A Meditation on Islamophobia and Freedom of Speech
In light of recent University of Illinois happenings
As with most instances of this character, the recent bit of contention over freedom of speech and the safeguarding of religious minorities on U of I’s campus is multifaceted. One might even deem it embroiled in double standard, particularly in view of the administration’s response. Nevertheless, it strikes me as nearly equally emblematic of the shifting (or already redefined) topography of university culture as of the pernicious bigotry long present in our society.
With the somewhat bungled but all the same speedy firing of Larry Jacobsen this past week, the University has incarnated the latest iteration of many in the clash over free speech on college campuses. I am not fully prepared to assert that it has come down on the wrong side of things, but I am resolved in my uneasy suspicion that the ultimate firing may not be infallibly laudable. This is not a mere indictment of the University’s wobbly and unconvincing route to this course of action; instead, it is a call to debate that about this situation which renders the snap judgment element at least premature, if not ultimately inadvisable.
The crucial detail without which one cannot form an adequate impression of the matter is, of course, Larry Jacobsen’s tweet. In response to President Elect Biden’s announcement of his intention to appoint Muslims “at every level” of his administration, Jacobsen wrote “The guys who flew planes into twin towers, the pentagon, and who behead people because they aren’t Muslim, thank you Joe”. An ignorant, anti-pluralistic statement of the kind which Muslims on campus and in the US are undoubtedly sick, and perhaps terrified, of hearing. Indisputably, Jacobsen’s words denigrate the avowed principles of the University with respect to inclusion and convict him of a particularly base form of chauvinism and nativist prejudice while revealing, crucially, his clear inability to discriminate.
At first glance, one might consider any deliberation on the retention of such an employee frivolous and incomprehensible. After all, Jacobsen expressed himself in such a way that Muslim students who are in a sense entrusted to the University felt unsafe. One’s resolve on this point might ossify further with the knowledge that in 2014, U of I rescinded its offer of tenure to Professor Steven Salaita for his vigorous Twitter protest against Israel’s bombing of Gaza. At least in the interim before the end of this piece, I caution one against such unscrupulous judgments.
Let us examine the way the administration responded to the incident: upon initial complaints from students, U of I offered an assurance of its awareness of the tweet but maintained its inability to interfere given that Jacobsen had acted on a private account in his personal time. Days later, after an apparent reawakening of its judicious faculties, the administration relayed the firing of Jacobsen as well as its “unqualified” condemnation of his statement. The intervening days saw spirited petitioning by the Students for Justice in Palestine, the GEO solidarity committee, and other student groups with which I sympathize for a more severe crackdown by the University on the white supremacist it appeared content to harbor.
I must admit, not at all begrudgingly but rather as an ode of solidarity, that these student activists can lay significant claim to moral indignation as a result of past University actions in this sphere. SJP has endured several unsympathetic conflations of Anti-Zionism with Anti-Semitism by the administration over the past few years, and the University’s amenability towards widespread student demand for better-funded social services for underrepresented campus minorities has proven underwhelming. Additionally, the case of Professor Salaita serves as a reminder to many of the University’s neglect for the Palestinian cause and of its complicit preservation of the status quo on that front. One could cite further examples of significant grievances held by the sort of liberal, left-wing student activists among whom I would hope to count myself against the University on matters of social justice.
Even still, at the risk of sounding glib, the demand issued by the Muslim Student Association and signed by numerous other groups strikes me as potentially callow. Insofar as it was advocated as a direct retaliation against Professor Salaita’s treatment, and even purely on the grounds that the tweet was racist, the firing of Jacobsen is easy to support. The University cannot afford to retain an individual who endangers its Muslim population and is fully justified in removing him on principle, goes the thinking. But it’s worth noting, as is not lost on the student petitioners by any means, that the University was largely responding to student protest. The actions of the administration hardly convince me of a genuine decision to protect its students but rather of a caving into popular pressure more indicative of a desire to avoid bad press. I fully believe it is neither necessary nor accurate to accuse the University of white supremacist sympathies or anything of the kind for my perception to hold; it is merely a matter of taking the path of least resistance.
In some sense, then, what has been achieved is less a reflection of the University’s tolerance and more a sign — perhaps a portentous one — of the power of students to set the limits of discourse. After all, from U of I’s initial noncommittal response, it seems entirely possible that without the petitioning and outcry, Larry Jacobsen would still be inputting data part-time for the Office of Student Conflict Resolution. This lays the onus on the students to determine the sort of campus environment in which they would like to learn and necessarily raises the matters of Islamophobia and freedom of speech.
On the former, one must consider both the broad and the situational. Jacobsen’s tweet clearly betrays his suspicion of all Muslims, his ascription of the barbarism of some to all within Islam, and his general intolerance for a vital group of people who populate this campus. His remarks and the simplistic, small-minded prejudices they reveal deserve immediate repudiation from the University. Consider, however, if his statement had read a bit differently: say, “I am tired of Muslims committing terrorist attacks and beheading non-Muslims”. Would this spark similar outrage and cause commensurate accusations of Islamophobia? Though it is admittedly a crude comprisal of the matter, and although it lacks the specific contextual reference to Biden’s administration present in the original tweet, the statement does in part reflect reality. In mature, reasoned discussion, better distinctions are to be drawn so as to indict Islamist terrorists instead of all followers of the religion; nevertheless, on its own, the statement could and should pass as a critique of religion.
While I sympathize with Muslims who are subjected to this sort of rhetoric on a consistent basis, I would hope that my comrades would more or less agree with the appeal for free speech I have just outlined. From a normative standpoint, it is incumbent on students on the left to push against things like no-platforming and the more misguided manifestations of cancel culture for the sake of university culture. Progress is favored by open and robust debate, not by hyper-sensitivity and excessive limitations on acceptable speech. And even pragmatically, I maintain that the evident power of students to shape campus discourse is somewhat ill-spent in these sorts of endeavors. The danger of this sort of methodology being applied to, say, another pro-Palestinian activist in another misdiagnosis of anti-Semitism has probably increased. Moreover, those who sympathize with Jacobsen and figures like Trump may become energized and motivated anew to shove off the “persecution” imposed upon them by the University for their views (a less favorable outcome than might have been achieved through their defeat in an organized debate, say). In general, one fears that the University’s situational applications of its language on inclusivity, itself fairly palatable, might enmesh it in contradiction in future, stickier scenarios.
I readily anticipate the counterpoints to such a stance and want to make clear my utter rejection of the right-wing baggage attached to free speech arguments. Yes, I am a privileged, non-marginalized white male who cannot claim to understand being stereotyped consistently for my religious identity. And I have already considered perhaps the most potent challenge to my position: does not the affordance of free speech to bigots preserve a racist status-quo? Accordingly, I might do well to restate my thinking with some qualifiers — that word which itself revealed the University’s sheepish hypocrisy. In a university setting in which kids are, per en loco parentis, protected by the University in some sense, incitements to violence and even non-violent forms of hate speech necessitate harsh, swift renunciation and sanction. Nevertheless, in another very eminent and vital sense, a college campus is a haven for free thought and expression, a place in which one is meant to encounter all sorts of ideas and viewpoints. Why? Because such is the life of the intellectual and the educated person: a series of cultural, political, and moral imbroglios in which dangerous opposing perspectives must be dealt with skillfully and earnestly. College should serve as the training ground for such exercises in critical thinking and debate: why preach the dialectic if we call for it to be stifled and truncated? Unfortunately, I fear that the insidious underbelly of hypersensitivity and the promulgation of a rather tepid form of multiculturalism will amount to such a suffocation. The line determining what is offensive or not, what is insensitive or not, and even what is at all acceptable to utter treads on the precipice of encompassing much more than it should, and I worry that edging it along without reservations as the student petitioners have done may prove unwise. With my qualifying conditions conceded, therefore, I reaffirm my stance.
I must comment finally on a related yet slightly distinct concern with regard to the students’ indignation. My qualm concerns the student claims of feeling unsafe as a consequence of the comments. Though I wish in no way to defend Jacobsen’s remarks, the claim of imminent danger expressed by the Muslim Student Association, namely in its appraisal of the University’s care for the safety of its Muslim community as lacking, falls a bit flat in my view. No visible incitement to violence was made in this case. Though such expressions of intolerance can of course inspire others to adopt similar stances and can, in sufficient quantity, foment dangerous environments, the case at hand did not accomplish this in any noticeable fashion. As such, the anticipation of such contingencies by way of imprudent censorship is simply not good enough.
In closing, I will offer some minor prescriptions. Petition for an apology and a statement of condemnation; protest outside Jacobsen’s office for the same; extend an invitation to him or a like-minded organization on campus for a debate on religious tolerance or an educational seminar on the beauties and contributions of Muslim culture. But don’t call for a hasty, unthinking firing, the kind of which the University has proven easily induced by mild student pressure into making. Muslims deserve to feel just as welcome and safe on campus as anyone else, and extra measures are surely required of the University for this to become reality, but the current milieu seems to portend a further degeneration of adversarial intellectual activity on this and all campuses and must be counteracted. While I will grant us all this one in the name of Professor Salaita, let us advance with no illusions whatsoever. May this instance not serve as a harbinger for suppressions of religious criticisms just as vividly as it stands as a reminder of the long road to deep, meaningful multicultural tolerance. After this week’s events, the choice with regard to the former appears to lie with the students.
