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Have grievances, will travel
by Scott Gilbreath ~ November 4th, 2008
A peripatetic grievance-monger named Asaf Rashid showed up at the Joseph Howe Symposium last Saturday and attempted to shout down Margaret Wente as she was about to deliver her keynote address. When she came to the podium and was introduced, he stood up and started ranting at the top of his lungs, calling her a racist and claiming that her recent politically incorrect column contained factual errors.
It immediately became clear that Mr Rashid intended to prevent Ms Wente from speaking and members of the audience resisted his intrusion; some yelled at him to sit down and wait his turn to speak, some started booing. The moderator, speaking into the microphone, tried to reason with him, saying that he’d have a chance to ask questions when Wente was finished.
Finally, after a few minutes of this nonsense, he shut up and soon left the room.
At the end of the day, some students attending the symposium alerted us to a photo of Rashid (at left, click for larger view) in the current issue of the Halifax Commoner, published by the University of King’s College School of Journalism. He spoke at a recent demonstration against Canada’s involvement in Afghanistan. His comments are about as coherent as those of other quoted speakers.
Below is a photo of the intrepid investigators sharing their findings with us. Unfortunately, I don’t know their names, but I assume most of them are students at University of King’s College. The young man on the left asked some very challenging questions at the symposium, suggesting that human rights commissions are already stifling free speech.
Rashid’s self-serving account of his fearless attempt to shout down Margaret Wente is posted at Facebook.
The article is posted here at the Halifax Commoner’s website but, although the full text is posted, only two of the eight photos in the print edition appear online. I scanned Rashid’s photo from a paper copy.
Blazing Cat Fur links to this fascinating blog post on Mr Rashid’s career as a professional protester.
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