… Columbia University administrators called in the New York Police Department (NYPD) on Wednesday evening to violently suppress and shut down a pro-Palestinian student occupation of the campus’ Butler Library. Approximately 78 protesters were arrested just over a year after the police-state crackdown at Columbia last April, when the NYPD swarmed the campus to arrest over 100 students and break up the “Gaza Solidarity Encampment.”
On Wednesday afternoon, a group of around 100 anti-genocide student protesters took over Butler’s main reading room and renamed it the “Basel Al-Araj Popular University,” after the Palestinian activist and writer killed by Israeli forces in 2017.
The students’ demands include Columbia’s financial divestment from Zionist organizations, an academic boycott of complicit institutions, cops and ICE off campus and amnesty for all university members unfairly targeted and disciplined for pro-Palestinian actions.
Columbia’s Public Safety officers immediately responded and violently barred protesters from leaving unless they showed identification, which created a prolonged standoff…
Columbia is speedrunning fastest university decline in the public eye
People will forget about it all 2 months after it ends. They have the memory of a potato. Americans still praise NYT after the WMD lies.
Americans thought NYT was a bastion of accuracy and non-bias until they accurately reported that Biden was having mental issues in office like Reagan.
Those fake WMDs are so 2003, so it’s not important. Those graves are to be ignored.
Not the first time they did this
If peaceful protest is going to be consistently met with violent police response; maybe they should stop being peaceful from the outset.
I wonder how long it will take for enough to realise their government is not compatible with protests. Peer pressure does not encourage authoritarians.
The running platform was making empathetic people angry; small scale protests are a badge of honor and large scale protests are a mild annoyance to be dealt with however they deem fit.
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.” -JFK
It won’t happen at this rate. Last thing that was closest to that was the CHOP zone in Seattle a few years ago. And that still fell through. Most protest folks that participate won’t fight back since most are against baring arms and only want it to be via peace since they are too afraid to die for something. They will shift that fear on to their peers and react as well with “I don’t want to have people miss me” or “I don’t have the time to up and remove my life from what I’ve worked towards so far”
If security shows up to stop protestors from leaving, they aren’t there to secure the peace, they are there to oppress.
Oh brother…
They should start doing minor acts of vandalism in places where there are no cameras like emptying all the toilet rolls all the time. But not too obviously and consistently. Just occasionally when they enter a toilet.
Personally, I’m all for vandalizing the property of zionists and their supporters.
It shouldn’t even be that difficult. Could probably rig up a drone to drop bricks or paint on their cars, for example.
What would the accomplished by doing that?
seems like it would just make a lot of people angry without letting them know who did it.
Tank the universities rating and cost it financially.
Sure, but let’s step back and analyze it a little more.
Protest itself does not achieve political change. Its usefulness is in direct action or in recruiting those present into further action, education, and organizations. Liberal protests are state-sanctioned parades. Real protests tend to have an actual action to take, demands to be met, people to impact, costs to incur on others.
The terminology of “peaceful protest” is already poisoned and should be questioned. The media and politicians - and those propagandized downstream, all conflate private property destruction and violence. If a protest breaks windows, suddenly it is no longer “peaceful” and can be rejected by the propagandized as invalid and not to be supported. The US is full of such good little piggies, happy to align with the ruling class picking their pocket and doing actual violence because they exist exclusively in a world of capitalist propaganda.
Under these auspices, all direct action that the capitalist system wants to crush is, will, and has been labelled terrorism. It’s already done this for private property destruction by environmentalists, peace activists during all major wars (except WWII, where American Nazis were coddled and of course did not damage private property), labor organizers, anti-segregation organizers, socialists, communists, Mexicans, Chinese, Native Americans, etc. They happily do it again against anti-genocide protesters, particularly because they can play on the islamophobic use of the terrorism label at the same time. Like all fascistic logic, they must frame themselves as the true victims, so they also happily call every critic of Israel an antisemite.
All of this bombards the US population 24/7. Americans exist in a haze of accusations and terms they barely understand, trying to slot it into what could only charitably called an ideology - the naked reactionaries in red and the obfuscated reactionaries in blue.
All of this is to say that the greatest barrier in the US is education, and education begins with agitation, e.g. these protests in any form. Get as many people as possible to show up to the next thing, to organize the next thing, and spread knowledge.
Under these auspices, all direct action that the capitalist system wants to crush is, will, and has been labelled terrorism.
Fun fact that runs parallel to your point: it’s not terrorism if you only destroy property.
Terrorism is defined as using violence (or the threat of violence), against civilians, in pursuit of a political goal. All 3 requirements must be met for it to be terrorism: violence, civilians, politics.
Burning down a Tesla dealership is thus not terrorism. It is violent, and it’s definitely political, but the target is not civilians but property. In a similar manner, the destruction of the NordStream pipeline was also not terrorism, by definition.
On the flipside, you can argue that some things politicians do are terrorism - if you remove someone’s disability benefits that could cause them tangible harm, and thus could be considered violence, in which case a politician attacking someone’s benefits would be committing terrorism against the benefit recipients. It’s also plain to see that invading a country, slaughtering a bunch of people, and bringing some back as hostages is terrorism; but so is raising entire cities and levelling buildings full of civilians.
Terrorism has many different flavours under its definition, yet so many people just have a vague idea of what terrorism is in their minds that doesn’t hold any rationality.
Fun fact that runs parallel to your point: it’s not terrorism if you only destroy property.
Terrorism is defined as using violence (or the threat of violence), against civilians, in pursuit of a political goal. All 3 requirements must be met for it to be terrorism: violence, civilians, politics.
Many people who only damage property are still labeled as terrorists by the powers that be. The dictionary can be quite misleading, as it does not really analyze inconsistent usage, particularly for political or propaganda purposes.
For example, “ecoterrorists”. Classically labeled as such even when just destroying property. Or even sometimes just for slowing down logistics. Predominately First Nations protesters and activists were labelled “ecoterrorists” by Rick Orman, citing examples like chaining themselves to equipment.
The inconsistent usage has at least two means of biased use. I’ve already mentioned one, which is using the term for those damaging private property or slowing down enterprise, i.e. equating damage to private property as violence (when private enterprise seizes land or destroys water this is never called ecoterrorism). The other is in inconsistent application: it is a label only routinely used by the targets of capitalist-run states. When their states destroy entire cities and target civilians, it is not called terrorism. When their targets go after a politician insteas of strictly military installations, suddenly they are terrorists. Hell, they can be called terrorists even when going after only military targets. The actusl use of the term corresponds to the means used and the political and ethnic background of those engaging in the acts more than whether the acts are violence for political (isn’t everything political?) ends. Terrorism is when a car bomb and not a JDAM.
The real meaning of terrorism must be understood through describing its actual mainstream use. Descriptivism not prescriptivism, lest we miss the reality of propaganda. This is important because the term will continue to be used as I described and to justify rounding up protesters that occupy buildings or block highways or burn down a Tesla dealership. It doesn’t really matter ehat the dictionary says, tge law will say enough, the cops will arrest on orders of preventing “terrorism”, the judge will convict and sentence based on calling a dumpster fire terrorism, and one might even get sent to a black site to contain such “dangerous” people, “terrorists”.
And this is not new. Anarchists and other cool people were lazily labelled exactly the same way over a century ago for the same types of acts.
Your reply is very well written and on the whole I agree. The one thing I would say is that I am not simply dismissing the mainstream usage of the word, but pointing out its misuse as intentional deception given that the usage contradicts what the word describes. I aim to point out that the word is actively being used for propaganda, and encourage others to associate it as such.
Thanks!
I would say that if a word has been misused for a century it actually just has a new meaning. And I’m not aware of it ever being used consistently.
Taking over a university facility and making demands isn’t “peaceful.” Peaceful is sitting outside of University property and protesting.
Huh yes it is. Taking over a building isn’t violence idiot.
Taking over a building is on the far end of “peaceful”.
The majority of protests involve taking over space temporarily; that alone doesn’t make them not peaceful.
They weren’t invading/forcing their way into spaces that they weren’t already openly invited to be in, nor were they violent towards officials that were demanding they leave (self-defense aside).
I specifically didn’t say they were being violent. When asked to leave their presence becomes trespass. Being somewhere you aren’t supposed to be gets to the far side of “peaceful”. You’re not violent, maybe, but you’re not lawful either. At that point the police are within their right to remove you.
Peaceful does not mean lawful. You can peacefully break the law.
The law is not always right - that is why it has the facility to be changed - and when laws are wrong it is a good citizen’s duty to break them, as that is the first step to changing them.
Peaceful does not mean lawful. You can peacefully break the law.
Sure… But…
The law is not always right - that is why it has the facility to be changed - and when laws are wrong it is a good citizen’s duty to break them, as that is the first step to changing them.
Don’t be vague. We’re talking about trespassing. Somebody peaceably trespassing in your living room would be a pretty big deal.
It’s fine that they protested, but expect to be arrested when you refuse to vacate a building you’re trespassing in.
Fun fact: trespassing isn’t even a crime everywhere, not on its own. Also, trespassing doesn’t occur automatically, in a nutshell you have to be notified and then remain on the property in spite of notice - this is why No Trespassing signs are a thing, they serve as notice.
Here, the students had every right to be there so were only trespassing after they were told to leave but remained. You’re absolutely right that they should expect to be arrested after this point. However, they should not expect nor do they deserve to be assaulted by police acting unlawfully (yet apparently shielded by the legal system).
You have literally said you are for the armement of Israel. Of course any protest against Israel is too violent for you.
Yes? If a bunch of Trump supporters took over the same building, would you have the same attitude about it?
The difference is that Trump supporters are pro-genocide, not against
Ohhh, Mr. “gotcha question” showed up.
Feel free to complain that I didn’t answer your question like you deserve one
Okay.
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable” -JFK
I gotta say, Hong Kongers put up way more of a fight than Americans seem to be. Hong Kong Polytechnic University went through a full blown siege in 2019. Six years later, in the land of the free, student leaders get picked off and any protests that manage to get going are easily crushed by the police.
fwiw, Hong Kong protestors were protesting about their own home, rather than these universities protesting in international solidarity against their university’s investments and policies. I’d kinda expect the Hong Kong ones to be defended more viciously.
More specifically, the Hong Kong protests were about the possiblity of HKers being sent to the mainland. Here and now we have multiple actual renditions of US residents to El Salvador and elsewhere (including one of the protesters!)…
The Hong Kong dudes threw tear gas back. If American protesters do that they get shot and killed. Even sitting down peacefully with a flag gets American protesters painted as violent terrorists.
The students’ demands include Columbia’s financial divestment from Zionist organizations, an academic boycott of complicit institutions, cops and ICE off campus and amnesty for all university members unfairly targeted and disciplined for pro-Palestinian actions.
Not a single one of which wouldn’t be a given in a sane and civilized modern society.
Columbia’s Public Safety officers immediately responded and violently barred protesters from leaving unless they showed identification, which created a prolonged standoff…
Because of COURSE they did!
When it comes to Apartheid regimes (and indeed most big picture stuff), student protesters are always on the right side of history and the people who derive income directly dependent on the atrocities continuing always react with the subtlety and intelligence of trying to remove a splinter with a machete.
Are you serious? So, any group can just take over a University now, and demand things, even if they are deemed “sane and civilized” by people like you? Okay…
That’s what protesting is about…and a protected right you ignoramus shit stain on humanity.
No, any group should be able to protest without arrest and expulsion. The school escalated it.
Spoken like someone who has never attended university. Please don’t come back and say you did - that would be even worse, because it will mean you didn’t learn a fucking thing by being there.
In terms of how a sane and civilized society would handle this, well for starters it wouldn’t even get to this point - a sane and civilized society does not support genocide. However their argument is that a sane and civilized society would view the requests as reasonable regardless, they’re not saying that such a society would give in to their demands because of the way they were protesting.
Oh hey ZK686. Havent seen you since you were banned from news and all your comments deleted.
Are you a nematode protein?
Oh brother…
Demanding not to bomb civilians should be a given yes. Are you pro mass-murder?
I’ll bet Columbia’s fall enrollment will be greatly decreased. If I was a student there, I’d definitely be going somewhere else in the fall.
Are people still applying to go to school there?
zionists who want a chance to sue for discrimination. imagine their shock if their entire class shows up wearing Israeli flags etc. the disappointment.
Removed by mod
If trump admin is smart enough, they will bus police from other states to go to New York, learn and practice, trump will soon have his Schutzstaffel
shut down a pro-Palestinian student occupation of the campus’ Butler Library
I don’t understand, though. Were they expecting not to be arrested? I thought that was the point of civil disobedience. What was the point of occupying the library if not to instigate a response from police or campus police?
They probably were intending/expecting arrests. There are probably protesters who didn’t go into the library because they specifically don’t want a criminal record (especially if they’re on a visa or some such).
And you can see in the comments here how angry the arrests are getting some people.
That’s the goal of a lot of nonviolent protest. Get your allies loud about it and split some moderates away from the authorities that they hadn’t really thought of as “the bad guys” before.
funny how occupation is unacceptable all of a sudden
