Campus protests

I don't think outside people are or should be included in the university community norms I've talked about in this thread for the reasons I've mentioned.  As a practical matter, however, it is really hard to keep outside folks out if the inside people want them in.  Even if you have secure buildings (and by "secure" I basically mean "locked and you need a card/app/key to enter"), people can just hold the door open for others.  Even if students aren't trying to let in non-students, social norms are such that they generally aren't going to ask each other for ID or insist on closing the door as each individual enters, so my experience is that you end up with (usually harmless) non-students in ID buildings all the time.  The only other option is to have staff at the doors checking IDs, and that is probably cost-prohibitive to do at all buildings across campus for most colleges.

TL;DR -- it's hard to make college campuses secure.  

This right here. I am concerned about outside agitators who have their own agenda. This seems like a situation that could go from bad to worse, with lots of people getting hurt.

what rings in. my head is the lyrics "forgetting Ohio".. I know someone who was there when student protesters were killed.

uc berkeley is letting them protest and they are. no violence. can make their message known.

Actually they have a right to protest and hold parades. As much as I think it's totally disgusting, they do have the right. 

This is such a complicated subject. The students have a right to protest. But I feel like a lot of this is leaning into antisemitism territory. Chanting to burn down a city? That crosses the line. I'm really concerned about what some of these students are listening to. 

I've always said that the speech you agree with is not the speech that needs protection. The legal test is you can't threaten and you can't incite violence. Peaceful protest, fine. Signs describing your issue, fine. The KKK held a quiet rally on a street corner in broad daylight when I lived in NC. They weren't disruptive, didn't threaten anyone overtly, nor did they call for violence. They even got a permit. Gotta let them do it even though it's abhorrent.

Palestinians have both threatened and incited violence against Jews. Showing up to "counter-protest" is just picking a fight so pro-Israeli counter-protestors are in the wrong, too. The Palestinians who want to protest peacefully haven't done enough to distance themselves from Hamas, the elected government. Palestinians elected the people who murdered innocent people on October 7. These weren't some radical fringe. How are we supposed to find sympathy for their cause? I'm reading a book written from the Palestinian POV in an attempt to understand where the common ground but I'm not finding it.

The same way ee ELECTED people who are taking away our rights over our bodies?

You can be anti-Israel (a country with unpopular current policies and actions) without being anti-Jewish (a people). Similarly, one can be pro-Palestinian without being Pro-Hamas.

I feel like it's not really worth it to try and have a conversation about this because any anti-Israel comments are "anti-Semitic" although that's not always the case. And there's are certainly opportunistic racist anti-Semites who are taking advantage of these protests for their own political gain.

Usually anyone who wants to remain uninvolved and neutral will state "this situation is so difficult" and back away.

I personally feel the US should stay out of it because we haven't yet been able to fix it and never will. I have long thought and wondered about this situation, what gives Israel the right to claim that land? What gives Texas the right to ban Mexicans from what used to be their land? The US vs Native Americans? It's always "we won the war". No other answer. It's just...the way of humans. There will never be total peace on this planet because that's not the way human biology works.

What bothers me about the police presence at some universities is that it's an overwhelming display of force designed to terrorize the protestors into going away. To my knowledge, there were no threats or violence at the Austin protest, yet Abbott sent tons of DPS officers in riot gear. In another state there were snipers with rifles trained on the protestors.

Seems reminiscent of the protests in 2020 where everything was often or mostly peaceful until the police showed up and started throwing tear gas.

There was a protest at my kid's large university here in Texas the other day. No cops other than the usual campus police. Everything was peaceful. But we're not in the public eye enough for Abbott to want to make a big show of force by sending out the riot gear, I suppose. Everything is a campaign stunt with him.

I'm not sure if this was mentioned elsewhere, but the SCOTUS just upheld a law in three states, including Texas, that allows protest and rally organizers to be sued for damage/violence caused by participants. This has the effect of silencing protest, of course, because it only takes one person to cost organizers a lot of money. And in some cases, that one person might be a police officer.

I do not condone violence, threats or terrorism. I do notice that shouting Burn down Tel Aviv is considered worse than actually burning down Gaza.

It's all horrible. Both sides hate each other. There is so much hate. There will never be peace. It's a vicious cycle. 

I have a question that will likely seem ridiculous. Please remember English is not my first language and sometimes I have a hard time articulating what I mean.

Some people seem to be equating Hamas and Palestine and then others say Hamas and Palestinians are not the same at all. Isn't the first one like saying MAGA and Americans are the same? MAGAS are a group of Americans, but not all Americans are MAGA. Hamas is a radical group of Palestinians. Right? I am trying very hard to understand the conflict and that is one of the things that is hard for me to grasp and making reading about it hard to get through. Some articles seem to use the Palestinians and Hamas interchangeably.

Please be kind. I am trying very hard to understand what is going on and seeing the Antisemitism is very upsetting.

Who said that?

Large anti-war protest in Tel Aviv tonight.