Martin: Universities fearful of debates due to cancel culture and disruption 

Speaking at the forum on neutrality at University College Cork (UCC), Mr Martin said: "I worry about the campuses of today in the future. I would worry about that, I genuinely would."

Mr Martin said university presidents and others are now "very fearful" of debates on campus.

"To me, the very purpose of being a student is to be open to different views and different perspectives, but to have that done in a respectful way. That's something in terms of the future of our democracy that we need to protect.

It's not just cancel culture, I think it's people with a particular viewpoint on the world saying nobody else can have another viewpoint or nobody else can come to a forum to articulate another viewpoint."

Referring to his own time as a student in UCC, he said: "I fortunately came through this institution, I can recall being at the philsoc and various debates and the historical society. There would be all sorts of views left, right and centre but we all heard each other.

"We didn't have people standing up saying 'it's our view, please listen to us and no one else is genuine'."

Mr Martin said there was now a tendency not to address controversial issues over fears protesters would seriously disrupt any form of discussion.

His comments came after a small group interrupted his own address to the Consultative Forum on International Security Policy, with a number of people removed from the auditorium by gardaí.

"What worries me about protests of this kind, many third-level institutions are now shying away from debates, because they're afraid of this kind of thing. They're afraid of disruption, they're afraid of trouble in the campus, so 'better that we don't have any debates'," Mr Martin said.

In March, a talk by controversial UK preacher Mohammed Hijab at Trinity College Dublin, which some students had planned to protest at, was cancelled.

Mr Martin said: "In the modern era there's a tendency that in order to avoid any sort of potential trouble or disruption, let's not have any debate. 

"Our academic institutions should be the centrepiece of good evidence-based inquiry, good solid debates, and should be spaces where people can become more informed, enlightened, get more insights, and then formulate your own views."

Mr Martin added that as a country we should have greater self-confidence in our capacity to debate.

He said even exploring or referencing issues relating to foreign policy could be interpreted as somehow "you're going off on the desperate journey down to joining Nato". 

"That's not the case," he added.