Scripps College Students Protest Madeleine Albright, and That's Okay
There's no such thing as a non-controversial commencement speaker.
Scripps College's decision to invite Madeleine Albright to give the spring commencement address has met with a familiar backlash. Many students at the all-female college think Albright is an unfit speaker.
She's also a war criminal, according to some of the students, who take issue with the former secretary of state's policies regarding Iraq and Rwanda. Student Kinzie Mabon criticzed Albright for saying "there's a special place in hell for women who don't help other women." (Mabon supported Bernie Sanders, I gather.)
Albright is just the latest in a very long line of commencement speakers at various colleges who provoked the ire of one student group or another. It's very hard for colleges to find someone who is acceptable to everybody on campus, and it may even be the case that the least controversial people are so boring they aren't worth inviting at all.
Students who pressure universities to rescind speaking invitations are in a sense refusing to listen to ideas with which they disagree. They are also denying their fellow students the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to hear the words of a famous expert.
All that said, I don't have any problem with students announcing their opposition to Albright. The coverage of the controversy does not suggest that they are actually trying to get her disinvited—they are merely criticizing her. They certainly have that right: they are, in fact, engaged in free speech. And for what it's worth, I think many of their criticisms of Albright are merited.
(I was deeply opposed to the policies of my own commencement speaker, President Barack Obama.)
