This piece was featured in the Columbia Spectator on Tuesday, September 20, 2011.  It was written by the Columbia Spectator Editorial Board (Samuel E. Roth recused himself from the writing of this editorial because he previously served on CIRCA’s executive board).  It was not written by a LionPAC member.

Columbia International Relations Council and Association’s plan to dine with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad this Wednesday has raised a few eyebrows on campus and in national and international media. Given the implications of dining with a man accused of gross human rights violations, political repression, and hostility toward the United States, we urge CIRCA to reconsider its decision to participate.

Numerous media outlets­—American and Iranian alike—have inaccurately equated CIRCA’s acceptance of the invitation as from the University as a whole. National news outlets have demonstrated no more commitment to honest reporting than Iran’s, and we hope that the international community understands that CIRCA’s actions do not represent the University’s views as a whole. Fox News inaccurately claimed that President Bollinger was attending the dinner, a statement it later corrected.

While we uphold Columbia’s commitment to free speech, open dialogue, and freedom of association, CIRCA’s attendance at the dinner surpasses the bounds of responsible group behavior. We don’t doubt that the students involved in the dinner identify an opportunity to engage a world leader in a sincere gesture of diplomacy, but to do so with a leader like Ahmadinejad is not constructive.

In the past, Ahmadinejad has invited other American students from notable universities to dine in New York City, where students were permitted to ask one or two questions as a group. Therefore, the belief that the students’ questions can lead to any sort of meaningful and open dialogue is overly optimistic and naïve. A dinner where students are only allowed to ask a few questions in a controlled manner is not an open forum.

Though Ahmadinejad was invited to speak at Columbia’s World Leaders Forum in 2007, CIRCA’s involvement with the dinner differs starkly from the setting of a political forum. The act of dining with someone is intrinsically different from an open forum. The breaking of bread symbolizes friendship and trust—honors Ahmadinejad does not deserve so long as his regime continues its outrageous human rights abuses against the people of Iran. Given the international make-up of Columbia’s student body, it is likely that some Iranian students and their families have experienced persecution—a sensitivity that shouldn’t be overlooked.

Though it has been proposed that Columbia students will learn from Ahmadinejad and vice versa, the dinner is not a peer-to-peer to meeting. Ahmadinejad stands to gain political clout from dining with American students, not an enlightened point of view. While we like to have faith in the power of student diplomacy, history has taught us that the likelihood of changing a tyrant’s mind—never mind from one dinner—is nonexistent.

It’s no easy task to weigh two of our dearest values as Columbia students—freedom of speech and association, and a respect for human rights—against one another. This is one of the reasons why students should be engaged in reflection and discussion about CIRCA’s dining with Ahmadinejad—it forces us to confront the intangible ideals we hold in a situation with real social and political consequences. We distinguish few benefits from dining with Ahmadinejad other than legitimizing a leader who blatantly disrespects humanity, and for that, we urge CIRCA to reassess their plans.