Academy Of Ideas

When University College London’s students’ union banned a Nietzsche reading group in March, on the grounds that discussions about right-wing philosophers could encourage fascism and endanger the student body, many saw it as the reductio ad absurdum of student-union bans in recent years. These have included bans on Robin Thicke’s pop hit ‘Blurred Lines’, on the grounds that it might be distressing for victims of sexual assault, as well as everything from the Sun (thanks to Page 3) to ‘offensive’ T-shirts depicting Jesus and the prophet Mohammed in cartoon form. So have British universities become bastions of politically correct censorship? Or are such restrictions - enacted by elected unions rather than the state - a welcome attempt to ensure universities are safe spaces for all students? Student politics has long involved political boycotts, going back to campus bans on Barclays Bank in the 1980s (for operating in apartheid South Africa), Nestlé products in the 1990s (for promoting baby milk in