Nick Griffin Exposes Oxford Students' Totalitarian Views

Oxide Radio has been banned by the student union from interviewing Nick Griffin, the BNP chairman. I have been thus informed by my daughter who also sent a link to an article Death Threats Sent to Oxide DJs in The Oxford Student.

It is sad to be forced to agree with Nick Griffin (his views are disgusting) but he has justifiably complained about this infringement of his right to free speech.

A university is one institution that is entirely dependent on freedom of speech. It ia a pity that every generation of students seems to have to relearn that:

• freedom of speech is worthless if it is extended only to those who share your own views;


• it is your freedom that you risk when you adopt such an attitude because the prevailing view may change against you;


• having accepted the principle that free speech may be curtailed you will have lost the right to complain if your views are then suppressed;


• the way to defeat and undermine false positions is to expose them to the light of open debate; and


• suppression of particular views tends to lend them revolutionary cachet attracting rather than deterrring followers.

University Challenge: Who famously said words to that effect? The answer is at the end.

Oxford University is supposed to be a home to enlightenment and so it is a big disappointment that the students (or some of them) have provided Griffin (whose views they rightly despise) with the opportunity to portray himself as oppressed.

Tony Blair, although not a great fan of his critics being entirely free to express their views, has yet to threaten to assassinate any of them.

What did the students who made this decision think was going to happen as a result of a radio interview, in the course of which I assume the DJs would have challenged Griffin's views? Griffin was going to gain vast support among their fellow students? This does seem to show some disrespect for their fellow students' intelligence.

Answer to Uniiversity Challenge:

You probably thought the answer was Voltaire. It is not. It was a made up saying summing up Voltaire's attitude written by Evelyn Beatrice Hall writing under the pseudonym S G Tallentyre in The Friends of Voltaire.

"The men who had hated [the book], and had not particularly loved Helvétius, flocked round him now. Voltaire forgave him all injuries, intentional or unintentional. 'What a fuss about an omelette!' he had exclaimed when he heard of the burning. How abominably unjust to persecute a man for such an airy trifle as that! 'I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it,' was his attitude now."