In 2017, when the College Historical Society (the Hist) came under fire for inviting former UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage to address the society, this Editorial Board defended the invitation, with the caveat that Farage should not be given a Gold Medal for Outstanding Contribution to Public Discourse – considering the role he has played in spreading xenophobia and lies about the European Union in Britain.
Banning Farage from speaking would have been censorship plain and simple, and would have played into the usual “snowflake” trope that has been attached to students.
The Hist’s Auditor at the time, Paul Molloy, had followed this course of action – but not without a heavy punishment. Students, members of the Hist and prominent former members of the society savagely lambasted him online. Two weeks before the Hist’s AGM Molloy stepped down, citing personal reasons.
Since then the GMB’s debating societies have been rocked by allegations of racism and sexism by its members.
When Auditor of the Hist Bríd O’Donnell decided to revoke the society’s invitation to Prof Richard Dawkins last week, this, as well as memories of the Farage episode, was undoubtedly on her mind.
The fury surrounding the Farage debacle has served its purpose: it has made censorship of controversial voices acceptable. A society that once valued open debate has been bullied into turning on the cornerstone of any debating society: freedom of speech.
Whether you agree with Prof Richard Dawkins or not is immaterial – in fact, this Editorial Board finds some of his statements destructive, as it did in the case of Farage. But a debating society doesn’t exist to protect its members’ “comfort” – which, O’Donnell has said, is now the society’s primary objective. They are about testing your ideas against ones you disagree with.
The Hist must now reckon with what exactly its role is on campus, because – as long as it silences voices that make it feel uncomfortable – it cannot call itself a debating society. It is simply a society where like-minded people can listen to speakers that won’t challenge their views.
If that’s the future of the world’s oldest student society, then so be it. This Editorial Board simply believes that that is a depressingly low bar for what was once a serious society – where good ideas could defeat bad ones.
