I gather that the protesters at Ottawa U find Ann Coulter and her opinions offensive, fair enough. If you do not like what she has to say, don’t listen to her. Two weekends ago Mika and I were invited to a friend’s birthday party, held at the Shanghai restaurant on Somerset Street. We discovered during the meal that Friday nights at the Shanghai features stand up comedy. On this occasion a fundraising event was staged for some charity seeking to end violence against women. The emcee was a young man, an aspiring comic, his act needs some polishing, and the main event was an array of fat, homely women trying to be funny in telling crude jokes about men, sex organs and bodily functions. Mika and I came to the restaurant for our friend’s birthday party, so we politely declined to offer a donation to the cause, then quietly asked for our bill and took our leave of the premises. There was no need to heckle or cause a disturbance or run and file a complaint with the Ontario Human Rights Commission because we found the material offensive. We simply voted with our feet.

Had Coulter gone on with her speech at Ottawa U without the fuss that was raised, it would have gone largely unnoticed. Regardless of who called off Coulter’s lecture, she is the one who came out on top. She walked off with her speaker’s fee and expenses in her pockets and a great deal of free publicity. As for those opposed to having her on campus, protest is fine, but setting off a false fire alarm crosses a line well beyond the bounds of freedom of expression. The fire department had to respond and establish that there was no fire. What if there was really a fire somewhere else while they were tied up with this false alarm?