Wasn’t last week crazy?

Monday it was all about Guillermo Gonzalez and intelligent design; by Friday the discussion was somehow about the Holocaust. The Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Allies Alliance held its Awareness Week. It began with sidewalk chalk controversy and by Wednesday they were sharing the Free Speech Zone with fundamentalist Christians, Missionaries to the Pre-born. Oh, and Tuesday the latest “final showdown” in the Democratic nomination process, the Pennsylvania primary, managed to settle nothing.

That’s a lot to talk about, but let’s stick to campus. First, who knew Ben Stein was such a partisan for ID? Once upon a time he wrote speeches for Nixon, but these days I thought the only thing he was passionate about was reducing eye irritation and redness.

I gave my two bits on this issue last week, so I’ll just reaffirm my point by saying that the Holocaust – inspired by social Darwinist philosophy or not – has absolutely nothing to do with whether ID makes sense as a theory.

LGBT Awareness Week, on the other hand, invited us to take up a much more interesting and important discussion – how we relate to people who challenge traditional definitions of gender and attraction. As with attitudes toward most minority groups, our actions often don’t match well with our stated opinions. If we don’t listen to what these individuals have to say, we will continue giving our worst offense when we do or say things we haven’t asked enough questions to know are inappropriate.

Certainly someone knew they were being offensive when they decided to erase a message written in sidewalk chalk right in front of Maple Hall. I’m glad to hear this person has come forward and met with representatives of the LGBTAA, but I am still baffled at his original intent.

Whatever happened to the “sticks and stones” rule of freedom of expression? Some words do hurt, but “lesbian” and “bisexual” – especially in this context – aren’t among them. Such an impotent act reminds me of high school when I would rip “Go Hawks!” posters off athletes’ lockers. Even I knew the act was petty; the only end was to stir up some kind of drama or resentment.

Speaking of terrible ways to make a point, how about those Missionaries to the Pre-Born? They get points for keeping the volume down. At least while I was by the library they chose to hold up their posters – the approximate size of the average doorway – and speak in modest tones to anyone who came near.

Still, I can’t fathom how coming to our campus with their giant images of aborted fetuses and marching around their children was supposed to be an effective argument. Graphic displays are a good way of exposing a problem people may not be aware of, but people who support abortion rights don’t do so because they think it is clean or morally inviolate.

It’s important and grounding to hear other opinions on issues like abortion, but, as in any discussion, rules must apply. Maybe I’m just cynical, but it felt to me like one of those posters was drifting ever so slowly closer to the opposite corner of the grass, the area where members of the LGBTAA were practicing their own free speech rights. They were at least close enough that when I arrived on the scene I thought the people listening in to the LGBTAA were either with, or had stopped to listen to, the people with the giant posters.

Not to create conflict where none exists, everyone kept their cool. Observing the tense, but respectful, interaction might have been the most influential message of the entire day to me. It demonstrated a quality I hope everyone exercised at least to some extent last week – not freedom of speech, but freedom to listen.

Opposing points of view aren’t always easy to cope with. Often the wise choice is to avoid the agitation, refuse to pay attention, or avoid hearing it altogether, but we don’t become any wiser for it. Last week showed us how vibrant a place our campus can be for the exchange of ideas. Let’s not be a vibrant campus with our fingers in our ears.

– Kevin Stillman is a senior in journalism and mass communication from Emmetsburg.