I’m with you. This is why we have police. This is why we arm them. The school has an obligation to have these events go off without violence or people fearing violence. If they need to call in a hundred cops, call them in. If they need to close off the campus, they should do it. And they—and the cops—should not allow anyone to where masks. I’m pretty sure that CA is a state that has a law agains it.
I’d rather be in the top 100 then the bottom 100. 
Crush their skulls!! KILL!!
It is my understanding that any recognized group can invite any speaker they want. No one is “obligated” to invite anyone.
If you think that the problem is a small number of assholes, you are sadly mistaken. Do a YouTube search for Milo protests on campus. The black bloc was there this time to dial things up, but students do this even without them. This time the size of the crowd and the size of the Black Block combined to make this one particular noteworthy.
And you should know!
What the fuck are you talking about?
I’ve seen the videos – it’s a relatively tiny number of vocal assholes. Sure, out of a country of hundreds of millions, relatively tiny numbers can add up, but it’s still a minuscule portion of liberal protesters, much less liberals in general.
Just getting into the blood lust spirit. Did you miss Blinky’s hope about skull-crushing before? Let’s get stomping!
When you look at the large pool of liberals, sure. But when you restrict that pool to the liberals on a particular campus, it’s much. much bigger and not small. If it were as small as you are trying to argue, they wouldn’t be able to shut down so many events.
Well, as the right winger protests/standoffs in public lands showed, it will take months for the authorities to crush the heads of the armed ones.
Nope, even there I do think that the authorities should promptly arrest protesters that do resort to violence or use threats of it.
Why would he care if there’s a violent response? He’s a privileged white guy who lives in his mommy’s basement (presumably) rent-free and has never faced any “oppression” greater than some kind of cheese allergy.
And this is at least the second call for violence from him. I want to know if he’s going to slither up from his basement to participate or if he only wants others to commit violence on his behalf.
Yes, that is a logical and reasonable response to being assaulted by people who are attempting to murder you.
Self defense is a good thing.
A very small number of assholes can cause a lot of havoc – we have plenty of examples of this through history. Yes, just a relative handful of assholes at a protest can do enough damage to shut down an event.
Violence and chaos have always been easy to do. They always will be, in a free society.
Missed it, I guess. But the cops do need to keep order. The quicker they arrest assholes, the better. Giving them free rein doesn’t work. I’d start with arresting everyone with a mask. They’re against the law. At least then you can know who they all are, get fingerprints, etc.
Yes! Kill them! Stomp their babies! Crush their skulls! Drink their blood!
I have no problem with arresting violent people. And in this case, not only is the violence wrong, but it’s counterproductive. It helps the bigots.
If necessary, sure.
Yes! Use fire! And pitchforks! And napalm! Kill them! EAT THEIR BABIES!!
These two posts get to an issue that hasn’t yet been dealt with adequately: who is doing the inviting?
Many universities, especially prestigious and relatively wealthy universities like Berkeley, often have a large number of different avenues by which speakers are invited. Sometimes the invitation is extended by the university as an institution, often through special committees or students and/or faculty tasked with bringing speakers to campus. Other times, invitations are extended by particular organizations within the university, such as an academic department or a student society.
I’ve been an undergraduate, a grad student, and i’m a university-employed academic. I’ve seen this stuff work in a variety of institutions on two continents.
Take the university where i went to grad school: Johns Hopkins, in Baltimore. As a wealthy and prestigious institution, Hopkins has the ability to draw some pretty high-profile talent for public speaking engagements. One of the signature lecture events at Hopkins is the Milton S. Eisenhower Symposium, which invites a series of speakers to address a broad general theme. The whole event, including choice of speakers as well as logistics, is run by undergraduate students, and the broad mission is to attract a diversity of ideas and viewpoints.
During one of my years at Hopkins, speakers included Ann Coulter and Michael Moore. I have no problem with inviting controversial speakers to campus, of whatever political persuasion, especially if they are invited under the umbrella of a group that seeks to encourage broad engagement with ideas. Another event i attend while in grad school was a debate between Eleanor Smeal (at the time, head of the National Organization for Women), and Phyllis Schlafly, well-known conservative opponent of feminism and the Equal Rights Amendment.
At most of the campuses where i have been a student or academic, explicitly political groups like Democratic and Republican clubs also invite speakers. And while these groups might sometimes tout their belief in a broad mission to expose students to different ideas, such groups nearly always invite speakers from their own side of the ideological fence. Rarely do they ask someone to speak whose ideas they don’t, at least in some measure, endorse.
I’m not arguing that this is a bad thing. I think that the Berkeley Republicans had every right to invite Yiannopoulos, and i wish they had been able to hear him speak. But remember that, in making my original point about this issue, i was responding to the following post:
I was simply observing that, when mainstream conservative organizations, especially ones directly identified with the GOP, invite someone like Yiannopoulos to campus, then you can’t blame people for arguing that it’s becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish the right from the alt-right, especially in a national political environment where conservative politicians are kowtowing to a whole bunch of alt-right priorities, and where one of the best-known leaders of alt-right ideology is the puppet-master with his hand up the shirt of the guy in the White House.
I’ve made clear, multiple times in this thread, that Yiannopoulos should not have been prevented from speaking. I also agree those who have argued that he’s a master troll who loves this sort of publicity, and that the interests of liberal and leftist politics would be better served by letting him speak and just ignoring his idiotic babble.
But as iiandyiiii has suggested, in a world of finite time and finite resources, is it really a big problem if prestigious educational institutions fail to invite a few sensationalist douchebags to campus? In an era of easy access to ideas, is the cause of intellectual diversity really stifled if a few clowns are left to argue their case without the institutional support of universities that are supposed to be devoted to thoughtful and rational discussion?
Good luck with that. You understand, i assume, that flying across the country and giving a speech takes considerable time, both in preparation and in the execution? While i’m a firm believer in affordable education, and i think it would be nice if we had a world where it was possible for people to teach and otherwise give their time for free, the fact is that everyone needs to pay the bills.
There’s nothing wrong with taking cost into account; you might decide that it’s better value to pay a few thousand bucks each to some interesting but lesser known speakers, rather than fork over tens of thousands for a really big name. The money for these things also often comes from directed alumni and sponsor donations, rather than out of the universities’ general funds.
Does he ask for debates? Or does he just stand on a stage and sound off? Because those aren’t the same thing.
Unlike Yiannopoulos, right? Here’s a selection from a speech he gave just a couple of days ago at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo:
What an intellectual giant! The fact that this guy, at least according to folks like Blinkyandpinky, belongs in the pantheon of conservative intellectuals is, in itself, pretty telling. He’ll fit right in with the legacy of Mises, Hayek, Kirk, Friedman, Bloom, Buckley, and Strauss.
He’s oppressed here by the Pit bullies who call him names. 
He is a prime example of a black or white this thinker. He has trouble understanding POV that differ from his own. He cannot grasp that some of his current positions might be wrong.
He is on a mission from God.