Unifying the Campus in a Sea of Green

On Monday, the Daily Cal printed an advertisement promoting Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week, a smear campaign hosted on campus by the Berkeley College Republicans and sponsored nationally by conservative UC Berkeley alumnus David Horowitz. According to Horowitz, the mission of the campaign is “to confront the two Big Lies of the political left: that George Bush created the ‘war on terror’ and that global warming is a greater danger to Americans than global jihad and Islamic supremacism.”

Deconstructing these two ideas leads to some obvious conclusions and essentially undermines the very foundation of this week’s events.

It doesn’t take a genius to see that Horowitz aims to alienate Muslims in the United States. At the same time, he intends to rail on universities for being both bastions of the political left and sympathizers “for the enemy.”

Horowitz seeks to denigrate the core principles of Islam by utilizing non-contextual statements, pictures and videos. In using these tactics, Horowitz underestimates the intelligence of his audience, mainly college students who are already in pursuit of higher knowledge.

With such radical statements and motives, Horowitz and BCR are looking for a response. They want to see young Muslims and friends present inflamed reactions to their events.

Enraged responses and attempts to silence the events can only add fuel to Horowitz’s fire. Horowitz and his supporters allege that such actions stifle free speech and confirm that American college campuses promote solely leftist ideology. This is the same argument we have been hearing from our local BCR.

An attempt to understand free speech might help Horowitz and his crew to reconsider their argument. Freedom of speech is not a free pass for hate speech and the spreading of falsehoods and misinformation. Presenting an argument about the threat of terrorism by using contrived terminology is at best crafty, yet essentially a cheap shot.

Breaking down every single argument made by proponents of this week’s events is not a difficult task. We could write about the peaceful nature of Islam. We could speak about how the very term coined by Horowitz has no basis, and how its very use is divisive.

Instead of confronting these arguments directly, we think it is more worthwhile to explore the background of their sponsor and speakers, and the disingenuous tactics they employ.

The events’ primary sponsor, Horowitz, is a good starting point. Once a vocal leftist and supporter of the Black Panthers, Horowitz has taken a radical shift in his later years, condemning reparations to the descendants of slaves and blaming slavery on black Africans. He has strongly criticized universities for bolstering support against the war in Iraq. Most recently, he has embarked on a campaign against Islam and Muslims.

We could also look at his line-up of speakers for his week of events. From Nonie Darwish here at UC Berkeley, to right-wing Anne Coulter at USC, it is easy to find a trend. Each of these speakers has publicly and repeatedly vilified Muslims and Islam.

As for tactics, we can examine events on campus this past week. Yesterday, for example, BCR hosted an event titled “Voices of Terror,” where members of the group recited the words of radical terrorist leaders. Many of the quotes chosen were taken out of context and clearly attempted to equate Islam with terrorism. This tactic was mere child’s play.

In this piece, we could easily employ the same tactic by printing quotes from David Horowitz and his line-up of this week’s extreme speakers. But such a move would merely mimic the same political strategies we find reprehensible.

The Peace not Prejudice campaign, symbolized by green T-shirts on campus, comes not as a direct response to the arguments constructed by Horowitz, but rather as an affirmation of the diversity of opinion on college campuses.

The racist ideology and terminology promoted by supports of Horowitz failed to produce the organization’s anticipated response. Students comically laughed at the sign held up on Sproul Plaza on Monday, which sought to feminize and attack Islam through the figure of the female body labeled as oppressed and abused. Instead of yelling and screaming, they stood together. Unfortunately for Horowitz, this week brought students together from many groups that seldom interact. Ironically, Islamo-Fascist week has reemphasized the need for peaceful dialogue and campus unity.

We thank and commend all the student groups and supporters that contributed to the success of Peace not Prejudice week. We also express our gratitude to the ASUC Senate for its support of the coalition and disagreement with the terminology used this week. The bigger challenge in moving forward will be to maintain the bonds and friendships we have formed.

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