H. L. Mencken Quotes
I believe that it should be perfectly lawful to print even things that outrage the pruderies and prejudices of the general, so long as any honest minority, however small, wants to read them. The remedy of the majority is not prohibition, but avoidance.
Mencken, H. L. Minority Report: H. L. Mencken's Notebooks. Alfred A. Knopf, 1956.
In 1989 the Chicago Institute of the arts exhibited a controversial work where the American flag was draped on the floor that appeared to invite patrons to walk on it. The Senator introduced a bill making it a crime to display the American flag:
Islamic modernists like Serageldin are many among the educated Muslims but their views are often drowned out by the violence and extremist statements of the fundamentalists.
The important thing about rights is that they exist independent of majority opinion. The majority might want to trample the rights of an unpopular group or individual. Very often Islamic modernists like Serageldin are many among the educated Muslims but the majority views are often drowned out by the violence and extremist statements of the fundamentalists.
The “burning” is a reference to the range of murders from the burning of heretics in the Middle Ages to the crematorium ovens of the German Concentration Camps in the Holocaust of WWII.
In some universities would sometimes protest the selection of a commencement speaker and demonstrate. On some of these occasions the school administration withdrew the invitation. In addition to the problem described by Beckel, the university sells out its basic intellectual commitment to hear all ideas and points of view—regardless of how repugnant or evil. Commencement speakers tend to create a bigger problem because of the custom of the university granting the speaker an Honorary Degree. Whereas it is against the academic tradition to censor a speaker and having a speaker does NOT associate the University, the faculty or the students with the views of the speaker. But the granting of the Honorary Degree does imply an institutional approval and admiration of the speaker, and that is fair game for student protest. However in the beginning of the 21st century some extreme left wing students succeeded in intimidating spineless university administrators and trustees into censoring speech and the ideas of the speaker. This was typical behavior of the right wing brownshirts of the 1930s when it was the Fascists who were prohibiting certain speakers—usually left wingers. 80 years later it was the left wing extremists engaging in this undemocratic behavior.
Henry Louis Mencken was an American journalist, essayist, satirist, cultural critic, and scholar of American English. He commented widely on the social scene, literature, music, prominent politicians, and contemporary movements. His satirical reporting on the Scopes Trial, which he dubbed the "Monkey Trial," also gained him attention.
