“It is unfortunate that Columbia University, an institution ostensibly dedicated to the pursuit of truth and knowledge, should choose to provide a man so divorced from reality and historical truths with a platform to spout his venomous ideology,” according to a Yad VaShem spokesman as quoted in the Jerusalem Post.
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the president of Iran, has threatened to destroy the state of Israel; promised to wipe if off the face of the earth. What took Adolf Hitler almost a decade to accomplish, Ahmadinejad can accomplish in minutes thanks to his ongoing attempts to gain nuclear status. And in the midst of international politics, of threats of nuclear attacks and one man's attempt to delegitimize, if not destroy a nation, Columbia University is taking a stand. Against tyranny? Against racist, genocidal threats? No, Columbia has decided to give the Iranian president an honor and a platform from which to spew his hatred. Many bloggers have written about this, so I'll make one comment more... One of my first days at Columbia way back in my late teens, I walked through the campus by myself in early September, shamelessly listening to the conversations around me. I was enthralled. They didn't talk baseball, although I'm sure students often did. They didn't talk about the weather. I heard two students talking about the requirements in the School of Engineering, and a bunch more talking about apartheid in South Africa. A few were discussing the US government. They were so intelligent, I thought, and they'd accepted me. I was honored and humbled. I studied, I learned. I attended classes - even a course with Lisa Anderson and her snide little anti-Israel comments she'd slip in. I took a course with another professor and was as amazed by his brilliance as his conceit. But even more than the knowledge I amassed during my four years at Columbia, was the growth of my awareness as a person and my place in this world. At Columbia, you learn that a person can shake the world, take it higher...or lower. With a single act of kindness, Mother Teresa could raise the world; with brilliance, men such as Einstein, Freud, Salk and so many others could better mankind; and with cruelty and hatred, single men such as Adolf Hitler, Saddam Hussein, and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad can speak and act to bring death and destruction to hundreds, thousands, and even millions. I learned that I had power too - power to make people listen, if I dared to use it. Somewhere along the way, while at Columbia, I began to write - for others, and for myself. In 1893, Edward George Bulwer Lytton, an English novelist, wrote, "the pen is mightier than the sword." Ahmadinejad comes to Columbia to wave the sword of hatred and genocide - but around the world, those of us who care, raise the power of the pen against him - and sadly, against my alma mater, Columbia University, whose lessons I learned...and President Lee Bollinger of Columbia forgot: a single person can change the world...if you let him. Behold...the power of the pen: Open Letter to Lee Bollinger - True Freedom of Speech Denied Martin Peretz on Adhmadinejad at Columbia: The World is Nuts Iranian Maniac Leader Will Entertain Columbia University Students Monday Latest Outrage at Columbia University Letter to Bollinger Columbia U did itself in Voice of Condemnation
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