MORAL CLARITY

As a retired academician, a lifelong civil libertarian, and graduate of Harvard Law School, I was appalled by former Miami Beach Mayor Dan Gelber’s completely unwarranted assertion, in his Dec. 13 op-ed, “University leaders didn’t realize no group should be targeted — not even Jews,” that the three university presidents who testified so ineffectually before Congress recently were motivated by antisemitism. Gelber makes much of his certainty that these leaders would have responded differently if the alleged advocacy of genocide had been directed to African Americans rather than Jews — an entirely hypothetical suggestion for which I know of no evidence.

These presidents weren’t asked whether advocacy of genocide is acceptable; rather, Rep. Elise Stefanik demanded that they agree that such speech amounts to prohibited “harassment.” However, it isn’t necessarily harassment, which connotes abuse targeted at particular listeners.

Hateful, offensive or menacing speech put forth on placards at a rally, or in an online manifesto, doesn’t become “harassment” when addressed to the world at large, or the word ceases to have meaning. This matters, because you can’t punish a student, or anyone else, for violating a nonexistent rule or trying to apply a rule that doesn’t fit the

behavior in question. There probably aren’t too many universities, until now, that have explicit rules against advocacy of genocide. There probably should be.

I wish those university presidents had done a better job of explaining this and making clear their denunciation of such unacceptable speech, but to publicly call them antisemitic because they failed to do so?

Gelber owes them an apology. – Marc Rohr, – professor of law emeritus, – Nova Southeastern University, – Plantation