Madison Student Paper: Running an Ad From Holocaust Deniers

From Letters in Bottles:

. . . the fact that the The Daily Cardinal, the official student paper at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, ran an ad from a Holocaust denial organization.

(Scroll down to the bottom of the page to see the ad.)

[Update:] This link now points to a later edition of the paper.

We aren’t as offended as Letters in Bottles is, and indeed think that at a public university this kind of thing is protected by the First Amendment.

Marquette, being a private university, can have stricter standards.

A few years ago, the Tribune staff got in trouble with the Administration for running an ad from a pro-abortion group. Quite a few people, including a lot of faculty, were up in arms.

Then, shortly after that, they ran an ad from an anti-Semite group. While the ad wasn’t overtly anti-Semitic, a bit of research would have shown that the sponsor was thoroughly disreputable. When the Tribune staff got into trouble over this latter ad, nobody much cared.

We were satisfied with the University’s actions in both cases, since Marquette (like any newspaper publisher) can have standards about what it will and won’t support, and whose money it will or won’t take.

We do think, however, that disreputable groups shouldn’t have the luxury of being the victims of violations of their free speech rights. We tend to sympathize with anybody who is being shut up, and these groups don’t deserve any sympathy.