A good example of how arrogance + emotions can override any amount of intellience.

SLC - How can violent protest aimed at preventing individuals speaking be described as "proving their poit in a democratic way"? Where was the democracy? I must have missed the vote! If the tables were reversed and BNP protests stopped a debate on immigration would that be democratic? Who decides who should speak and who should not? What criteria will they use? The situation can be simply summarised as a group of yobs deciding that they were going to physically stop someone they don't like. I don't think anyone will like where that model would take us. Or do these arrogant students believe they have a monopoly on knowledge of what is "right".

Noah, Knutsford, UK

ALL the news articles missed the content of the debate and rather concentrated on its controversial speakers, which led to opinionated reviews and the inevitable spin. The press has totally missed the point of the debate. What were the arguments and how were they put forward - How else can we comment when the actual debate was not reported or televised? The press is not well balanced on this occassion - I will admit that even bad politicians can make good arguments on occasions - leave us to decide what we think on the matter, rather than telling us what we should think and feel! Stop trying to contol the readership.

B Taylor, Leeds, UK

There are still people around today who have directly suffered the ignominy of the Holocaust and survived when others didn't. They have a story to tell, and no matter how many times David Irving gets up on the platform in the Oxford Union to deny the Holocaust never happened, they, while they are alive, can be listened to. Their story tells of the depths of depravity that human morality can sink to. And if Nick Griffin has a problem with the number of Asian people who have settled in this country, then ask him what the British were doing in Amritsar in 1919.

Both of them can be defeated by argument, and as part of a free democracy (denied to a lot of people in pre-war Germany), they should be allowed to make their point. As should Abu Hamza, whose venom about the very people he lived amongst could be experienced for all to hear. His vision of how Britain should be governed would have no place for the Oxford Union debating society. Love them even as they revile you, as Jesus said.

Bob Ericson, Tewkesbury Glos,

I thoroughly disapprove of the views of the BNP, and believe Irving to be the most self-deluded historian in the world. However, the tactics of the anti-fascists were counter-productive last night.

Having seen the protests first hand, I can safely say that most of the trouble the police had to deal with originated from the far-left, not the far-right. Had the demonstration been peaceful, it would have served the anti-facists' interests much better.

Furthermore the protestors might also have then been able to then hear the jeers and laughter from inside the chamber as Griffin's policies were revealed as ridiculous and utterly abhorrent.

Free speech and public ridicule are always the best ways to deal with these types of minority views.

Tim Boothman, Oxford, UK

It's worth noting that while Tyrl wanted the publicity this stunt got him he was too scared of the consequences to stage it until the last opportunity to remove him from office by a motion on the floor of the union had passed.

His term as president ends on Saturday.

David Simpson, Heckmondwike,

The scum outside the debate were a very good argument for voting BNP and studying carefully the history revealed by David Irving. If the degenerate mobs outside the event are against Messrs Griffin and Irving then there must be some good in them. I am sure that they are grateful for the publicity.

W.S.D.Barnes, Guildford, Surrey

One despairs of Trevor Phillips, genuine issues are facing the black community, family break down, gang culture, nil asperations, yet all the CRE has done under his leadership is hunt down the merest whiff of racisim , institutional or otherwise, intended or not and beat people over the head with it. Stiffling debate in this way, does nothing for the cause of miniorites he seeks to protect, it merely drives racisim underground, and breeds more resentment among the indeginous population. Phillips is famous for stating the obvious "Britain is sleepwalking towards segregation" and then having no solutions to offer.

Uche George, London, England

What good is the right to speek if you don't have the right to act according to what you preach.

Igor, Ljubljana, Slovenia

Is their not an analogy with the Iranian Presidents visit to the US recently ?- similar howls of protest - but the ability to hear him say his stuff and for him to be laughed at ("no gays in Iran" etc) was surely a better demonstartion of the ultimate power of democracy and free speech.

Allowing a single group to dictate what is or is not said in public is not the way forward.

mark, houston, texas

The "Oxygen of Publicity" was not provided by the Oxford Union but by the fascists who refused these men the right to free speech.

I find it rather strange that fascists are described in some of the posts here as anti-fascists. Who are the ones with the jack boots preventing free speech. Any right of free speech is not there to publicise views one agrees with, but those views that are unpopular.

While Griffin and Irvine have odious views the publicity provided by these thugs is the only thing keeping them in the public eye.

Brian Vallance, Corfu, Greece

Was the purpose of the debate to change the minds of Griffin and Irving or to allow students to make educated decisions? Like it or not the BNP is a political party and people should be able to decide for themselves whether or not they agree with their policies.
I don't see how this event in any way legitmised the beliefs of these men. Will they be able to look back and say, 'When I spoke at the Union...' when everyone knows they men 'When I was howled down at the Union...'
Also, following Allan's comment...what did they actually say? The debate wasn't, after all, on their policies - it was on free speech.
It appears that the subject of the debate is whether they should be allowed to debate.

Meg, Pembs,

Yes I too noticed the heavily biased comments in the opening paragraphs which ruined the credibility of the writers views in the rest of the article.

George, Glasgow, UK

I was a student in early '60s London and joined Amnesty a few months after it started.
I thought then, and still do, that freedom of expression is everyone's right.
Equally, no-one has a right not to be offended by the opinions of others.
I can't accept reasoning that declares : "Your views are highly offensive so you must be made to shut up. If you don't, it'll make me so angry that I'll get very nasty - and it'll all be your fault".
That's the attitude of people who believe the world should conform to their view of it, who throw the toys out of the pram on discovering it doesn't.
It's one step away from self-righteous censorship and only two steps away from the thought-police.
Libby Purves is dead right ; argument beats banning.

Mike, Cardiff, U.K.

Yes, Libby, these fanatics should be allowed to have their say; as should the protestors. But when anyone starts throwing stones, or even blocking access to a public meeting, and should be firmly dealt with for breaking the law of this land. It gives them the freedom to express their opinions, as well as those of the people they are protesting against. Neither they, nor the object of their very distasteful hate, are given license to defy the law. StevieB

S. Barraclough, Huddersfield, W. Yorkshire

The news included two stories on freedom of expression yesterday. In one a backward (sorry: Developing) African nation jails an English teacher for letting her class call a bear Mohammed.

In the other the (supposed) intellectual elite of this country hide their faces in balaclavas and riot - to prevent two men from expressing their opinions.

As examiners used to ask: "Compare and contrast these two approaches to free speach"!

Mike Bibby, St Albans, England -not EU

If these so-called "anti-fascist" students are supposedly the cream of the intellectual crop in this country, we really are in trouble. Chanting "Kill Tryl" (the debating society's pro free speech co-ordinator) and physically attacking people who had merely turned up to listen to arguments they would probably have rejected, marks these spoilt contrarian juveniles as the nascent Brown Shirts they really are. Their hysterical bullying has had the unfortunate effect of making the loathsome Nick Griffin and David Irving look quite civilized in comparison.

Diesel Balaam, London, UK

I was a student in early '60s London and joined Amnesty a few months after it started.
I thought then, still do, that everyone has a right to freedom of expression. Around the world brave people suffer in pursuit of that right.
Equally, none of us has a right not to be offended by the opinions of others.
I deplore the reasoning that implies : "Your views are highly offensive to me and others so you must be made to shut up. If you don't, you'll make me and others so angry that we'll get very nasty - and it'll all be your fault, fascist! "
That's the attitude of people who believe the world should conform to their view of it, who throw the toys out of the pram on discovering that it doesn't ; noisy name-callers.
They're one step from being censors and only two steps from being thought-police.
And let's face it, trying to stop slippery Griffin and discredited Irvine from speaking in Oxford doesn't take much courage.
Libby Purves is dead right ; argument beats banning.

Mike, Cardiff, U.K.

The Nazi party was allowed to take power in Germany because the Weimar government backed freedom of speech and a voice for all. I am not suggesting it is a bad thing, but we need this debate.

Ben, York,

The sordid truth is that liberals are the most intolerant clan. There posturing is not so much based on improvement as a wilful display of power. As long as there is a practice they will provide a challenge and the more their terms are complied with the more adventurous they will get. The willingness of these people to take a stance on the basis of apocryphal insinuation, supposition and tales from the woods is so damning, where is the empathy? The Lady Chatterley's Lover trial was astonishing in that, under the banner of liberal contentions, everyone was acquainted with the unexpurgated liaison between two people, since we have been introduced to Romans in Britain, nude Mozart and soft porn in main stream television, a superfluity of sexual innuendo and nudge-nudge that boarders on the yawningly inane. The Oxford debate is in the same context and I feel sure is only opposed by those who have their fingers firmly wedged into their ears, bigots who need a mantra and not the truth.

Malcolm Turner, Alsager, England

There is a distinction between unsavoury political views and straitforward lying, such as Holocaust denial. The former have a role to play and need debating. Denial however cannot be reasoned with. Irving and Griffin ignore reams of historical evidence and will like all deniers will never give ground. I've experience the same in numerous climate change deniers. That is why Oxford shouldn't have invited them - they are the precise opposite of scholardom.

Ironically, the debate that has happened outside the chamber is much more interesting than the one that was to happen inside it!

Dr Richard Milne, Edinburgh,

Glyn Payne

Can you not see the contradiction in what you say? You're attempting to create the idea that disapproval of the Irving/Griffin participation is all about them being poor contributors to a debate about free speech. Would you have shown the same level of disapproval had a couple of uncontroversial, airhead celebrities been invited instead? What is the real subject of your disapproval? The intellectual quality of the participants, or the content of their opinions?

You portray the invitation as a stunt; why do you do this? Both Irving and Griffin have considerable personal experience of being denied free speech. What is it that causes you to assert that they may make little useful contribution to the debate? The fact that they have only minimal experience, or, more tellingly, that they may put forward arguments that you find difficult to refute.

What's the debate supposed to be about? Progress towards correctness, or just meek affirmation of contemporary orthodoxy?

Simon Stephenson, Windermere, UK

Yes,Irvine and Griffin should be allowed to speak,freedom of speech is for all no matter how abhorrent their views.
What would have been more useful was these two, with their
barmy and antique ideas ,debating in silence in a near empty chamber.That would have been worth arranging.
The young people of the university are allowed some exitement and drama and the young are given to such displays but some of the more mature people attending the "protest "seem to have views that are as unattractive as the speakers and illustrated behavior that is the hallmark of both Griffinn's supporters and Irvine's heros.

robert everitt, wolverhampton,

Thomas Goodey is talking nonsense. David Irving is a proven falsifier and distorter of history, a man who has wilfully manipulated the historical record to promote his own racist agenda. He may possess considerable knowledge of the Third Reich but it is his absurd, ignorant and offensive conclusions that rightly discredit him.

Jeremy Havardi, London, UK

So the anti-fascists by their unlawful forms of protest should determine what others may or may not discuss. So only they know what is right. No doubt they have an Orwellian Newspeak definition of Free Speech. Who gave them their mandate to be arbiters of what it is right to believe and think? This smacks of totalitarianism and is an affront to democracy by those allegedly possessed of above-average intelligence.

wilson, London, UK

Free speech means free speech. That means that you have to defend the right of people to say what they like, even if you disagree with them, and even if they spout views that make you very angry. For me that includes Muslim hate-preachers, the likes of Gerry Adams and hectoring Blair babes like Harridan Harman.
I have no time for the leftist view that you can have your opinion provided you agree with the speaker. Therein lies the way to Stalinism and Maoism: compute the human misery they caused and the likes of Nick Griffin and David Irving suddenly seem insignificant, because, you see, we don't really take them seriously.

Dave, slough,

I have to agree with Ray, of Dartmouth. I am an alumna of the university, and was out in the streets of Oxford last night (trying to get to a comedy gig which was impeded by police barricades for the protestors, incidentally!), and saw that, although there were students among the protesting group, around half were not Oxford students, but local people and activists mixed with some trouble makers.

In the spirit of freedom of speech, I think the protestors ought to have been allowed to demonstrate, but behind a cordon that allowed those who wished to hear the arguments and present their opinions in free debate - I think perhaps the police had assumed that it would be a polite student protest, the like of which occured in Oxford around the introduction of tuition fees, which most certainly was not. They did their best after the fact, but there ought to have been more planning for security,

Finally, I should say I agree with Ms Purves. Free speech for all, or none

Hannah, Oxford,

I have to agree with Ray, of Dartmouth. I am an alumna of the university, and was out in the streets of Oxford last night (trying to get to a comedy gig which was impeded by police barricades for the protestors, incidentally!), and saw that, although there were students among the protesting group, around half were not Oxford students, but local people and activists mixed with some trouble makers.

In the spirit of freedom of speech, I think the protestors ought to have been allowed to demonstrate, but behind a cordon that allowed those who wished to hear the arguments and present their opinions in free debate - I think perhaps the police had assumed that it would be a polite student protest, the like of which occured in Oxford around the introduction of tuition fees, which most certainly was not. They did their best after the fact, but there ought to have been more planning for security,

Finally, I should say I agree with Ms Purves. Free speech for all, or none!

Hannah, Oxford,

None of the reportage of this story actually tells us what was debated. How can I form an opinion about the appropriateness of the guests when I don't know what they were actually talking about? Surely we wouldn't exclude someone from a debate on one topic, on the basis of opinions that they might or might not hold on a completely different topic?

John Woods, Birmingham, UK

Libby, you seem to suggest that Jean Marie Le Pen's appearance at the Cambridge Union was cancelled - in fact the opposite was the case. The whole event, despite more violent protests than seen last night featuring a number of arrests, went ahead successfully as planned and without half the furore seen in the media. Just further testament to Cambridge's superiority over the Other Place.

Joshua, Cambridge,

The right to speak is accompanied by the right not to listen.

John Bowman, Sarlat, France

Note the heavily-biased introduction to Nick Griffin and David Irving in the Purvis article, with all the obligatory left-wing labels. The real intelligentsia know that those opposed to free speech have every reason to believe they will lose the argument.. .

F Kimbal Johnson, Louth,Lincs, uk

Exactly so Glyn Payne. The empty heads at Oxford knew the furore this would cause giving the obnoxious Griffin and Irving the oxygen of publicity in their internationally well respected society. We all know what they stand for they have their free speech-now cut off their oxygen.

Ripsnorter, Almeria, Spain

The problem with the proposed debate is this; It legitimises the views of Griffin and Irving. In other words, you may disagree with Irving et al but their viewpoints are worthy of serious consideration, of scholastic thought.

The distance between a categoric denial of Irving et al's viewpoints, on the one hand, and a full and very public debate about them is large. The distance between that point of legitimacy and the rewriting of history isn't so large

Donald, London, UK

So the anti-fascists by their unlawful forms of protest should determine what others may or may not discuss. So only they know what is right. No doubt they have an Orwellian Newspeak definition of Free Speech. Who gave them their mandate to be arbiters of what it is right to believe and think? This smacks of totalitarianism and is an affront to democracy by those allegedly possessed of above-average intelligence.

wilson, London, UK

This wasn't a debate about free speech, it was a freak show, and the president of the Union knew it. There are plenty of other speakers you could get in to have a serious debate - to go ahead with this was juvenile in the extreme. However, I suppose students will be students.

Also - SLC, Hants, this wasn't the student union, this was the Oxford Union. The Oxford University Student Union is a different body altogether and wouldn't have dreamed of engaging in a childish prank like this.

Octavia, Oxford,

In a country which has allowed terrorist preachers to hold meetings in the street,it seems a little OT to stop a political party from voicing its opinion in a closed debate.

Free speech? That seems, now,to be for only those and such as those,and definitely not for everyone.

Disgusted Dorothy, Glasgow, Scotland

And in all the hoohah WHAT the speakers said has been totally overlooked.

Allan, Cowling, England

I am a well educated individual who doesn't need Trevor Philips or anyone else to decide, or even advise, on whose views I should listen to. I am suspicious of his motives in proferring his opinion.
Margaret Thatcher denied leaders of the Irish Republican Movement their right to be heard by having actors speak their words on TV and radio news. These same individuals are now, rightly, members of the Northern Ireland government.

Malcolm Williamson, Welwyn Garden City, UK

Back in the 60s & 70s, a lot of the so called students were actually just yobs looking for a punch up. The media is making the same mistake today - despite relatively huge numbers of "students", I suspect most of this mob comprised yobs.

Ray, Dartmouth,

It's ridiculous, almost libelous, for you to refer to David Irving as a "historian" in quotation marks. He's a historian - and is probably the most knowledgeable person about the history and personalities of the Third German Reich on the planet today. He has read and digested many tens of thousands of pages of original documents all over Europe and Russia. His opinions cannot be merely dismissed as ignorant or self-serving.

Moreover, he has demonstrated his committment to the future and to modern electronic practice by putting ALL his writings on the subject onto the internet, free of charge. Can any other modern historians boast the same?

Thomas Goodey, Cuxton-upon-Medway, UK

So the anti-fascists by their unlawful forms of protest should determine what others may or may not discuss. So only they know what is right. Who gave them their mandate to be arbiters of what it is right to believe and think? This smacks of totalitarianism and is an affront to democracy by those allegedly possessed of above-average intelligence.

wilson, London, UK

So the anti-fascists by their unlawful forms of protest should determine what others may or may not discuss. So only they know what is right. Who gave them their mandate to be arbiters of what it is right to believe and think? This smacks of totalitarianism and is an affront to democracy by those allegedly possessed of above-average intelligence.

wilson, London, UK

The right will recall the events of tonight as an example of leftwing democracy for decades to come. Tonight the morality of the left dipped into the red.

Al, Oxford, UK

I believe more is to be gained by allowing the rights of objective speech whatever the viewpoints held than to ban people .

Rational dialogue can and should be mutually beneficial.

Whatever gets banned goes underground .

D MCMgregor, Tunbridge Wells, Kent

A lot of commentators seem to be missing the point of the protests. It's not about stopping Griffins' free speech but rather about condemning the Oxford Union for inviting them in the first place. Free speech is a worthy subject to debate and there are plenty of interesting and learned people from all sides of the argument that could contribute far more than Griffin or Irving. It all seems more of a childish shock tactic rather than an attempt to foster serious debate.
Also, those that suggest the best way to fight racism and anti-semitism is in debate are forgetting that nothing is going to change the views of Griffin or Irving (witness the thorough demolition the latter had of his position in the Lipstadt judgement). Whether or not the fine minds of the Oxford Union can "defeat" them in debate is immaterial as it's only a few of the privelleged elite that will see it! The real message has already gone out providing Griffin and Irving with a legitimacy they've never before had.

Glyn Payne, Witney, Oxon

Hear hear Libby Purves, Taj Hargey and his fellow-protestors and all others who realize that stifling debate, no matter how deeply noxious the debaters and their political beliefs, simply elevates them to a profoundly undeserved level of martyrdom - we must let them debate and show up the true idiocy of their hateful ideologies, exposing them as the vile bigots they truly are. "Either there is free speech for everyone or there is free speech for no-one." Exactly.

Ruth (expat), Salwa, Kuwait

Whether the protesters are right or wrong ,doesn't it warm the cockles of ones heart to hear them stand up for something they believe in. People are quick to condemn modern youth for having no conviction or being apathetic. The bulk of the student body do not belong to the student union, so they are the majority. I think they have proved their point in a democratic way.

SLC, Hants, U.K