I was happy to see that my Scroll post in praise of “censorship” at Hillel provoked some fierce and wholly uncensored debate; unanimous agreement would have been better, but I guess you can’t have everything. I’ll respond briefly to some of the main comments I’ve received and then go back to my actual job, which is reporting on Israel (rather than trying to make a case for why it should exist in the first place).
First, to clarify a point I didn’t make: All individuals should be welcome at Hillel, whether they privately believe in parapsychology, reincarnation, alien abduction, sexism, homophobia, or anti-Zionism. I’m not talking about admitting individuals, but about offering official sanction and funding to certain ideological positions. If we kept people with questionable views from attending Hillel dinners, the resulting coleslaw surplus would sink the US cabbage industry.