It may not be fair to make fun of random internet users, but sometimes you can’t help it. One of the X users (Twitter) wrote in response to the events in American universities: “A good rule of history is that if you ever find yourself in opposition to a student movement and at the same time on the side of the ruling class, you are wrong. Every time. At every time. Regardless of the specific issue.” He was justifiably ridiculed for this obvious nonsense.
Examples of student-supported movements that were definitely not on the right side are Bolshevism, Nazism, Maoism or the Taliban. And there are many indications that the current demonstrations on American campuses are among them. They are not murderous, but they are particularly stupid. They mix idiocy with anti-Semitism. And they’re not entirely non-violent either.
City College students exchange views with police officers. New York, April 25, 2024. Photo: Profimedia.cz
At the epicenter of the protests at Columbia University, demonstrators broke into the historic Hamilton Hall administration building, smashed windows and barricaded themselves inside. On the campus of the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), there were more and more fights. Eventually, the police intervened and evacuated both Columbia University and UCLA.
Supporters of the protests say they are not anti-Semitic. The protests are said to be a mere criticism of Israel’s policy in Gaza. Criticizing Israel is not a priori anti-Semitic. Likewise, anti-Zionism is not automatically anti-Semitism. Some Jewish students even participate in the protests. Labeling the protests as anti-Semitic is only an attempt to unfairly discredit ideological opponents.
Sure, no one is shouting “Kill the Jews!” at the protests, but one of the leaders of the protests at Columbia University, Khymani James, declared that “Zionists don’t deserve to live.” “Be thankful that I’m not just going to murder Zionists,” he congratulated himself on Instagram. And on some campuses, Jews, excuse me, Zionists, obviously have limited space to move around.
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