Atheist,humanist and secularist students are under attack, not in the temples or mosques but in the universities, the institutions of learning of the highest level. They are humiliated, threatened and banned. Instead of protecting freedom of expression the authorities have been protecting a bunch of irrational myths. Nothing is more dangerous than the ideas that our secular institutions have to behave like religious institutions and instead of enlightening students it is alright to keep them in the dark.
Why don’t we file cases against the people who violate people’s freedom of expression? We should not let them go unopposed.
I read your interview in Sept 13 . Its nice about right to expression.
When the atheist, humanist and secular students are threatened, humiliated and banned in the universities in the secular countries, it is too painful. I cannot understand how it is possible. I think that those countries where such incidents are taking place are not at all secular countries.
I agree with you that we should not let them go unopposed.
I’m really saddened, after spending much of my life struggling against racism, sexism & the devastation of the natural environment, to see that despite the progress we’ve made, all those arguments need to be started all over again.
Protecting persons, & their right to believe whatever they please, is not the same as assuming that white people have to ‘respect’ everything said or believed by a person with browner skin. We made progress as a society precisely by challenging oppressive belief systems. It took us 500 years to get the boot of the Church off our necks, & now, in the 21st century, atheist, secular & humanist societies are being told they have no place at our universities. Unbelievable!
But if we could organise a campaign to resist this return to mindless conformity, underpinned by a threat of violence if we don’t comply, I have the time & the willingness to put my shoulder to the wheel again. Anyone for targeted letter-writing?