After disturbing students with a Hitler impersonation, an art historian was barred from speaking at a Cambridge University debate society.
After Andrew Graham-Dixon spoke at the event, Cambridge Union president Keir Bradwell issued a new blacklist. Mr Graham-Dixon apologized for upsetting and stated that he was attempting to “underline the totally terrible nature of Hitler.”
Mr Bradwell, who immediately apologized to members after making a joke about the speech, has since apologized. He admitted to being “very intoxicated” while presiding over the argument. He later admitted that he drank two glasses of wine with dinner but that he was “unaffected in my capacity to chair the debate.” He did, however, say that not stopping the parody was “inexcusable.”
On November 4, the group, which works to encourage free expression through conversation, held a debate on the concept of good taste.
Mr Graham-Dixon angered members, according to Mr Bradwell, in a letter released on Facebook, when he used Hitler’s “deplorable” remarks on Jews and black people in his address.
“In my lecture, I caricatured him (Hitler), briefly, echoing HIS crude and insensitive views about art and race,” Mr Graham-Dixon said in a statement.
He stated that his goal was not to offend the audience, but rather to persuade them that “poor taste and bad morality frequently go hand-in-hand.”
According to the art historian, Hitler sponsored a major art exhibition during the Third Reich “as propaganda for his poisonous ideals.”
“I apologise sincerely to anyone who found my debating tactics and use of Hitler’s own language distressing; on reflection I can see that some of the words I used, even in quotation, are inherently offensive,” he said.
Mr Bradwell could not say how many complaints the union had received, but said: “By a long shot, that was the most in my tenure in Cambridge.”
He claimed that the union would now “institutionalize solid concepts of racism,” such as anti-black racism and anti-Semitism.
“We will create a blacklist of speakers never to be invited back, and we will share it with other unions too. Andrew will be on that list,” Mr Bradwell wrote to members.
