Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a Somali-born woman who escaped from an arranged marriage and left her native country, first for the Netherlands, and she now lives in the US. She has been an outspoken critic of mistreatment of women around the world, but particularly in Islamic countries. She is a scholar with the American Enterprise Institute.

Brandeis University was going to award her an honorary degree — until a protest erupted from Muslim students who object to the fact that she calls Islam a religion of violence. An online petition demanded that the university reverse itself because of her “hate speech” and her supposed desire to “eliminate” Islam. Naturally, Brandeis caved in. You can read the story here.