Kenan Malik makes some valid and nuanced points about the tendency of people on both the left and the right to defend freedom of speech only for views with which they agree (“If you defend free speech, you must defend it all and not silence those you disagree with”, Comment). But he is wrong to invoke freedom of speech to defend attempts to silence certain views.
Malik describes the fact that the Oxford student union was forced to retract a public demand that “gender critical” feminist Kathleen Stock should be no-platformed as a “blatant denial of free speech”. He implies that it is hypocritical for free-speech advocates not to support the right to attempt to silence others. But this confuses the right to protest and criticise with a right to attempt to silence those with opposing views.
The philosopher Karl Popper pointed out in his “paradox of tolerance” that “if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them”. Universities must resist the onslaught of the intolerant, not least for the sake of our students, who must not be deprived of the opportunity for open discussion, which is fundamental to the value of education.
Silencing tactics directed at academics who believe that sex matters are a form of harassment can take a high personal toll. Speech that is intended to silence the legitimate speech of others has a chilling effect on research and education and is not worthy of respect in a democratic society.
Professor Alice Sullivan
London, NW1
Malik misses a crucial point. The day after his article was published, Good Morning Britain featured a panel discussion about trans people – without any trans people. While Kathleen Stock and her ilk may have plenty of options to be heard in UK mainstream media (MSM), trans people protesting against her do not. Indeed, while there are many thousands of articles about trans people in UK MSM each year, the overwhelming majority trans-hostile, trans people are allowed to publish only a tiny fraction of them.
If Malik cares so much about free speech, he should be pointing out the huge injustice of this almost hermetic exclusion. A lecture cancelled affects a few hundred people at most. The exclusion of trans people from MSM means millions don’t get to hear our voices. That is the elephant in the room; until trans people get as much media access as anti-trans activists, his concern for free speech is, by a significant order of magnitude, wholly misdirected.
Who here is not defending all free speech; who is silencing those they disagree with?
Dr Natacha Kennedy
London SE14
Malik writes: “There is an important debate about how to negotiate trans rights and women’s rights, and how best to ensure that both are respected. Shutting down one side of the debate as unacceptable will not settle the issues but merely make it more difficult to work out a fair solution.”
The crucial aspect is mutual respect. The trend of silencing, erasing, harassing and even threatening women for wanting to live in peace without men entering female public toilets must end. Giving rights to one group of people should never be at the expense of someone else’s right and sense of safety. That said, the debate should never be shut down because then we never learn or develop. Freedom of speech is the cornerstone of democracy and one of the most vital liberties. It’s too valuable to throw away.
Sanda Ivezic
Nykøbing Falster, Denmark
More to a wage than money
No working definition of a “living” wage can be rationally expressed in terms of an hourly “minimum” (“The UK’s world-beating minimum wage is not as good as it seems”, Comment). For a wage to be agreed to meet the costs of living, it must be expressed as a guaranteed annual income, taking into account reasonable conditions, including such rights as working hours and holidays.
Austen Lynch
Garstang, Lancashire
Can Ukraine win?
Simon Tisdall overlooks the elephant in the room: there is no conceivable amount of aid that we can send to Ukraine that will win this war for them; all we can do is stop them from losing (“The moment has arrived: Biden must give Ukraine all it needs to win”, World Affairs Commentary).
There are only two ways for Ukraine to win. The first is for Vladimir Putin to lose power somehow, and to hope his successor will be more moderate towards Ukraine. The other is to wholeheartedly embrace Ukraine as part of Nato and join in the offensive (had we done this before the war, Russia would not have dared to attack). But the west has become too fat and lazy to fight a war of principle like that.
Simon Prutton
Winchester
Bamboozled on arrival
How right Rowan Moore is to draw attention to “the bamboozling of new arrivals [to Gatwick] by the range of options offered by [rail] ticket machines” (Notebook, Comment) But it begins in mid-air, when airlines offer tickets for the Gatwick Express without properly warning passengers that they are much more expensive than a Southern Trains ticket and the train is non-stop to Victoria.
How many then board a Southern train, not understanding the difference and also because they can alight at East Croydon or Clapham Junction, only to find the Gatwick Express ticket is not valid? A great welcome to Britain, especially if they have just spent an hour getting through passport control.
Andrew Hillier
London SW4
The killing fields
Henry Porter’s assertion in his brilliant but sadly depressing article that “the vanishing swifts from the sky above my shed are a sad omen” is indeed true (Comment). What is equally sad is that few people are taking the fact of the disappearance of much of our insect and wildlife seriously.
Locally, Labour councillors insist on building housing developments on the very fields from where they are disappearing. In articles and letters, people want developers and government to build on the green belt. However, this is an ecological emergency and there are alternatives: brownfield sites, empty houses and it is possible to build low-rise in the cities and towns. But no one is interested, least of all the Labour party, which is far more conservative on the issue than Michael Gove.
Stephen Dorril
Netherthong, West Yorkshire
Golden oldies
Ian Dowding complains about “new words” in the Observer Magazine (Letters). There’s nothing new about scramblies in our family; scrambly-wamblies was a favourite of my children 40 years ago. By the same rules, other “new” words could be dee-doh (cheese on toast) and rangs and tangs (meringues).
Susan Treagus
Manchester