Traditionalists banned by University College London Student Union

Discussion continues concerning the decision of the student union at University College London (UCL) to ban a Traditionalist reading group initially called "Tradition UCL" but renamed, at the time of its banning, "The Nietzsche Club." This was a smart move on the part of the UCL Traditionalists, as the ban has been most frequently reported as the banning of Nietzsche, and criticized as such.

The Nietzsche Club put up some posters entitled "Too much political correctness?" and "Equality is a false god" and advertising readings of de Benoist, Evola, Heidegger, and Nietzsche. They were, then, somewhere between political Traditionalism and the New Right. The student union voted to ban them on March 11, 2014 on grounds of protecting UCL students against the dangers of fascism, but the Trustees of UCL then suspended the ban while they took legal advice. Nothing has happened since, but the story passed from online news source to online news source until it was picked up by The Huffington Post on June 3 and The Daily Beast on June 6. And then by this blog.

It is not clear how many students were involved in the club, but their reading list has certainly reached a far wider public as a result of the ban than it did as a result of the initial advertisements.It also seems that the UCL student union is itself somewhat political, as the motion banning the Nietzsche Club noted that "fascism is used by the ruling class to divide workers and students... to split them and thus... undermine their resistance to... consequences of the crisis of the capitalist system."