USC cancels valedictorian’s speech because of obviously bogus “safety” concerns

The student in question is an American of South Asian descent who was chosen by the administration, out of a couple of hundred eligible straight A students, to be this year’s valedictorian. I don’t see any indication that she had written her speech yet, so the basis for the cancellation is, putatively, “safety” concerns about somebody who apparently had, according to a group opposing the choice, “a link to a curated media page” as part of her social media bio. On that page are statements calling Zionism a racist settler-colonial ideology, and advocating the abolishment of the state of Israel.

So basically USC’s administration is saying that if the right people complain about having a student whose social media bio includes links to anti-Zionist statements as the valedictorian, that person will be removed — cancelled if you will — because of fabricated concerns about “public safety,” which as Pope Hat points out is the very definition of a heckler’s veto, assuming it’s the genuine reason for the cancellation, which very obviously it’s not.

While it’s true that nobody has a right to give a speech at graduation, cancelling a speech after inviting a student to give it because the student is an Asian-American with apparent sympathies for anti-Zionist views is really really bad. This isn’t in any way like protesting handing a big check to Condi Rice to come and spout pablum while demurely not mentioning any of her own war crimes, and anybody who makes that analogy, given LGM’s official anti-Condi Rice being given big checks to give commencement speeches policy, can step right off.

There’s something about this whole topic that drives otherwise reasonable people completely insane.