BARBARIANS DISPLAY IGNORANCE AT UCLA (WITH POSTSCRIPT FROM STEVE)
Heather Mac Donald is the nation’s leading expert on policing and race. Her book The War On Cops is a classic of social science. In December my think tank, Center of the American Experiment, hosted Heather for a speech in Minneapolis that was attended by more than 400, including over 150 law enforcement officers.
That was a great crowd. But when Heather spoke at UCLA last night, at the invitation of the college Republicans, the crowd was not so welcoming. In the real world, ignorance is frowned upon. But on college campuses, it is treated as a positive virtue.
The College Fix reports on what happened last night:
A speech by Heather Mac Donald at UCLA on Wednesday frequently descended into chaos as Black Lives Matter protesters stormed the stage and chanted their signature phrase over and over, and also took over portions of the Q&A with angry accusations and raucous shouting, a video of the event shows.
Heather was pretty much able to give her speech, but when the time came for questions and answers, the barbarians took over. For the most part, they didn’t actually ask questions, they just chanted, gasped and and snapped their fingers. (What’s with that?)
Event organizers tried to calm the crowd and regain order. After the Black Lives Matter chant ended, several protesters remained at the front of the room, shouting and making gestures as a student organizer asked for calm. But they started up with more chants, including: “America was never great!”After the uproar — which lasted about eight minutes — finally died down, Mac Donald fielded questions from the audience, including from a black female who asked her to speak on whether “black victims killed by cops” mattered.“Yes,” Mac Donald replied. “And do black children that are killed by other blacks matter to you?”At that the room erupted in gasps and angry moans and furious snaps, and the young lady who asked the original question began to yell at Mac Donald, pointing her finger and repeating the original question.Mac Donald, known and admired for her unapologetic stance to report facts over emotion, doubled down on the infuriated young black woman.“Of course I care, and do you know what,” Mac Donald said. “There is no government agency more dedicated to the proposition that black lives matter than the police.”Again, gasps and moans filled the auditorium.“Bullshit! Bullshit!” a young woman off camera could be heard screaming.
I can’t emphasize enough what a hero Heather Mac Donald is. She needs to deal with morons like those who disrupted her speech last night like she needs a hole in the head. But she tirelessly works to spread light amid the darkness of America’s college campuses. Last night she had to be escorted away from the baying hounds of barbarism to safety.
You can see video of the entire event at the link, but it doesn’t seem to be available in embeddable form.
What is Heather doing tonight? Speaking at Claremont, where the forces of stupidity are already lying in wait:
Mac Donald is scheduled to speak at Claremont McKenna College tonight and already plans are in the works to “shut down” the event, the Claremont Independent reports.The Independent cites a private Facebook page organizing the protest that state: “Heather Mac Donald has been vocally against the Black Lives Matter movement and pro-police, both of which show her fascist ideologies and blatant anti-Blackness and white supremacy. Let’s show CMC that having this speaker is an attack on marginalized communities both on campus and off. Together, we can hold CMC accountable and prevent Mac Donald from spewing her racist, anti-Black, capitalist, imperialist, fascist agenda.”
Right. In other words, more ignorance is in store. But maybe a handful of teachable students will attend, too. Heather Mac Donald, we salute you.
STEVE adds: As it happens, I hosted Heather on campus up at Berkeley—Berkeley!—on Monday, but it was a small affair on the issue of free speech on campus. (Several local Power Line readers were in attendance.) It went fine, and Heather gave her usual high-octance performance. But there were no protests, and we had a great conversation going to the airport.
Heather just emailed an hour ago to say about tonight’s scheduled appearance in Claremont:
There is already black lives matter chant going on outside my little apartment here in Claremont an hour and a half before my speech this is going to be much worse than UCLA.
P.S. On Tuesday I doubled down, and snuck Charles Murray onto the Berkeley campus and had him speak, with no prior announcement, to my Constitutional Law class. Several students asked him good, tough questions, but there was no silliness.
The real test of whether Berkeley can behave better is at the end of the month. Ann Coulter is scheduled to speak. Stay tuned for updates. I may get some inside info on how the administration is planning to handle it.
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