The religious police went conscientiously to work in Sultan Khan’s bookshop that afternoon. Any books portraying living things, be they human or animal, were torn from the shelves and tossed on the fire. Yellowed pages, innocent postcards, and dried-out covers from old reference books were sacrificed to the flames.

So begins Asne Seierstad’s memoir “The Bookseller of Kabul,” in which Seierstad, a journalist, depicts the struggles and lifestyles of a family in Afghanistan, where it was only a year ago that women were first permitted to sing in public or on the radio, and where until just recently, nothing that offered a viewpoint contrary to that of the Taliban could be distributed or, in some cases, even owned.

Imagine the Afghan women struggling for the right to make music, to go out in public with more than their eyes showing. Picture other such freedom fighters: the abolitionists, the religious martyrs, the civil rights leaders.

And then go ahead and try to fit on-campus speech movements — like Koala Editor and A.S. Elections Manager Steve York’s “right” to show off his latest sexual conquests, or a public display of gay couples displaying borderline-obscene physical affection, for instance — with Afghan women, with or Martin Luther King, Jr. Not only are such “demonstrations” wholly ineffective and counterproductive, but they are also incredibly degrading.

As students of the University of California (and, of course, U.S. citizens), it is within our rights, and among our duties, to express opinions and beliefs and to speak against injustices, prejudice, cruelty and the like. It’s one thing to make a well-thought-out, relevant, strategic political statement; it’s quite another to intentionally attempt to offend people in the name of civil rights.

It would have been OK for Student-Run Television to air porn as long as it was billed as “Bored college kid uses shock value in an attempt to grab 15 minutes of fame,” or something along those lines. But what astute observation or important political message was York trying to convey through his big break into the world of low-budget pornography? To broadcast obscene acts devoid of any artistic or social value is bad enough; to cite “freedom of speech” as the reason for it is 10 times worse in that it challenges the integrity of meaningful free speech.

And the “making out” going on between gay couples on Library Walk? All it accomplished was letting students know that there are in fact same-sex, transgender and other relationships on campus — but then, we already knew that. To gratuitously announce, “Hey, we exist!” sets the gay rights movement back about 10 steps. It’s offensive and inappropriate for any couple to shamelessly make out in public, regardless of the couple’s sexual orientation. And to turn what should be a private display of affection into a circus, complete with shouts of “Hey, come watch!” and “Can we get some cheers?” only made the participating couples look like members of a freak show. In a failed attempt to be “provocative,” and to “challenge people’s ideas,” the Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Queer Intersex Allies simply alienated many viewers who were offended at being assaulted by quasi-sexual acts committed on a public walkway. Finally, the event perpetuated hurtful, negative and inaccurate stereotypes of homosexuals held by Christian extremists — that gay people don’t respect people’s values, that they’re hypersexual, that they have no sense of propriety. Whether or not students believe in the morality of a queer relationship, they should not be subjected to having the physicality of one — or of any relationship, for that matter — blatantly shoved at them in a public place.

For York, the LGBTQIA, and others who claim that their actions were a means of fighting for freedom of speech is insulting to those who actually are. We can’t ban such individuals from publicly proving themselves foolish, of course, but we should hope that next time they’ll consider the sacredness of whatever excuse they’re using (free speech, free expression and who knows what’s next), and choose not to degrade or devalue the right — by saving it for when it is genuinely necessary.