The main problem with bringing speakers like Ann Coulter or Michael Moore or other inflammatory, often offensive speakers to campus is not so much what they say as it is our response to them. We are a country that is far too willing to demonize the other side as "hateful" or "intolerant" or "ignorant" or "closed-minded" when, in fact, we ourselves are embodying all of these traits while hurling them at others. We are playing into these divisive pundits' hands by allowing them to simplify us into two distinct, separate, irreconcilable groups.

Take, for example, the belief often held by left-leaning people that only liberals care about human rights. Amnesty International, for example, holds a large conservative and pro-life Catholic population that works diligently and tirelessly to defend oppressed people all over the world.

Or look at the oft-held conservative belief that liberals don't give a damn about our country, and then watch my mother, a left-leaning political activist, tear up every time the national anthem is played.

What this campus needs to realize is that we can't be so simply divided along party lines and that there is a difference between shouting at each other and meaningful dialogue. So campus liberals, listen to Coulter and then respectfully disagree, and campus conservatives, be very careful when you hear Coulter or any other pundit telling you the other side is evil, ignorant or idiotic. We're more alike than we think.

Matt Hershberger

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