[M]iddlebury College officials canceled a controversial event featuring a conservative Polish politician and academic Wednesday, citing security and safety concerns.
The incident is the latest to divide the campus between those who argue for the right of controversial figures to speak, and those who say such events give a platform to people who hold racist, sexist or other harmful points of view.
The planned lecture by Ryszard Legutko, a Polish academic and member of European Parliament, had stirred opposition on campus, with a contingent of students planning to protest the event because of his positions against homosexuality and immigration.
But many on campus were disappointed when the college administration abruptly decided to call off the event, criticizing officials for failing to take into consideration perspectives of others in the community, and for how they handled the announcement.
The controversy comes two years after protesters interrupted an appearance by political scientist and author Charles Murray in an incident that attracted national attention. A professor was injured in the demonstrations following the event.
The administration called off the event in an email sent early Wednesday afternoon, about three hours before Legutko was scheduled to take the podium.
“We cancelled the event because we did not believe we could respond effectively to potential security and safety risks given the large number of people planning to attend the two events — the lecture and the event the students had planned in response,” college spokesperson Sarah Ray said in an email Thursday.
The number of people who wanted to be at the event “escalated rapidly” in the lead-up to when it was set to begin, she said. The college initially planned to move both the lecture and the demonstration to a different location, but, she said, between the number of people as well as “heightened tensions on campus” the college did not have capacity to ensure security.
Legutko was invited to campus by the Alexander Hamilton Forum, which puts on a public lecture series. The forum has already invited Legutko back to campus to speak next fall, according to the college.
Cora Kircher, a junior who was involved in planning the protests against Legutko’s lecture, said demonstrators, raising objection to his “homophobic” positions, were looking to “critique the school’s continuous legitimization of really, really harmful speakers to a high academic platform,” but did not plan to interrupt the event.
“We never had any intention to prevent him from speaking,” Kircher said.
The group was preparing to hand out flyers with information on Legutko’s stance on homosexuality, immigration and other issues before the lecture. Then they planned to go to a nearby area to hold what she described as a mix between a “pride event” and a “healing space,” with music and rainbow clothing.
Kircher also criticized the school’s handling of the cancelation. It wasn’t clear from the announcement whether it was called off because of security threats posed by protesters, to protesters, or otherwise, she said, mentioning that comments threatening demonstrators had been overheard on campus.
“That failure to specify it is a huge failure on the part of the administration,” she said.
Though Legutko’s public lecture was called off, he did end up speaking on campus Wednesday in an impromptu appearance before a political science class.
Professor Matt Dickinson was just entering his political science classroom when he got word that the lecture had been called off. Dickinson didn’t have any prior connections to the event, but one of his students did, and when the opportunity to have Legutko in to speak came up, Dickinson put it up for a vote. If, in a secret ballot, the class unanimously voted to invite Legutko in, they would, Dickinson said.
All nine students voted “yes” and an hour later, Legutko gave an abbreviated version of his lecture and answered questions. A few dozen additional people filtered in for the event, part of which was live-streamed by the college newspaper, the Middlebury Campus.
The Murray event two years ago, Dickinson said, prompted some concerns about the susceptibility of the college to the “hecklers’ veto”— that if someone doesn’t want a speaker to appear, they could threaten security. While Dickinson wasn’t clear on the details of why Legutko’s public lecture was canceled, he said it raises questions.
“I do wish that he was able to speak and that students were able to protest, and I do worry that security concerns can become a pretext for shutting down controversial speakers,” Dickinson said.
Owen Marsh, a junior and a student in Dickinson’s class, had been planning to attend Legutko’s lecture and was disappointed when college officials decided to cancel it.
“I really felt like they didn’t have input from the students from the poli sci department or the Hamilton Forum or anything like that,” he said.
In his talk to Dickinson’s class, Legutko offered a critique of liberal ideas that Marsh said is uncommon in the United States, and, though he didn’t necessarily agree with the Polish academic, he welcomed the opportunity to engage with a different point of view. In the subsequent question-and-answer session, students pressed Legutko on his ideas, including his controversial stance on homosexuality.
Marsh was in the auditorium when Murray’s speech was interrupted two years ago.
“I personally feel like the college administration missed an opportunity to kind of move on from the Charles Murray incident and show that the college, you know, had this platform for an open exchange of ideas and was able to debate perspectives that they generally disagree with,” Marsh said.
Legutko’s appearance in the classroom irked some on campus, including protesters. Kircher, who had planned to protest the lecture, said it was upsetting that he spoke to the class, without the apparent knowledge of the administration. She’s also concerned that Legutko is invited back.
“The school can emphasize like the rhetoric of the robust public sphere as much as it wants, but until it starts hearing the voices of marginalized students who are being hurt by this type of thing that’s all empty, empty rhetoric,” Kircher said.
Legutko did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday afternoon.
