The 2008 presidential election has been over for months, but former Weather Underground member Bill Ayers is still causing controversy. Boston College’s decision to rescind its invitation to Ayers to speak at an event titled ‘The State of Democracy in America’ shows that BC is more concerned about its own image rather than the academic interest of its students.
BC spokesman Jack Dunn told The Boston Herald that ‘he was unaware that Ayers had been invited to BC.’ But there’s no excuse for this ignorance; the event was posted on the events calendar on BC’s website, so somebody from the administration must have approved it.
The argument that BC had students’ security in mind is nonsensical. Boston policemen may have planned protests, but there is no reason to believe that these protests would turn violent or pose any threat to student safety.’ It seems that the real reason for the Ayers cancellation was strictly for public relations. The fact that the event was cancelled on the same day conservative talk show host Michael Graham called for a protest of the event further suggests that BC bowed to right-wing pressure.
It’s not as if Ayers was invited to speak about his controversial past. The fact is, he is a renowned professor at Chicago University whose expertise on education was very relevant to the event discussing academic freedom.
The Boston community is understandably sensitive about Ayers given that the Weather Underground was allegedly responsible for the death of a Boston patrolman decades ago, but this has never proven.’ Bill Ayers has never been convicted of any crime, and in this country, one is innocent until proven guilty. An alleged connection to a crime committed more than 40 years ago is not justification enough to bar Ayers from this event.
Just because BC does not see a speaker as a role model does not mean that the speaker should be barred from contributing to an academic discussion. It is ironic that at a discussion about academic freedom, BC has shown that this freedom is not as important as keeping conservatives happy.
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