Iranian Universities: Apostates and Dissidents Need Not Apply
Thank you for your comments. I try to avoid the temptation of responding to nitpicks, but I am feeling frisky tonight:
David: I am all too aware of the lack of intellectual diversity on American campuses. I believe that the context of the statement you cite makes it clear that I was not referencing intellectual diversity there. That comes later, appropriately enough, in the section about dissidents: “Western institutions commit their own sins in this area, enacting speech codes and other instruments of ideological control.”
Wendy: I appreciate your kind comment. However, I do not believe that I implied that the Bahai faith is a subset of any religion, let alone Islam. Note my words: “Iran’s largest non-Muslim minority.”
The word “sect” seems to be the source of your concern. According to dictionary.com, a sect is “1. a body of persons adhering to a particular religious faith; a religious denomination. 2. a group regarded as heretical or as deviating from a generally accepted religious tradition.” Hence, the word can reasonably refer to either a standalone group or a subset of a larger group.
I fear that “apostate” may be another word that inspired your objection, as apostates are members (or former members) of a larger body. However, it is commonly reported that Bahais are persecuted as “apostates from Islam” because this is how the two founders of the faith were/are regarded. In the minds of the mullahs, it is apparently not necessary for you to have personally been an adherent to a faith in order to be an apostate from it.
