John Cleese Pulls Out of Cambridge Union Talk over ‘Woke Rules’

Cleese didn't blacklist himself, he cancelled the Cambridge Union. Cambridge suffers the greater loss in that transaction.

Good for him. It's sad to see these Universities going so downhill.

Wow...

The Cambridge Union website really says "Defending Free Speech Since 1815": https://cus.org/

I assume that mr Bradwell will be the next on the deny/excludelist for using the word "blacklist"

They used the Fawlty Towers bit where he literally made fun of hitler...

The bit I'm sure he was referencing was the "Mr Hilter" bits in Monty Python... He literally played Hitler to make fun of him...

It is hilarious though that Cleese can Godwin any argument instantly.

aoeuaoeu

Id be interested to know the story behind this historian getting banned for impersonating Hitler - that initially sounds like it would be a rhetorical tactic or mocking impression; in which case, why ban him? Either there's more to the story, or the union banned him on bad info (which seems to happen semi regularly with regard to deplatforming), or they have a radically new woke take where lampooning fascists is bad now.

Edit:

> In a letter, published on Facebook, Mr Bradwell said Mr Graham-Dixon offended members when he used Hitler's "deplorable" words about Jewish and black people in his speech

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-5921439...

That seems like a bad idea. Even if you're not expressing those sentiments yourself, voicing them out loud is certainly going to upset some people.