Nobody should be intimidated into silence. Ever

THAT we need Milo Yiannopoulos to fight for free speech illustrates everything that is wrong in this age of intolerance, writes Sarrah Le Marquand.

A scheduled speech by Milo Yiannopoulos was cancelled at the University of Berkeley in early February after protesters and police engaged in violent skirmishes. (Pic: Elijah Nouvelage/Getty Images/AFP)

THERE are times when what was intended as an insult can be the highest of compliments.

So when a friend recently emailed to let me know that professional bigot Milo Yiannopoulos was having a sulk over a column I wrote about working mothers, I figured it was a good sign.

You must be doing something right when a bloke with a well-documented penchant for racism and sexism takes furious objection to your views.

So suffice to say you won’t find much love lost between myself and Yiannopoulos, the British darling of the alt-right who built an international profile by shamelessly trolling the usual suspects; namely feminists, Muslims, and blacks.

Often credited for helping Donald Trump get elected, it was all going swimmingly for Yiannopoulos until video surfaced of him earlier this year in which he appears to defend paedophilia — a development even his fans considered unseemly and which saw him fall mercifully from favour.

Now he is planning a comeback in the form of a weeklong event at the University of California at Berkeley, in which he plans to make the campus “the free speech capital of the United States once again.”

And it is here — as much as it pains me — that I find myself in full agreement with Yiannopoulos. A speech due to be delivered at the university last week by conservative American commentator Ann Coulter had to be rescheduled, and was eventually cancelled, as a result of security concerns amid the threat of violent protests.

Demonstrators called for the right to freedom of speech after Ann Coulter’s speech was cancelled at the University of Berkeley. (Pic: AP/Marcio Jose Sanchez)

That’s right. The students of Berkeley — a famously progressive institution — could not bring themselves to allow a woman with polarising views to be heard. Seems tertiary education’s commitment to open-minded debate extends only to those with whom students are already in full agreement with.

You can’t run the risk of listening to an outsider with a dissenting perspective... that incurs the risk of actually learning something new!

So Yiannopoulos has a point in supporting his friend with his one-man mission to hold a Free Speech Week on campus grounds later this year (“I WILL BRING AN ARMY IF I HAVE TO” he declares with characteristic swagger.)

“We will ensure that Ann and others can speak and we will publicly, ritually humiliate UC Berkeley for its failure to meet its legal obligations until conservative speakers no longer fear violent mobs just for exercising their First Amendment rights,” he railed.

Sure, Yiannopoulos is a delusional prat, but the staff and students of Berkeley walked right into that one.

After comments made regarding paedophilia surfaced in an online video, Milo Yiannopoulos resigned from his position at Brietbart News and lost a major book deal with Simon & Schuster. (Pic: Drew Angerer/Getty Images/AFP)

Ann Coulter had insisted she would show up at Berkeley despite the university saying it could not provide a suitable venue because of security threats. (Pic: AFP/Getty Images North America/Alberto E. Rodriguez)

That Coulter was forced to cancel her speech illustrates everything that is wrong with public discourse in an age where intolerance has reached new heights — and it’s even worse here in Australia. Calls for Yassmin Abdel-Magied to be fired are a reminder that anyone who expresses an inflammatory or unpopular opinion must be silenced.

That anyone who puts a foot wrong must be vilified.

Given all that has been said about Abdel-Magied’s ill-advised comments on Anzac Day, there’s no need to rehash them here. Suffice to say that while her remarks were ignorant, foolish, and profoundly insensitive — and they were indeed all of those things — petitions demanding that she lose her job are also uncalled for. The removal of Abdel-Magied from her role as a part-time presenter at the ABC as a result of the controversy would set a sinister precedent.

Do we really want to live in a country where every time a broadcaster or commentator causes a stir they are shamed into silence? Criticism and counter-arguments are one thing, but this rush to deny a voice to anyone we personally happen to disagree with is increasingly common. It’s censorship by hashtag; unemployment by petition; conformity on demand.

There are some who have called for Yassmin Abdel-Magied’s dismissal after her Anzac Day comments. (Pic: Supplied)

Ironically, the hypocrisy is rife among many of those clamouring to sing Abdel-Magied’s praises and champion her right to freedom of expression — a right those very same free-speech crusaders suddenly forget when they don’t see eye-to-eye with other commentators who cause offence.

The absurdity of this situation was perfectly captured when Abdel-Magied found herself in the midst of another media storm earlier this year after an exchange with Jacqui Lambie on Q&A. Springing to her defence at the time, an article published by Fairfax Media helpfully suggested: “Here are 10 people more deserving of a petition to be sacked than Yassmin Abdel-Magied”, which contained an all-too predictable list including (of course) Lambie, my colleague Miranda Devine and the late Bill Leak.   

Much to the blissful ignorance of its author, it was a roll call that served only to highlight the convenient double standards applied by most people when championing free speech: if you happen to agree with me then you’re a hero, but if you disagree with me then you’re a travesty.

That’s not how free speech works. The unpalatable, non-Berkeley sanctioned truth is that everyone deserves to be heard, whether their views align with our own or not.

Nobody should be intimidated into silence. Not Ann Coulter. Not Yassmin Abdel-Magied. And not even Milo Yiannopoulos.

Sarrah Le Marquand is the editor-in- chief of Stellar magazine and the founding editor of RendezView.