James O'Brien brands caller "cleverer than me" after free speech observation
6 March 2020, 15:10 | Updated: 6 March 2020, 15:28
James O'Brien dubbed this caller cleverer than him after he made an insightful observation about the fate of free speech after Amber Rudd was disallowed to speak at Oxford University.
Former Home Secretary Amber Rudd has hit out at Oxford University students who cancelled her talk 30 minutes before she was meant to speak at an event marking International Women's Day.
The caller Sam said he was "pretty annoyed" at the "de-platforming" of Ms Rudd because "when you ban someone like Amber Rudd coming who is a legitimate politician, what you do is close the opportunity really...to disinvite people who shouldn't be given a platform."
He said that people who shouldn't be given a platform will now be emboldened by her being banned.
Badly judged & rude of some students last night at Oxford to decide to “no platform” me 30 mins before an event I had been invited to for #IWD2020 to encourage young women into politics. They should stop hiding and start engaging. #FreeSpeech
— Amber Rudd (@AmberRuddUK) March 6, 2020
"[The media] are going to make it a free speech issue. Trump's now signed a bill in universities in America that you have to let people speak."
James understood, "By banning her you give ammunition to the liars and the racists and they'll use that ammunition to give liars and racists the platform to speak."
Sam agreed that prejudiced people, like Katie Hopkins, "will be all over this."
"So they use Amber Rudd being disinvited from a party to argue that Eugène Terre'Blanche should be given a professorship," James said, and made the exception to give this caller a round of applause outside of Mystery Hour.
