Why this year's encampment protests are a harbinger of things to come
I’m old enough to remember when tents were something used for people going out to the woods for a weekend or so. They weren’t common in urban environments, though you might see the odd one in someone’s backyard for a time.
On top of homeless encampments throughout most of our major cities, we’ve also seen them on college campuses. They’ve become symbols of protest at our major universities, right up until the colleges get sick of it and crackdown.
The problem is that at least some are giving in to the mob.
It’s well past time for a shower and anyway, summer internships start soon. But just as the protests are fizzling out, with students packing up their “tentifadas” for the summer, some colleges have decided to negotiate with the Hamas-curious campus cohort.
The latest to strike a very one-sided bargain with students is Harvard. In exchange for the protesters going home, the college has announced it will consider adopting boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) measures against Israel, setting up a Palestinian Studies Center, and not taking any action against 80 protesters. Harvard student Shabbos Kestenbaum, who is suing the college for failing to tackle antisemitism, told The Free Press that the deal was “an absolute betrayal” that will only incentivize further protests.
“I’ve been asking for a meeting with the president Alan Garber and college administrators for months,” Kestenbaum said. “Apparently to get a seat at the table I should have been calling for the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.
“It’s a major victory for the protesters. The message is that if you shout loud enough and make enough noise, you’ll get away with some truly terrible behavior. They have bullied and harassed Jews. Letting them off without punishment will just mean it all starts again in the fall.”
Exactly.
This is basic psychology. If you do a thing and get a reward for doing it, you’re more likely to do that thing. It’s how we train both dogs and people. If your kid gets a piece of candy for taking out the trash without prompting, they’re more likely to take it out without prompting.
In a case like this, capitulation means that the protestors will simply decide they can use this tactic again for the next round of whatever it is they’re demanding. Since it’s unlikely this was everything this gaggle wanted, there’s every reason to believe they’ll start back up in the fall.
And this isn’t just about protesting. This is about crossing the line and getting away with it.
Whatever the next thing is, we’re going to see them cross it more and more because they have every reason to believe they’ll get away with it. After all, they already have.
But let’s also remember what all happened on Harvard’s campus. Jewish students were bullied, belittled, and harassed simply because they were Jewish. I’d say there isn’t a lot of room for escalation, but there is.
Most of it involves violence, however.
As it stands, the 2020s seem likely to make the 1960s look like the 1950s. We’ve already had riots and protests. What follows next is blood.
Especially because these twits—the same people who scream “racism” at everything they disagree with—are making common cause with actual white supremacists who also despise anything to do with Israel.
They’ve dehumanized their fellow students simply because they’re Jewish, and we know how that tends to work out for Jews. They will take this to the next level, and all of that will rest of Harvard.
Meanwhile, campuses where administrators had enough and used the police to enforce the law will see less of an issue. They cracked down and, so long as they continue to hold the line, the protestors understand that there are lines that don’t get crossed.
It won’t change the politics of any of these schools, mind you, but at least the opposition should be safe from assault.
And before anyone tries to say that the Jewish kids’ parents voted for this kind of thing, it should be remembered that Israel, Palestine, and the Jewish students aren’t really the issue. The revolution, as always, is the issue.
Right now, they’re the target, but who is next?
The next group could be Christians. It could be conservatives or libertarians. It could just be people who want to be left the hell alone.
Whoever the mob decides to demonize, they will attack. Unless it’s slapped down, the attacks will get worse and worse.
Harvard just made their campus a more terrible place than it was. Other universities that follow their lead will do the same as well.