Is Massey backing down?

Stuff reports:

The university club that sparked a free-speech firestorm is still keen to invite the man at the centre of the controversy back. …

Society president Christian Houghton said the group was pleased to get the talks back on track. It hoped Brash could return without a repeat of last week’s controversy.

The society wants to meet with Thomas to discuss Brash’s potential return.

“We just don’t know where the vice-chancellor stands on it, since she stopped commenting publicly,” Houghton said. “We don’t want to waste his time again … if she hasn’t changed her mind.”

Massey spokesman James Gardiner said the university wouldn’t oppose Brash returning to speak on campus. “Of course we wouldn’t. It wasn’t a ban on Brash, it was a cancellation of an event because there was a perceived security threat.”

This is dissembling bullshit. If it was a security issue, then no decision would have been made until after talking to the Police. And the VC wouldn’t spend half her press release talking about how much she hates what Don Brash says and thinks it is closer to hate speech.

Gardiner said if Brash returned, and security concerns were raised again, Massey would do its best to ensure the talk went ahead, as long as police and university security  advised it was safe.

So why wasn’t this done last time? Because the VC used security as a pretext to stop Brash speaking because she didn’t like what he says.