TheEschaton
02-11-2008, 01:03 PM
So there's a bit of controversy at BC Law this spring, because our Dean (who is a very conservative, traditional Catholic Irish kind of guy) unilaterally invited Michael Mukasey to speak at our commencement this spring. Included in this invitation is the awarding of the Founder's Medal, which is given to those people "who represent and act on most fully the ideals of Boston College." In an EMail to the school announcing the speaker, our Dean said, "I can think of no one who the graduating class could look up more to."
Now, Boston College is a Jesuit, Catholic school, and the Jesuit tradition is a rather progressive one in the Catholic Church, focusing on the commitment to the poor and the Catholic Social Thought movement. As some background, a few years back the University as a whole implemented a speaker policy which allowed Administration to "balance" events where a non- or anti-Catholic sentiment was being put forth. IE, if you were sponsoring a gay rights, or an abortion rights event, the University had the right to force you to have a speaker at the same event espousing the Catholic view, or they could cancel the event. No such requirement of balance was necessary at events already espousing Catholic views, so those hate-filled pro-life rallies could continue unimpeded. This was not binding on the law school, but was recommended; the law school quickly said they would not follow such a policy at the outcry of the students and concerns about free speech.
The next year, the University, after cancelling a popular Gay Gala ball, invited Condi Rice to speak at commencement, despite the Catholic Church saying that the war in Iraq was unjust and Catholics should not support it. Now they've invited Mukasey, who equivocates on torture, in my opinion, so he does not have to investigate CIA officials, despite it being the right thing to do.
There seem to be three arguments in this whole debate over whether Mukasey should come to speak:
1) He should come, because he is a distinguished person, and the sitting Attorney General is a big coup for any law school to get.
2) He should not come, because he goes against the whole idea of the law school's Jesuit, Catholic tradition, which condemns torture, and espouses that law students seek and fight for justice in all things, even against what is comfortable and easy.
3) HE should not come, because the Dean unilaterally picked him, and no faculty (who are pissed as hell) nor student knew of this decision.
I tend to fall in the #2 camp. Awarding him the Founder's Medal, and the Dean saying this is what we should aspire to, pisses me off to no end. Now, the criticism of #2 is that we do not want to allow free speech that does not conform to our liberal ideals. To me, this rings hollow: conservatives (IE, the Church, and most Republicans in this debate, including the presumptive nominee for the GOP) as well as liberals have decried torture as illegal, and think it should be condemned wholeheartedly, CIA investigations or not. This is not a matter of suppressing a viewpoint, it is a matter of protesting the dominent (Administration) viewpoint. Furthermore, a commencement address is not an open debate, by allowing him to speak at commencement, and giving him our Founder's Medal, it is implicitly endorsing his viewpoints, that justice is irrelevant when it comes to protecting Administration officials who condoned this practice.
Anyways, I didn't really think this would start any discussion, I just wanted to vent. Feel free to comment if you want though.
Now, Boston College is a Jesuit, Catholic school, and the Jesuit tradition is a rather progressive one in the Catholic Church, focusing on the commitment to the poor and the Catholic Social Thought movement. As some background, a few years back the University as a whole implemented a speaker policy which allowed Administration to "balance" events where a non- or anti-Catholic sentiment was being put forth. IE, if you were sponsoring a gay rights, or an abortion rights event, the University had the right to force you to have a speaker at the same event espousing the Catholic view, or they could cancel the event. No such requirement of balance was necessary at events already espousing Catholic views, so those hate-filled pro-life rallies could continue unimpeded. This was not binding on the law school, but was recommended; the law school quickly said they would not follow such a policy at the outcry of the students and concerns about free speech.
The next year, the University, after cancelling a popular Gay Gala ball, invited Condi Rice to speak at commencement, despite the Catholic Church saying that the war in Iraq was unjust and Catholics should not support it. Now they've invited Mukasey, who equivocates on torture, in my opinion, so he does not have to investigate CIA officials, despite it being the right thing to do.
There seem to be three arguments in this whole debate over whether Mukasey should come to speak:
1) He should come, because he is a distinguished person, and the sitting Attorney General is a big coup for any law school to get.
2) He should not come, because he goes against the whole idea of the law school's Jesuit, Catholic tradition, which condemns torture, and espouses that law students seek and fight for justice in all things, even against what is comfortable and easy.
3) HE should not come, because the Dean unilaterally picked him, and no faculty (who are pissed as hell) nor student knew of this decision.
I tend to fall in the #2 camp. Awarding him the Founder's Medal, and the Dean saying this is what we should aspire to, pisses me off to no end. Now, the criticism of #2 is that we do not want to allow free speech that does not conform to our liberal ideals. To me, this rings hollow: conservatives (IE, the Church, and most Republicans in this debate, including the presumptive nominee for the GOP) as well as liberals have decried torture as illegal, and think it should be condemned wholeheartedly, CIA investigations or not. This is not a matter of suppressing a viewpoint, it is a matter of protesting the dominent (Administration) viewpoint. Furthermore, a commencement address is not an open debate, by allowing him to speak at commencement, and giving him our Founder's Medal, it is implicitly endorsing his viewpoints, that justice is irrelevant when it comes to protecting Administration officials who condoned this practice.
Anyways, I didn't really think this would start any discussion, I just wanted to vent. Feel free to comment if you want though.