sure the U.S. definitely has shown signs of corruption, even if only looking at what we've learned so far in history (though, I guess it was not technically today's independant America yet in those times). Still, I reference my "U.S. terrorism" segment in my first comment.
I think it's important, as the generation that will hopefully take it to heart to make a change in the world for good, to not assume that we are the tried and true lifelong good-guys. As it is right now, a good many people in foreign countries think of us as "arrogant Americans." We'll have to acknowledge the darkside, so to speak, of our country as well as the good parts in order to keep an open mind and deal with problems. If we're convinced that we're the best, how are we going to improve?
That's all.
I definitely agree with everything you said Angela. I really liked how you brought up that Bollinger switched sides by inviting him to speak freely, but then verbally attacked what he said. It seems to me the Bollinger only invited Ahmadinejad for not just a learning experience for students, but also to stir up controversy. He wanted to make the president of Iran look bad and degrade him (“I doubt that you will have the intellectual courage to answer these questions”). Although Bollinger was correct in his statement and I completely agree with them, his comments had a malicious intent. Since Bollinger invited Ahmadinejad to speak freely at Columbia, he should not have handled the situation the way he did. It was necessary to state how Ahmadinejad never answered a question (yes or no), but the way Bollinger constantly attacked him was unnecessary.
When I first read the headlines of the paper that said "Ahmadinejad, at Columbia" I was sure I was "seeing things." The idea just seemed so peculiar, a terrorist coming to speak in one of America's most prestigious universities. Unreal!
I believe that it was very daring and almost admirable for the President of Colombia to invite Ahmadinejad to speak. After all, freedom of speech is the foundation upon which our country is build, and a terrorist being given a stage at a US university is the epitome of this right.
I am critical however of how Lee C. Bollinger behaved. Allowing Ahmadinejad to speak was a bold move, which could have greatly benefited the students of Columbia, but starting off with a diatribe completely defeats the purpose of this educational experience. I assume that the President of Columbia was tense from all the severe criticism he was bombarded with, but since he had already given Ahmadinejad the stage, he should have been more resistant to the censure, and maintained his calm. The whole point of inviting Ahmadinejad to speak was to hear his true beliefs and possibly the reasoning behind them. Ahmadinejad is a staunch believer of his inhumane doctrine, and there was no way that the President of Columbia could sway him. Calling Ahmadinejad a "cruel and petty dictator," therefore, although true, was completely uncalled for. I see two ways the President of Colombia should have behaved: He either should have saved himself from the reproac hhe is now receiving by not granting Ahmadinejad a stage OR he should have adhered to American's right to freedom of speech and given Ahmadinejad the microphone without any preceding insults.
There is not a doubt in my mind as to the extreme evil of the leader of Iran. To deny the Holocaust and 9/11 and to claim no homosexuals exist in Iran are all inexcusable statements in my mind. Although in this speech he evaded straightforward talk regarding Israel, I will never forget how not so long ago he wished the whole Israeli population destroyed and drowned in the ocean. As optimistic as I try to be, it is great evil we are dealing with, and world peace seems very far in our horizons. :-(
Phoebe, how can you judge the Us and say that we're corrupt and evil from acts that were committed BEFORE the Us was even created. You can't really look centuries back, even before the creation of the Country, to judge its morality. If you look back in History you could say that the US are very racist and had laves; however, we are now the most diverse country and probably the least racist. So you can't really look very far back into our past to judge. I would say look back to WWII on since that is when we became the "keeper of peace:
Remember i don't necessarily find us arrogant or anything of that matter, i just found that point of Ahmadinejab's rather interesting and provocative
I think it was a very bold and daring move for the President of Colombia to bring in the very controversial Mr. Ahmadinejad. This was interesting because it allowed the students and faculty to be able to address "the problem" directly; something that they are probably not able to do. This allowed the students and faculty to get the truth directly from the source which also made it very interesting due to the many differences between us and Israel. Such a agathering like could never have been done in Israel. This is also intriguing because it slighlty hints us about his upcoming UN meeting.
Juan
Molly, you said that you thought that Columbia let their students think freely and make their opinions. Did they really? To me it seems like, with Bollinger's "white and black" questions, that he was trying to elude to pre-destined assumptions of Ahmadinejab, as Ahmadinejad eluded to after being asked a yes or no question. I really feel like Columbia invited Ahmadineab to Columbia so that they may shoot him down and display ideas that they want to be displayed. Also with the writer's bias, i also get this impression.
Nick although I understand what you mean about Mr. Bollingers introduction if you can call it that. It was a very indirert if that was his approach, i felt he was just stating many ideas some times corralated with Mr. Ahmadinejad and Israel. Even so they said that the crowd was not entirely against Mr. Ahmadinejad.
Juan
Take it easy, Nick. I already acknowledged that it's somewhat unfair to look that far back into history, so I once again reference you to the terrorism section of my very first post. I promise I wasn't attacking you, and I'm still not, but I still don't feel that our country is a prime example of morality, even if you want to take a more recent point of view. Currently 600,000+ Iraqi men, women and children are dead. Iraq had no ties to Bin Laden nor any weapons of mass destruction.
Columbia's bold move to invite President Ahmadinejab to speak seems to have been a bad idea. The President of Columbia may have invited him to speak freely about his ideas, but before President Ahmadinejab even had a chance to talk, Bollinger immidiately started showing his hate for him, calling him uneducated or just merely stupid. Although these may be true statements, it wasn't the smartest way to introduce the President of a country. By doing this Bollinger only made Americans look hostile and mean rather than willing to look into others opinions and ideas. President Ahmadinejab is going back to Iran looking like a hero who came and talked to Americans who were rude and acted completely wrong towards the president.
While I believe all of this, I also know that what President Ahmadinejab said scares me. The fact that this man couldn't even answer questions directly shows his incompitence and inability to lead a country with a straight and clear mind. He wasn't even able to recognize Israel, nor did he think there are any homosexuals in Iran. This president is acting completley insane in saying women in Iran are treated fine and saying the Holocaust is just a theory.
I believe that inviting President Ahmadinejab to Columbia was a good idea to prove America's beliefs in freedom of speech, however I believe the way Bollinger introduced him was a bad idea. I think introducing him this way may have just sparked even more anti-American feelings in the middle east and could even lead to more fighting. President Ahmadinejab is clearly widely disliked and for good reasons, however I believe that people who were there should've had a chance to judge the President's speech before Bollinger completely discredited him in his introduction.
Exactly Phoebe, and that ties into my idea as to why those Iraqis are dead; Why? Because we felt as though we were the negotiator and we had to go and fix the world's problems. We assumed violence and terrorism which led to unprovoked deaths.
To Nick,
Nick, i found myself asking the same questions when i was reading this article also. What gives us the rihg to be the world police? I mean, on the surface it sounds extremely hypocritical to say that we are allowed nuclear weapons and tell another country it is not. They are their own country, they should be able to do what they please one would assume. However i concluded that we possess the right to have nuclear weapons for the sole reaosn that we use it only for the defensive, while Iran, an insecure country that has not only proven it is not remotely close to an ally, but also a threatening enemy to the western world, especially nearby Israel and of course us, the United States. If Iran got hold of nuclear weapons, being the aggressive nation that it is, they would almost surely go on the offensive and attack nearby Israel, and possibly lead us to a World War III. The bottom line is that Iran cannot be trusted, and i think we can all agree on that. If they cannot be trusted, why should we provide them with the permission to create somethign that can come back and harm us and our ally countries?
Thanks allison. Phoebe brings up a good point. We are definitely not a perfect country and in order to improve we do need to acknowledge our faults, and try not to act like the best country in the world.
I wonder if you guys watched the video on the page with the article. If you felt the article was biased, watch the video. There is reporter who filmed Columbia students, so you can see their reactions to Bollinger vs. Ahmadinejad.
I also would like to point out how ahmadinejad reacted to bollinger's yes or no question. Though I might not agree withthe content of Ahmadinejad's answer, bollinger, as an educated adult, should know you cant answer such a question wiyh simple yes or no. If our world was black and white, there would be no intnse political debate.
its something to think about.
Alright, Nick. Then I think we're both onto the same page as to America not being a prime example of morality.
Maybe the U.S. shouldn't presume so much.
And, Angella, you're right! I didn't watch the video provided there, though I remember watching clips on the TV... and somehow I don't remember the filmer's responses being so noticable on the television.
I think the decision to allow Ahmadinejab to speak at Columbia was a terrible decison. I understand the United States believes in free speech but, I think this act was going to far. He is a direct enemy of the United States. He funds terrorists and I do not think he should even be allowed to step on American soil.
The one positive to the appearance may have been everyone hearing Ahmadinejab's crazy ramblings. He made some insane claims. How can he state that there are no gays in Iran. But, what is even more frightining is his views on the Halocaust. How can it be considered a theory. The Halocaust is a fact. There is no arguing that. I think it that Columbia made the wrong decision and that they should not have let him spoken.
Adding to my views of US being the "world police" is the arising issues in Myanmar. For those that don't know, the monks and citizens are revolting against the government in hope for a revolution. In turn, the government is sending troops in to gun down monks and citizens. In Russia, or any other country that had a revolution, no restrictions occurred and it happened as it should have; however, now the US is putting economic sanctions on th Myanmar Government and telling them not to use cruel methods to stop the riots. We should let whatever will happen happen there. Because thats the way civilizations change. Hardships lead to revolutions which lead to restrictions and so on. We're trying to make everything better and no one put us in charge.
Nick, while I do agree that nations have a right to autonomy, I don't understand how you can take the position that it is alright for a government that is disliked by its people to use violence and wholesale slaughter as an imtimidation tactic to remain in power. One of the reasons we supposedly went into Iraq was to halt the use of violence as a political tactic within the country. We have no right to impose our political structure or social beliefs on any other society, but we do have a responsability to discourage the ruthless killing of innocent civilians.
I just wanted to correct myself i accidently exchanged Israel with Iran randomly
Juan
Alex that makes sense, all i'm trying to point out is why us. I definitely agree something must be done during extreme violence (like darfur genocide), i question why us. Who put us in charge of that? Isn't it the UN's job? Why does it then seem like were the ones doing all the work and why do we have nuclear weapons?
Alex, I agree with what you are saying in that there are times when we SHOULD step in and help a country whose leader uses "violence and wholesale slaughter as an imtimidation tactic to remain in power." Nick, I see where you are coming from by bringing up our over involvement in world issues. You brought up the current example of Myanmar but I don't think that the process of a country revolutionizing can be simplified to such plain terms. The process is much more complex than people suffering hardships, people rebelling, and countries reforming. People don't always rebel soon enough, many factors are involved in what sort of riots populations can bring about, and in the meanwhile many people's lives are the line. Reform is also a much more complex and time consuming process than you made it seem. We also must remember that in an instance like Iran, not only Iran's population is in jeopardy due to Ahmadinejab's terror regime, but Iran also poses a threat to many other countries e.g. Israel and our own US!!! At this point it is not about us being the "world police," but rather it is about us protecting ourselves and our ally countries from terrorism.
I am greatly disturbed by the extreme power that the so-called "Israel Lobby" seems to hold over the US. How can we continue to support blindly a country that is so hated by all its neighbors, and instead of dealing with them diplomatically, takes increasingly agressive military action against them. The key term here is blindly-- I think that Israel has a place in this era, but I worry that our unthinking support of Israel has gone far to erode US foreign image as well as Israel's image as its own country. i want to stress here that I am not in any way anti-Israel, I just think that if we as the US ever hope to reclaim our image as the fair arbiter of world issues, we need to actually critically consider Israel's actions, rather than give them carte blanche. 90% of the time we will still side with them, maybe even 99, but that 1 % where we set the boundary will go a long way towards a better world image of both the US and Israel.
Moving on from that little rant (I hope I didn't offend anyone), I am sadly not terribly surprised at Ahmadinejad's rejection of the Holocaust. The middle east has largely reconstructed itself over the past 50 or so years, with the rise (and fall, and possibly rise again) of pan-arabism, and they are increasingly trying to separate themselves from western influence. Iran, as the leader of the middle-eastern "revolution" right now, will obviously be at the forefront of separating themselves. A key part of such a separation is questioning the facts on which the West is based. This is always true-- for instance, the discovery of a round earth and a non-earth centric universe helped to separate people from the church towards the end of the middle ages and into the renaissance. It is also strategically advantageous for him to question the holocaust, since that was the primary impetus for the creation of Israel. I actually agree on one point. Although the Jewish people are well deserving of Israel, a)The palestinians do not deserve to lose so much of their land, and b)The creation of Israel in a den of muslim states was simply asking for trouble in the immediate future. However, Ahmadinejad is clearly biased on this point.
As bad as Ahmadinejad in m opinion is Bollinger, who at the beginning of the article I felt a deep respect for and by the end almost a sort of loathing. Universities are supposed to be places of learning and thinking, where people can consider and make decisions for themselves, independent of popular opinion, and Bollinger violated that. He invited this man, then gave a hateful speech, which, as Ahmadinejad said, was making the students decisions for them. In essence, he was politicizing what should have been an apolitical talk. I am deeply worried by the fact that so many people nowadays, even in this blog, have called him a terrorist. Let me make clear one thing up. Ahmadinejad is not a terrorist. He leads a radical country, but in fact, nowadays, so does president Bush. America is in many ways as radical as Iran right now, and I am deeply worried by the near-propaganda level smearing of Iran and Ahmadinejad that is appearing in the media today. He is most certainly a bigot. I will give you that. But he had more grace than the president of one of the greatest universities in the world. I am worried because people again and again talk about Iran's evident ties with terrorism and creation of Nuclear weaponry, but I have never once heard someone cite any hard evidence about anything to do with this. We are raring to go to war with a country that has less evidence of WMD's and terrorist organizations than Iraq did, and we are going to fall into that hole again I fear. Ahmadinejad is no worse than Saddam was, and we put Saddam into power!
In the end, I am deeply disturbed both by Ahmadinejad's speech but also by his hostile reception at what is supposed to be the most tolerant place in the country.
I can't even begin to understand why mr. bollinger invtied ahmadinejad to columbia. The students and faculty of columbia did not gain anything from ahmadinejad's visit. No one even really wanted him there. mr. bollinger even showed hostility toward ahmadinejad before his speech. I mean, he was SO unwanted here that the government put a boundary as to where he could go. Why would anyone want to bring someone so unwanted like him into america? i just cant grasp why bollinger would invite ahmadinejad if all his visit was gonna cause was anger among the students and faculty.
When ahmadinejad said that there were no homosexuals in Iran, it frustrated me that he could make such an outlandish statement like that. Doubting the factuality (is that a word?) of the holocaust is just plain ridiculous. Also, ahmadinejad should have expected an enormous amount of hostility in america. However, when bollinger directed a harsh comment towards him, ahmadinejad pointed out the absense of respect towards him as though he were surprised that he was faced with such hostility in america. finally, accusing america of supporting terrorist groups is just so ridiculously ridiculous. He doesnt even have evidence to support his thoughts, so he shouldnt even say them. wow, ahmadinejad should just go back to iran on the next flight and not come back until he has evidence that can bolster his statements (not that there would be any evidence to support him).
--Nina
ithink that its pretty cool that he spoke at columbia, but i also think that columbia went a little too far by inviting him. this is a guy that probably wants to destroy america and was likely involved with 9/11, so i don't think he should have the honor of an invitation to speak at one of our top universities. i think he showed the public that hes a total wacko with his comments on how the holocaust is just a theory despite all the evidence, including video evidence, and on how his country is gay-free, which as Alex said, is a statistical impossibility. Although most of the things he said were stupid, i did find some truth in his comments on how israel is based on ethnic descrimination, occupation, and usurpation. the law of return in isreal guarantees citizenship for all jews, but not for anyone else so its a lot harder to get citizenship if you aren't jewish. they also have taken lands that arent theirs like the west bank. although having the west bank as a buffer does seem necessary for the safety of the country, it still isnt their land, so i can see why that would bug presiden ahmadinejab. Unfortunately israel seems like a place taht will be fought over as long as religion exists.
Lian, I agree with your opinion of Bollinger, but I worry about your description of Ahmadinejad as evil. Surely he is a harmful Bigot, but indeed I would not call him evil. Try thinking from his point of view. The middle east has been arab land for hundreds of years. In Iran, the Shah embezzled billions of dollars until he was run out of office, and he truly hurt the country. Israel is given a blank check to do as they wish in the middle east, and it is created on Palestinian land, displacing millions of Palestinians with a rightful claim to their land. The US is becoming more and more prejudiced and less unbiased when it comes to dealing with the middle east, and it is the overpowering hegemon in this day and age. To him, what we call terrorism, which he has never been Directly associated, might be akin to the petite guerre tactics of the colonial americas, or the guerrilla tactics used in Vietnam. Terrorism is in his essence leveling the playing field, balancing out the US's overpowering strength to impose its will. The english may have thought us evil for using petite guerre tactics to balance their overpowering numbers, but to us, it was fighting back any which way we can. I know that this may seem horrifying, to compare modern terrorism to American roots, but the only major difference between the two is scale. Ahmadinejad is certainly not bin Laden. He did not plan the killing of 3000 Americans to send a message. He is a leader of a mainly third world country, trying to give his country more sway in world politics by going nuclear. He is a bigot, he is misguided, he is at this point our enemy, but he is not Hitler. It may seem like that from the way he is depicted, but he simply isn't. To term him evil would be to make the early americans evil, to make the vietcong evil (lets not even go into that...), would even make Elizabeth evil for using the weather as an advantage to defeat the overwhelming force of the spanish armada. He is a threat to Israel indeed, but that does not immediately make him evil, just as not all threats to the US are evil. To term him and them so would be to give up our discerning intelligence and become just as the fascists of the 1930s, rallying behind our country without thinking for ourselves.
Lian, i agree that no revolution r civil unrest is that simply; however, had to simplify to explain it without going into hours of detail I understand that people are dying and so on and i'm not saying that any sort of mass murder should be tolerated, but my more important outlying point of bringing up Myanmar is that we're the ones sanctioning their government. Why s it us? That's all i wanted to ask. And that sort of thing ties into our quest to disarm Iran and our continuing storage of our bombs.
brandon, i totally agree with what you said. ahmadinejad shouldnt even be here in the us, let alone be able to speak at an extremely prestigious university.
basically, this was the stupidest decision that bollinger ever made. period.
--Nina Kim
Well Nina, saying that Ahmadinejad shouldn't even be here doesn't really act upon the principles that our country is based upon. Yes he is the president of a Terrorist nation, and yes his principles are outrageous, but if we refuse his request to give a speech, wouldn't we just be doing the exact thing he hoped for. We would be giving into his beliefs. His stereotypes of America and the minimal examples of our Country having Free Speech. HYes Ahmadinejad is not a citizen, but shouldn't we give him a chance to speak, otherwise we're just one sided and have already made up opinions and stereotypes of Iranians and their president.
I think that Bollinger made a very patriotic and impressive move to invite Ahmadinejad (even when our President said that he wouldn't), however Bollinger went into the questioning with a mindset of displaying the terrorism and evil in Ahmadinejad.
I wish I could respond to each of your posts....again I find myself deeply in thought about them. I wanted to comment on Lian's post, largely because Phoebe mentioned earlier that what we think of as "American" is perhaps not something the founding fathers designed or even thought necessary. I think freedom of speech is an interesting topic to contemplate. are we as a nation founded on this ideal? or was this fought for and won from those in power who consciously did not want everyone to speak the truth?
I appreciate Nick's comments on "looking back," but I'm not convinced that it's harmful to do just that and to do it often. Aren't we the product of what came before us? even if it's the colonists -- and not the United States? I think, especially, as we begin to talk about what "america" is, what are "founding fathers" created -- that we think critically about it. I don't want us to romanticize the past and I don't want us to judge it without context, but I do think we should never ignore it.
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