The treatment of protestors at various private universities was abhorrent, but at public universities there is an additional problem: the right of citizens to petition for redress of grievances. That is exactly what the protestors are doing: their grievance is support via investments of various policies that support what is happening in Gaza.
And way too many universities are using the "possibility" of violence to justify preemptive arrests. How exactly is that not prior restraint?
Yes, sometimes the protests are "loud." So are crowds at the university football stadiums, one of which I had the misfortune to live near once. Try to study while a game was going on? Much less get HOME through the traffic as the game was letting out? Talk about disturbances.
But in all the MSM coverage I have not seen ONE documented case of a verbal attack on Jewish students, much less a physical one. Just references to the "fact" that they happened. Quite possibly they did, but we don't have the evidence to judge--not even to show that it was a protestor doing the deed. Or to see whether the verbal "attack" was actually an antisemitic statement. Is "Free Palestine" antisemitic or anti the well documented treatment of Palestinians for YEARS by the far right governments, both within Israel and encouraging the "settler" movement, quite apart from the actions in Gaza. Or is the idea that "Free Palestine" means "eradicate Israel" entirely in the head of the hearer? How is it anything but the call for a two state solution?
Yes, there are loudmouths who shout things that are actually Pro Hamas. Just as during the Vietnam protests of my youth some people shouted "Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Minh" But support of Ho wasn't the aim of most of us, and there is zippo evidence, or even credibility, that the loudmouths speak for the over 2000 students by now arrested.
"Guilt by Association" without any evidence that there was any crime in the associating has always been anathema to American Ideals. It is the very BASIS of prejudice, the method it operates: X is black and does Y, therefore all Blacks do Y." And yet we have university administrations--goaded by posturing Congressional committees full of people who STILL don't like letting Jews join their clubs--using that very argument to justify prior restraint or arrest of those who are not in fact doing anything but advocating their First Amendment rights.
The treatment of protestors at various private universities was abhorrent, but at public universities there is an additional problem: the right of citizens to petition for redress of grievances. That is exactly what the protestors are doing: their grievance is support via investments of various policies that support what is happening in Gaza.
And way too many universities are using the "possibility" of violence to justify preemptive arrests. How exactly is that not prior restraint?
Yes, sometimes the protests are "loud." So are crowds at the university football stadiums, one of which I had the misfortune to live near once. Try to study while a game was going on? Much less get HOME through the traffic as the game was letting out? Talk about disturbances.
But in all the MSM coverage I have not seen ONE documented case of a verbal attack on Jewish students, much less a physical one. Just references to the "fact" that they happened. Quite possibly they did, but we don't have the evidence to judge--not even to show that it was a protestor doing the deed. Or to see whether the verbal "attack" was actually an antisemitic statement. Is "Free Palestine" antisemitic or anti the well documented treatment of Palestinians for YEARS by the far right governments, both within Israel and encouraging the "settler" movement, quite apart from the actions in Gaza. Or is the idea that "Free Palestine" means "eradicate Israel" entirely in the head of the hearer? How is it anything but the call for a two state solution?
Yes, there are loudmouths who shout things that are actually Pro Hamas. Just as during the Vietnam protests of my youth some people shouted "Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Minh" But support of Ho wasn't the aim of most of us, and there is zippo evidence, or even credibility, that the loudmouths speak for the over 2000 students by now arrested.
"Guilt by Association" without any evidence that there was any crime in the associating has always been anathema to American Ideals. It is the very BASIS of prejudice, the method it operates: X is black and does Y, therefore all Blacks do Y." And yet we have university administrations--goaded by posturing Congressional committees full of people who STILL don't like letting Jews join their clubs--using that very argument to justify prior restraint or arrest of those who are not in fact doing anything but advocating their First Amendment rights.
Good to see you back, and correcting the crap on “antifascist” activists.