EDITORIAL:

When the Muslim Student Union invited controversial Imam Muhammad al-Asi to the UC Irvine campus for its annual week of seminars on Islam, was the organization trying to educate the community or provoke a fight?

That’s an interesting question, but when it comes to determining whether the union has the 1st Amendment right to invite the imam, that’s not something that’s debatable in our view.

We believe the Muslim Student Union absolutely has that right, and we should all do everything we can to protect that freedom.

This Memorial Day, we will reflect on the sacrifices of so many who fought for the principle of free speech. We can never show enough gratitude for those sacrifices. And though it galls most of us that those ultimate sacrifices allow for the rantings of extremists, we can never forget that our Founding Fathers wisely wanted it this way.

Just, for a moment, consider the alternative. Once you shut off objectionable speech it sets off a gathering storm of censorship that threatens to silence all freedoms. And we applaud UC Irvine officials for walking that fine line to allow for free speech and provocative debate on the campus.

We’re mindful of Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes’ admonishment that the 1st Amendment does not allow for someone to yell fire in a crowded theater. “It is a question of proximity and degree,” he said of free speech.

But as disgusting as it is for someone like al-Asi to recklessly question if the government had advance notice of the Sept. 11 attacks, he has the right to spin any conspiracy theories he wants. And we ought to be grateful that he has that right.

As Salman Rushdie once said, “Free speech is the whole thing, the whole ball game. Free speech is life itself.”