Marquette Gay/Straight Alliance President: Anti-Gay Marriage Views Should be Banned on Campus

A post of ours on a speaker coming to campus has produced an interesting exchange on the blog of the Gay/Straight Alliance.

The speaker, who has been brought in to attack the School of the Americas (that bête noire of the campus left), is also a proponent of gay marriage, and his statements on the issue make him look rather like a flake.

We found it interesting that the e-mail announcing his visit said nothing about his views on gay marriage.

We observed that:

Of course, there is nothing wrong with having an advocate of gay marriage speak on campus -- although it might be nice to have somebody on the other side of the issue speak too (fat chance that J.U.S.T.I.C.E. or the University Ministry will arrange that).

Gay/Straight Alliance President Jess Cushion, posting on the blog of that organization, ridiculed notion that both pro- and anti-gay marriage views should be presented on campus.

In addition, McAdams thinks Marquette should host an anti-gay marriage speaker on campus to even the score and cover the other side of the issue. What issue? Gay people are gay. They’re people. People deserve equal rights. All people. But let’s pretend for a moment that being born a certain way didn’t matter or wasn’t possible. Let’s follow that logic... we would need the KKK to come speak because despite the fact that you’re born into a race and ethnicity, there’s still a right and a wrong race and ethnicity to wind up with. Better book that speaker that’s against equal rights for people born with disabilities, because, you know, they chose to have them.

In fact, we believe in free speech, and would allow a member of the Ku Klux Klan to speak on campus.

But if we are going to forbid speakers on the basis that they believe evil things, then the teachings of the Catholic Church should guide the censorship. So no Ku Klux Klan speaker, and no pro-abortion speaker and no pro-gay marriage speaker.

Cushion seems to assume that when speakers are banned, she and her friends get to decide who will be banned.

But the exchange got worse.

We lectured Cushion a bit, asking:

You seem to be asserting that there is only one legitimate side to this debate, and that people on the other side should be silenced.

Once we decide that people on the “wrong” side of the debate should be silenced, you understand that some people might decide that you are on the wrong side, and are the person to be silenced, right?

Cushion responded:

I’m also acknowledging your point that the university should present both sides of an argument. However, the problem is that gay marriage is an issue of human rights, and having a speaker on campus that will stand up against human rights would basically be promoting hate speech on campus. It’s not like abortion where people can choose whether or not to have one. Homosexuality chooses you, and by automatically deeming someone a second class citizen because of how they were born, and by saying that a university should allow an influential speaker to come to campus and say that homosexuals aren’t entitled to the rights that other Americans enjoy because they were born a certain way, is promoting discrimination.

I highly doubt Marquette would stand for such things, and for once I have something to applaud them for.

So Cushion isn’t backing off. She’s continuing to insist that speakers with whom she disagrees should be banned.

We responded:

You seem to think you can label something “against human rights” and then declare that it should not be allowed on campus.

You are begging the question. What constitutes “human rights” is a matter for debate. You don’t seem willing to tolerate the debate.

I think socialism is “against human rights.”

Should I declare socialist speech “hate speech” and try to ban it?

Indeed, on a Catholic campus, speech favoring abortion has to be considered “against human rights.” Would you like to ban that?

What makes you think you and your friends have the right to ban speech with which you disagree?

Cushion, unfortunately, is all too typical of politically correct campus leftists. She hasn’t made up her authoritarian arguments on her own. She has learned them as part of the intolerant culture of the campus activists.