Recently, the University of California at Berkeley paid approximately $600,000 for security so their chapter of Young Americans for Freedom could host conservative pundit Ben Shapiro without riots breaking out. Similarly, Reed College was forced to cancel the first meeting of its core “Introduction to Humanities: Ancient Greece and the Mediterranean” class—which has been mandatory for freshman since 1943—after students objected that the course was Eurocentric and racist, and disrupted its classes. These protests are increasingly common on college campuses. They’re almost always carried out in the name of denying alleged oppressors a platform to spew “hateful” rhetoric.
But it’s a recent incident at the College of William and Mary that provides the best window into the disruptors’ way of thinking. A speech by a representative of the ACLU was interrupted by protesters who objected to the group’s defense of First Amendment rights for everyone—including white supremacists—and demanded zero tolerance for views they deem unacceptable. If one sorts through their various chants and screams, it becomes readily apparent why they reject free speech: they view it as an inherently conservative institution that stands in the way of “progress.”
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