Earlier this month I returned my degree to Oxford University. This was in protest at the failure of my old college – Exeter – to adequately address the widespread offence caused by them hiring out the college to a fundamentalist Christian group. The college authorities fail to grasp that the defence of the rights of all students requires affirmative action, not mere lip service to past achievements. Exeter's refusal to either cancel the booking or to apologise for it has provoked widespread condemnation, both within the University and the national press.If I was Amherst I would have never have given that Oxford degree back, whether symbolic or not it does look good on your CV in the current job market, I wonder if he'll be consistent and take it off his CV? He claims that Exeter College fails to defend the rights of all students, however what about the rights of those students who disagree with his views on this specific subject and their right to hear a view that he doesn't hold. Does he expect a written apology every-time a group uses Oxford's premises that he disagrees with? Although he's right that Exeter's refusal to cancel the event did make it into the press but going by the comments there were many people that disagreed with Amherst's conclusions and claims.
I did wonder why Amherst felt the need to refer to Christian Concern as a fundamentalist Christian group, yes historically as a protestant group the term is correct, however the modern usage as intended here is one that strikes fear into peoples hearts, as if Christian Concern are going to steal your children and plant bombs. Needless to say they are not, Jesus taught his followers to love and treat with respect those who disagree with them (Matthew 5:44).
Is it okay just to add 'fundamentalist' to the end of a groups name in an attempt to bypass any rational discussion? If it is then I suppose it would be accurate to describe Amherst as belonging to a radical leftist fundamentalist group who seeks to ban any group that deviates from his strict ideological view of the world. However by doing so I'm saying to people that he's a 'fundamentalist' he isn't worth engaging with because he's either stupid, fanatical, irrational or a combination. I'm not saying he's any of those things, after-all he seems articulate and passionate about what he believes to be the right thing. Sadly though that's how the term is understood today and using it isn't a substitute for an argument.
