Six “Dictator of the Week” A-boards belonging to my
group, Students Against Dictators, have been stolen from Bruin Walk
and throughout UCLA. These boards cost hundreds of dollars and took
many hours to assemble. Our posters raise awareness about the
villainous rule of dictators worldwide ““ irrespective of
race, religion or gender. Yet, sadly, there are clearly people on
this campus who support oppressive tyrants through illegal and
undemocratic actions.
What noble goals did these thugs possess in stealing our boards?
What motivated them to perpetrate that heinous crime? Freedom of
speech? Clearly not. Respect for private property? No. Freedom of
association and expression? Hardly. In fact, they stand for the
polar opposite of each and every one of these democratic American
ideals. They are attempting to stifle free speech, intimidate those
who believe in human rights, and silence their opponents.
Though some may see this incident merely as a prank, the theft
of our club’s poster boards is indicative of a far deeper
sickness that plagues the United States today ““ the failure
to act against evil. As in the past, many are willing to sit idly
by as basic human rights are categorically denied to entire
populations.
Are you not outraged, as an American, that women in Saudi Arabia
are forbidden to vote ““ let alone drive? Are you not
outraged, as an American, that tax dollars go to support a royal
family and government that does not allow freedom of religion and
will not even allow the building of churches and synagogues for our
servicemen and servicewomen who protect them?
Are you not outraged that hundreds of thousands of North Koreans
are currently imprisoned in forced labor camps? Are you not
outraged at the total lack of political and religious freedoms in
Iran? Are there really some human rights that should not be
afforded to all mankind?
Not only are the sign-vandals apparently devoid of any such
indignation toward these atrocities; their actions in fact provide
indirect support to this oppression. Undoubtedly, those who
perpetrated this crime will say, “My conscience is
clean.” As a great statesman once noted, “Everything
stays clean if one does not use it very often.”
How ironic that the censorship imposed on us by the theft of our
posters mimics the wholesale suppression of free speech, freedom of
press and the right to dissent imposed by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei
and his perverse Council of Guardians. How sad that the thugs have
given de facto support to Prince Sultan, whose funding of the
International Islamic Relief Organization, which supports al-Qaeda
and Hamas, has led to unspeakable horror and the murder of our own
citizens.
How shameful that Kim Jong II would be relieved that UCLA
students no longer see posters that identify his acquisition of
$700,000 per year of cognac while millions of his people starve to
death.
These travesties must not go unchallenged.
Part of the problem is an endemic apathy regarding the issue of
dictatorial regimes. Where are those who supposedly champion
“human rights,” “feminism,”
“religious tolerance” and the like? Why, for example,
was there not a single anti-Taliban protest pre-2001? Surely
because it is all too chic nowadays to support impoverished
populations only after the United States attacks.
Apparently, it is far more convenient to organize a protest at
the Federal Building against the U.S.-led war in Iraq than it was
to protest the systematic torture, rape and repression of Iraqis by
Saddam Hussein for over 30 years.
From Syria to Turkmenistan, autocracies and thuggish regimes
rule the day. Yet the world sits still. And, perhaps even worse,
UCLA students sit still. We all should heed the advice of the great
18th-century English philosopher Edmund Burke, who once said,
“All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to
do nothing.” Most of you are probably good people. Now go out
and do something.
I challenge the cowards who stole our boards to end their
duplicitous criminality and to debate with us in the public forum
““ for all to judge.
Keyes is executive director of Students Against Dictators.
For more information, go to www.dictatoroftheweek.com.