It has been one year since the Ray Kelly lecture. In the past year, numerous discussions both within and outside Brown have reflected on what happened that evening ad nauseam. To some extent, these conversations were lackluster. A significant position was left out of the equation entirely. I have yet to witness a pronounced effort to condemn Kelly, what he stands for and the policies he enacted, while simultaneously insisting that no one is allowed to dictate standards of free speech.
There is no doubt in my mind that Kelly should not have been invited and lauded in our University’s name as a testament to honorable public service. Unfortunately, due to the disgraceful failures of the Taubman Center for Public Policy and American Institutions, he was going to speak regardless of any dissent on Oct. 29, 2013. The protesters of the talk stood for what any person on our campus should stand for: opposition to the racist and oppressive policies that Kelly embodies through both his stop-and-frisk policies and his “counter-terrorism” surveillance.
But I draw the line at disrupting this inevitable lecture.
Here’s why: Endowing oneself with the power to decide who speaks and who does not speak is always a method used by oppressors to silence the dissent of the oppressed. Figures in power invoke empty and often deceitful terms to this end, the most insidious of which is “civility.” The use of the concept of civility is consistently claimed — for instance, by critics of the protest — to impose certain standards of what is acceptable and what is not. While I stand with the protesters, their demands and their fury, shutting down speakers implicates us in civility’s long and ugly history.
“Civility” is a blanket term originating from the white Protestant tradition as a tool of placing the “Other” — whether blacks, Jews, Arabs or indigenous people — under ruthless subjugation. The colonizers who ethnically cleansed this land to make way for the United States justified it as an act of the civilized Europeans against the boorish and vulgar Native Americans. This issue still runs rampant in society today. Look at the case of Steven Salaita, a former professor of American Indian studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, who lost a tenured position due to his “uncivil” criticism of Israeli war crimes this summer. It should come as no surprise that this “uncivil” academic is both a Palestinian American and a professor of American Indian studies.
In fact, one of the largest cries from those opposing the protest was that — disruption aside — a protest should never have been assembled because we should be able to engage in “civil” discussion. Those who portray themselves as champions of free speech use the concept of civility to limit expressions that do not fit their narrow definition of free speech.
The brave and necessary protest that was staged should not be discredited by the fact that it went to an extreme inside the lecture hall. This is why careful discussion is key when we talk about these matters. The options are not between shutting down Kelly and holding “civil” discussion. It is not contradictory to both condemn Kelly and affirm free speech rights.
We must understand the history of “civil” discussion, because the protesters tragically took a step too far and blurred the difference between themselves and those in society who invoke the term to exercise and perpetuate their power. The members of the protest must also understand the history in order to be wary of its reappearance in activist discourse. It is highly unsettling to see civility creep into social activism through insistence upon “political correctness” — a rampant phenomenon on Brown’s campus. The oft-repeated line was that Kelly’s speech threatened the safety of those listening.
But that is a treacherous precedent to set.
The college campus is the single safest environment for hearing views no matter how despicable. Claiming a lack of emotional safety is not a valid concern, and certainly pales in comparison to the safety of the world outside the comfort of College Hill — of members of communities outside Brown who, for instance, cannot leave their homes without fear of the New York Police Department clamping down on them and abusing their dignity. There is no clear barrier between what is acceptable and unacceptable, triggering or not triggering. The immense gray area that lies between these two ends is highly susceptible to abuse, and no one abuses the gray area more than the powerful.
People on both sides of the political spectrum manipulate the concept of acceptable discourse. Take as evidence the administration’s recent initiative Transformative Conversations@Brown, spearheaded in response to claims that some issues are highly sensitive. That was the administration’s way of saying: “If you cannot handle open discourse, we will handle it for you.”
I ask of those who shut down Ray Kelly: Consider if, tomorrow, the University decided that dissidents could not be part of a “Transformative Conversation” on our campus because it is discomforting for the administration to host those who oppose government policy or engage in civilian disobedience. Claims of political correctness or comfort are a slippery slope and do not dictate any clear standards of judgment, nor should there ever be any rigid standards of judgment regarding speakers. The last thing we want is for the University to impose its standards on the student body, so let us not give it any reason to do so. Or even more importantly, let us ensure we are not using the same methods of suppressing speech that it uses.
If lauding and paying Ray Kelly was an exercise in free speech, then we must change the manner in which we approach the freedoms and rights we do have. Yes, we have a duty to preserve free speech, but we also have a duty as a community to stand for the freedoms of all, especially those who are marginalized and subjugated by men like Kelly. Each freedom comes with a duty — we are not permitted to be libertines. One of the few well-articulated points in the ensuing mayhem was the notion of “collective responsibility.” “We can” has never been a proper justification for “we should.”
Peter Makhlouf ’16 can be reached at peter_makhlouf@brown.edu.
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