College GOP will ban some from Horowitz
Posted November 4, 2009 (3 weeks ago) at 12:50 am in News
The USC College Republicans’ decision to bring David Horowitz, a conservative writer and activist, to campus sparked controversy from the moment it was announced, but the outcry ramped up this week when some students were denied admission to tonight’s event.
The College Republicans, who are hosting the private event, are denying admission to around 30 students affiliated with specific student organizations, including Students for Justice in Palestine and the Progressive Alliance. Alexa Ekman, president of the USC College Republicans, said the group decided to ban certain students because they were worried about potential protests.
Ekman said the College Republicans has obtained copies of emails that made the organization feel there was a real danger of physical or verbal protest by members of SJP and other groups during the event.
Ekman wouldn’t say exactly why she believed a protest might ensue. She did, however, reference an Facebook message that was sent to members of SJP from the group’s president, Alex Shams.
The email tells SJP members, “The fact that a USC student group is bringing this kind of racist trash to speak at our school is absolutely unacceptable, and it is up to us as students to resist it. Students for Justice in Palestine has voted to oppose this speaker in any way possible, and I am now calling on you to help us figure out how to respond.”
In light of this message, Ekman said College Republicans was concerned.
“We’re worried about our event and the people attending and our speaker,” Ekman said. “We do have reason to believe that there is a threat of opposition, whether it is by words or via violence.”
Shams, a senior majoring in international relations, said he is angry about the choice of speaker because of Horowitz’s conservative principles, which often target Islam.
“Right now, the USC College Republicans is bringing a man who is a very vocal and famous racist and Islamophobe who has in the past come to campuses across the country and targeted students in a similar way with his hate speech,” he said.
But no verbal or physical protest was ever planned, Shams said.
“That protest wasn’t supposed to disruptive at all. It was supposed to be silent,” he said.
Leena Ali, a second-year neuroscience Ph.D. student and a member of SJP, said only a silent protest was planned.
“We weren’t going to shout anything; we were going to get up and turn our backs,” she said.
But Ekman insisted there was a real threat of a protest at the event.
“They have shown active involvement in preparation to protest our speaker, and [we] feel that the reasons above justify their denial to our event,” Ekman wrote in an email.
She emphasized, however, that it is not the protest that concerns USC College Republicans, but the way in which it might be conducted.
“We are fine with their protest,” she said. “We welcome their opinions and ideas, [but] not to the speaker on our time, and at our event that we paid for, in a disrespectful manner.”
Shams accused the College Republicans of denying anyone with a “Muslim-sounding” name entrance to the event, but Ekman denied that claim. Many members of Students for Justice in Palestine are Muslim.
“We are not letting anybody in those [specific] groups in. It has nothing to do with racial profiling,” she said. “We spoke with Heather Larabee, [assistant dean of students and director of Campus Activities], and we told her exactly what we’re doing, so we’re in the clear.”
Larabee did not return calls asking for comment.
Ekman said the USC College Republicans are using Facebook to determine if students are associated with SJP or the Progressive Alliance and emailing these students to tell them they will not be allowed to attend the event.
“This is event is entirely privately funded, and thus USC College Republicans reserves the right to deny entrance to anyone for any reason,” the email reads. “The rhetoric utilized by students opposed to this event has given USC College Republicans extreme concern regarding the safety of our speaker and all those in attendance of the event. We have excluded your names from the RSVP list. Please do not attempt to attend our event, as you will be denied entrance.”
The College Republicans did not attempt to talk to members of SJP before the event in order to find a compromise between the two groups, because SJP and USC Progressive Alliance demonstrated they did not want to make amends with the College Republicans, Ekman said.
“[The USC Progressive Alliance made] fliers that pretend to be from our club and are inflammatory and derogatory and are types of slander,” she said. “By putting those words in our mouth, they have usurped their rights to have attendance to our event because they are not respectful at all.”
On his blog, Horowitz addressed the creation of the fliers, which were titled, “Hate Muslims? So Do We!!” and refuted the Progressive Alliance’s claims that he is a racist, saying they misquoted him.
Horowitz wrote that the Progressive Alliance flier attributed a quote to him which was “entirely invented” and “represent[s] nothing” that he has ever written.
Despite the controversy, Dan Schnur, the director of the Jesse M. Unruh Institute of Politics, said one of the benefits USC students receive is the opportunity to hear speakers of a wide range of ideas and opinions.
“Horowitz is certainly a very provocative speaker, but his is one voice of many in the debate over the future of the Middle East that has right to be heard,” he said.
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The ENTIRE LIST of SJP is restricted from the event. And only RSVP’d guests will be permitted inside. It is a privately funded event, and the CR’s are reserving their right to restrict entrance to potentially disruptive attendees who refuse to listen to what Horowitz has to say.
To say that CR’s hate Muslims or any race is a sweeping accusation prompted by ignorance and hate.
I pity those who look at this article and believe that the CR’s are inhibiting others right to free speech. In fact it is quite the opposite, and your comments that this should be shut down or the President of the club arrested is proof. They are not trying to stop protesting, they just do not want it to be done in a disruptive and disrespectful way to the speaker. And why would they let someone in to the event who they know is going to try to be disruptive?
Has anyone looked into what Horowitz actually talks about? Or are you all taking these out of context quotes at face value as fact. Anyone who does read what he has to say will know that he is not a racist, however, he is against fanatical hate speech, which I believe we have seen plenty of from the Progressive Alliance’s posters. Thank you all for proving his point.
To reiterate one more time, the College Republicans only made the decision to limit who could attend based on past experiences Horowitz has faced when invited to and addressing college audiences.
Unfortunately Horowitz has often been met by Muslims and leftists who have shouted him off stage, and NOT given him the opportunity to freely speak.
Horowitz may not be right, or he may be perfectly right. His words may be hateful, or they may be spot on. In either case, he deserves the right and respect to share his words openly without being drowned out by a bunch of idiots who do NOT believe in an indiviual’s right to free speech. This is all the College Republicans have decided to do because they knew to do otherwise would play into the hands of the real hate-mongers.
I remember the controversy when Dr. Norman Finkelstein spoke on campus. He was also characterized as disseminating hate speech but was actually well-received by those in attendance. I saw Mr. Horowitz speak here at USC before on a panel with Yaron Brook discussiing the Mohammad cartoon controvery. He was often challenged on his assertions but was treated courteously throughout as I recall.
Maybe student groups could work together on events to pair some of the more provacative speakers so that a semblance of balance and the opportunity for rebuttal might diffuse some of the outrage that scheduling such individuals often engenders.
This is absurd. Not only because of the comments that Horowitz has made concerning other ethnic groups, but the fact that the GOP party can endorse this type of speaker/behavior. First Ann Coulter a few years back, and now this? The next thing I’ll read in the DT will be about Rush Limbaugh spreading his foolishness all over Bovard Auditorium. Ugh.
This is an outrage. If you want to associate/endorse this crap, then go off campus and don’t even think about using funds raised from USG towards paying your speaker/renting a venue to support this. I have been to several of the Unruh Institute’s events, and I really enjoyed them. Therefore, Mr. Schnur’s comment surprises me. No, he didn’t directly endorse it, and yes, we should be open to a variety of speakers at USC, but this is really just poor, poor taste. Surely there aren’t more conservative figures out there that are controversial for their concrete, well-reasoned points of view about the ME and not necessarily for the xenophobic comments they make?
To all of the sensible conservative Trojans out there, I know you’re there! Stand up and represent your party. Give Ms. Ekman a run for her money, and start your own Young Republicans club, as this is NOT how the face of the GOP should look at USC. The application of the label “conservative” should NOT be synonymous with racism and xenophobia, but inviting this speaker to campus convinces people otherwise.
…As for the right to peacefully protest: Why not?
If you want to talk about slander, how about the fact that the David Horowitz Freedom Center ran an ad in the UCSB campus paper claiming that the Muslim Student Association was a radical political group founded by the godfather of Al Qaeda and Hamas, what was this accusation based on, simply because they were muslim?
He started an organization called Discover the Networks that purports to keep tabs on leftist individuals and organizations because they may be in fact supporting Islamic terrorism.
So tell me how much of a benefit can students possibly derive from a speech from this guy? His parents were members of the communist party and ironcially if he were around back then he would most likely be part of the McCarthy mob that would have blacklisted them and even worse accused them of espionage and called for their deaths.
This is what a colleague of David Horowitz faced when speaking in London:
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/10/uk-muslim-protesters-threaten-geert-wilders-well-have-his-head.html
Is it any wonder the responisble college republicans are plocing who gains entry to Horowtiz’s lecture?
Sort of like the TSA looking out for the next Mohammed Atta.
As a Mexican-American who identifies as a Republican, i find this kind of race based hate mongering as repulsive as it is unconstructive. This is exactly the kind of thing that is making the Republican Party less and less appealing to Americans, we need to return to the Repulblican Party of old, the party that protects civil liberties, that limits federal governmental powers while upholding states rights, that promotes the free market economy instead of making it an “old boys’” club. I hope the CR get their act together. : D
Hey Jenny- this is for you.
Quotes by David Horowitz:
-“What happens to a black man in America? You slit your wife’s throat from ear to ear and you get acquitted,” in reference to O.J. Simpson and part of a larger argument about African-Americans and crime; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JLoX0ugB4g
“What About The Debt Blacks Owe To America?
Slavery existed for thousands of years before the Atlantic slave trade was born, and in all societies. But in the thousand years of its existence, there never was an anti-slavery movement until white Christians – Englishmen and Americans — created one. If not for the anti-slavery attitudes and military power of white Englishmen and Americans, the slave trade would not have been brought to an end. If not for the sacrifices of white soldiers and a white American president who gave his life to sign the Emancipation Proclamation, blacks in America would still be slaves. If not for the dedication of Americans of all ethnicities and colors to a society based on the principle that all men are created equal, blacks in America would not enjoy the highest standard of living of blacks anywhere in the world, and indeed one of the highest standards of living of any people in the world. They would not enjoy the greatest freedoms and the most thoroughly protected individual rights anywhere. Where is the gratitude of black America and its leaders for those gifts?
The Reparations Argument Is Based On The Unfounded Claim That All African-American Descendants of Slaves Suffer From The Economic Consequences Of Slavery And Discrimination.
No evidence-based attempt has been made to prove that living individuals have been adversely affected by a slave system that was ended over 150 years ago…The black middle-class in America is a prosperous community that is now larger in absolute terms than the black underclass. Does its existence not suggest that economic adversity is the result of failures of individual character rather than the lingering after-effects of racial discrimination and a slave system that ceased to exist well over a century ago?” –Published January 3, 2001 in Campus publications across the country, http://97.74.65.51/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=24317
-“Students should stay away from “women’s studies, black studies, cultural studies, whiteness studies, post-colonial studies, all those studies [sic]” because they are “dangerous” for students’ minds.” -April 6 edition of Fox News’ Hannity & Colmes, http://mediamatters.org/mmtv/200604280004?detectqt=false&
-Called USC Students for Justice in Palestine: “organization is a supporter of genocide against the Jewish state and of the Hamas terrorists and of the general terrorist jihad against Israel and the United States” – From his blog November 3, 2009: http://newsrealblog.com/2009/11/03/the-islamic-war-on-freedom-at-usc/
“If blacks are oppressed in America, why isn’t there a black exodus? Why do all those black Haitians want to come here? To be oppressed?” -http://archive.salon.com/news/col/horo/1999/08/16/naacp/
-“Blacks are the human shield of the Democratic Party” –on Glenn Beckhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=scRf_7L5-9I
REALLY? DID HE NOT MAKE ANY OF THE STATEMENTS SHAMS CREDITED TO HIM?
How many times does it need to be pointed out: Islam is NOT a “race”. Islam is a religion.
Calling someone who calls Islam a supremacist religion does NOT make that person a “racist”.
Mohammed treated non-Muslims with contempt. He forced them to convert to Islam, or forced them to pay a special tax that only non-Muslims had to pay, or if neither of these tactics worked he killed non-Muslims.
Mohammed waged many battles against non-Muslims. This is easy to prove as stories of these battles and the sadistic actions Mohammed and his men participated in can be found in the Koran. These stories are FROM the Koran. David Horowitz did NOT make them up.
Mohammed taught his followers to force non-Muslims to convert, or to become second-class citizens, or to be killed if they did not convert or pay the special “non-Muslim” tax. By the time of Mohammed’s death almost the entire Arabian Peninsula had been “cleansed” of all non-Muslims. (Today this would be called “genocide.)
Islam is NOT a race. It is a relibion. It IS a supremacist religion which considers all others to be inferior. This is what Horowitz said.