Will Peter Singer Speak At Fordham University?

Friday, February 16, there is a speaker who most certainly is not pro-life enough to speak at Fordham University. That speaker? Peter Singer. Fr. McShane has not sent out any statement in an e-mail addressed to the entire school about having such a speaker. The president not only did that in the instance of Ann Coulter’s invite, but expressed his “disgust.” I am disgusted with Peter Singer, and I expect Fr. McShane to be as well. Yet there has been no such e-mail.

In case you are not aware, Peter Singer is an advocate for abortion, as a woman’s right and as a form of population control; bestiality; and euthanasia, and he has made the moral case for infanticide, particularly for disabled infants. Yet from the description of the event and of Peter Singer on “FORDHAM NOTES: A NEWSBLOG FROM FORDHAM UNIVERSITY’S NEWS AND MEDIA RELATIONS BUREAU,” you would not know this.

The event is titled “Panel: Christians and Other Animals” with the subtitle “Christians and Other Animals: Moving the Conversation Forward.” Peter Singer is listed as the top panelist, with his credentials listed as “Peter Singer, Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics, Princeton University.” There is also a brief one-sentence bio listed about him at the end: “Peter Singer—in addition to being the most influential philosopher alive today—was the intellectual heft behind the beginning of the animal rights movement in the 1970s.” Regardless of whether that bio was written by a person from Fordham, which it may very well have not been, by attaching it to a Fordham advertisement for a Fordham-held and sponsored event, it seems as if the university is standing by Peter Singer “being the most influential philosopher alive today,” and influential in not such a bad way.

Ann Coulter was invited by a student group on campus, an invitation which is to be approved or denied. Regardless how one feels about Fr. McShane’s statement or the decision by the College Republicans to (dis-)invite Ms. Coulter, one surely realizes that the university could have denied the speaker even before approving her, and that neither the event nor Ann Coulter’s views are endorsed by the university or Fr. McShane. However, not only is Fordham University displaying the panel with Peter Singer on a web page for the university, but the panel is also co-sponsored by the Department of Theology, the Center for Religion and Culture, the Office of the Provost, the dean of Fordham College at Rose Hill, and the dean of Fordham University faculty.
Link (here) to Live Action News