U at Buffalo department website condemns Michael Knowles for trans 'threats of eradication'
The University at Buffalo’s Department of Media Study has implemented a statement condemning conservative commentator Michael Knowles on its website.
The statement explains that the department stands in support of transgender-identifying individuals at the school and attempts to console members following Knowles’ speech at the college last year.
The University at Buffalo’s Department of Media Study has included a statement condemning conservative commentator Michael Knowles on its website.
The statement explains that the department stands in support of transgender-identifying individuals at the school and attempts to console members following Knowles’ speech at the college last year.
“The faculty of the Media Study department stand in solidarity with the transgender community and others who have been the target of Michael Knowles’ rhetoric and threats of eradication and genocide,” the statement declares.
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YAF’s The New Guard first reported on the statement.
The statement also says the department is open to free inquiry, but that concerns about free speech must be weighed against other considerations including “inclusiveness” and “social justice.”
“While we are committed to the free and open exchange of ideas, we are also committed to inclusiveness, social justice and respect for all,” the statement continues.
The University at Buffalo’s Department of Media Study concludes its statement by condemning what it calls “hate speech” and saying that free inquiry must be limited by a respect for “inclusion.”
“There is no space for hate speech as there can be no open exchange of ideas without inclusion, justice, and respect,” the acknowledgement statement concludes. “We view Knowles’ public appearance on our campus as contrary to the values and aims of our academic community.”
More than 600 individuals arrived intending to attend Knowles’ speech. Not all of them were able to attend the lecture due to limitations with regard to venue capacity.
Knowles’ actual words during his speech at UBuffalo critiqued “transgenderism,” calling it a dangerous ideology.
“For the good of society and especially for the good of the poor people who have fallen prey to this confusion, transgenderism must be eradicated from public life entirely, the whole preposterous ideology — at every level,” Knowles said last March.
“I am not quite sure how someone could hear those words and conclude that I was calling to murder all the transvestites,” Knowles also stated during his speech at the university. “When one calls to eradicate poverty, one is not calling to murder the poor. When one calls to eradicate cancer one is not suggesting that we ought to murder cancer patients.”
UBuffalo’s media department also has on its website a “Media Study Action Plan for Diversity” section, wherein it describes its commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) policies “in regards to race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, class, disability, resources, and other social and institutional barriers to higher education and the arts.”
Campus Reform has contacted the University at Buffalo for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
