Freedom under fire

In the past, the University of Michigan Press has been known to publish a body of fairly controversial works. \nFor example, in 2004 it released “The Limits to Union: Same-Sex Marriage and the Politics of Civil Rights,” by Jonathan Goldberg-Hiller. This book provided a discussion of the same-sex marriage debate, which was and still is, needless to say, an extremely divisive issue. However, the company recently pulled and later reinstated publication of an anti-Zionist book by Joel Kovel, a professor and frequent writer on the Middle East conflict. “Overcoming Zionism,” which argues that Israel practices “state-sponsored racism,” was withdrawn from distribution when members of the university community questioned the soundness of its reasoning and deemed it an example of dogmatic “hate speech.”\nThis, then, begs the question: which controversies are acceptable to bring to a public forum? And just to add more confusion to the issue, who should decide? We at the Indiana Daily Student opinion staff hold this particular matter close to our hearts, for obvious reasons, and generally think that unless the expression of a personal belief is likely to cause a major catastrophe or start wars – as we fear from time to time that some of our more inflammatory Purdue jokes will - there is nothing wrong with expressing them. What’s more, this case seems even more straightforward, as it was involved in a scholarly work backed by a substantial body of factual research.\nBut there is, as always, another side to this issue. Earlier this year, a prominent Saudi Arabian businessman filed 11 “allegations of defamation” against Cambridge University Press to stop the release of the book “Alms for Jihad: Charities and Terrorism in the Islamic World,” which claimed that his company directly funded terrorism. Not only did they stop publishing the work, but they also burned the existing unreleased copies of it in a pyrotechnic display that would have given Ray Bradbury goose bumps. \nThe Cambridge University Press seems to have tucked its tail between its legs and run simply because it was unable to expend the resources necessary to have fought the accusations in court. So what if the same situation had occurred with Kovel’s book? Because it is affiliated with a university, and because institutions of higher education have traditionally been advocates of free speech, it seems that challenging such allegations should be a priority for the University of Michigan Press.\nHowever, because money is limited, this might turn out to be a pipe dream of sorts, and sadly, many freedom-of-expression issues will probably continue to be put on the back burner because of purely monetary considerations. But when it comes down to it, these institutions need to continue publishing carefully thought out, well-written, intensely researched works, as they have typically done in the past. Stimulating and promoting free discussion of relevant issues should not be a side effect of academically-based institutions; it should be their prerogative.