Brian Rainey '04 GS
On the one hand, I understand why he's a controversial person, and I certainly don't agree with the policies of his government domestically and sometimes internationally.
But at the same time I'm concerned with how people have reacted to it, because I think a lot of the rhetoric plays into the anti-Iran rhetoric that's happening in Washington - justifications for overly aggressive policies towards Iran.
Whether or not he comes to Columbia, I don't know. I'm sure controversial people have spoken at Columbia and (Brown). The question is whether or not someone who has said things as controversial as what he's said and done should be invited to a university. It's about context a lot of times.
I am very concerned about the anti-Iran rhetoric, and I think a lot of the reaction is not careful about how they play into that. I don't think he's a dictator. He presides over a repressive society, but it's a little different from dictatorship. It's a lot of rhetoric and luster, the reaction.
Pratik Chougule '08
From Ahmadinejad's standpoint, it was a great thing - the perfect PR stunt. (Columbia President Lee) Bollinger, Columbia and the liberal protestors in the street did a pretty good job of making sure he got the great media stunt that he pulled off.
The problem with academia, in general, is that they have this perverse concept of academic freedom. Bollinger tried to sound tough in his introduction, but when you invite this dictator who's threatening the world with genocide, and give him the distinction of speaking at Columbia, you've already lost all credibility in my mind.
And all those protestors out there - what better way for Ahmadinejad than to go home and show that he's speaking at a distinguished university and having a bunch of Jewish protestors protesting him? Can you think of a better image that he could create in the Muslim world?
I think all around it was a disaster.
Yael Shavit '08
Personally, I do not think that Ahmadinejad should have been invited to speak at Columbia. I do believe in diversity of ideas, I value challenging beliefs and I think that liberal universities should try to promote intellectual diversity.
But with Ahmadinejad - he propounds views that are factually incorrect, and he clearly doesn't value or advocate for free speech or diversity of ideas in his own country, so I don't know that it's the place of the liberal university to be giving a person who doesn't value other people's opinions at all a pulpit to speak from.
But what is also interesting is that I don't think Bollinger believes that his ideas are valid either. Otherwise, I just don't understand why he would have given him a reception like he did.
I think that if he had invited Ahmadinejad to Columbia to get a public slogging, that his intro would be great, and I loved it, and would have gone to see it. But if he actually meant what he said, and seriously invited Ahmadinejad to be there because he believes that the university should care about a diversity of points and he thinks that Ahmadinejad's viewpoints fall into that category, then his introduction was totally inappropriate.
I don't think you can on the one hand say that you care about hearing his opinions to your school, and on the other call those opinions stupid or invalid or incorrect before you even let him speak.
So I'm not entirely sure what was going on there, and I also heard that Bollinger might have changed his speech after a lot of public pressure that came before the speech happened. I'm not sure if that happened or not.
Either way, you can't have it both ways, and he was trying to have his cake and eat it too.
