Free speech from the other side

Ayaan Hirisi AliI feel I just lamented how Columbia handled the free speech issue when Mahmoud Ahmadinejad spoke there last week, when I read about Ayaan Hirisi Ali in today’s NY Times. She was a former member of the Dutch Parliament who left there and fled the Netherlands due to the credible death threats she received from Islamic extremists when she became critical of Islam. Hmm, this seems so unfortunate given the credibility the president of Iraq has been trying to gain by speaking at Ivy League USA about how the West has his country and people all wrong.

Granted, I do not know if their is a connection between Ayaan’s threats and Iran, but it seems to me thatĀ free speech should be done from and on both perspectives as a promotion of credibility. Then again, credibility seems somewhat subjective, doesn’t it?