Wednesday, February 8, 2017

Berkeley Law School Alumnus: We Are Happy With the Results of the Recent Violence

By Robert Wenzel


Organizers of the anti-Milo Yiannopoulos demonstration last week at UC Berkeley that ended in $100,000 worth of window-breaking chaos declared it a “stunningly successful” protest, reports the San Francisco Chronicle.

“We are happy with the results,” said UC Berkeley Law School alumnus Ronald Cruz of the group By Any Means Necessary, or BAMN. “We were able to meet Mr. Yiannopoulos’ fascist message with massive resistance.”

An estimated 150 black bloc anarchists attacked police with rocks and fireworks and used barricades to smash windows at the student union Feb. 1, forcing the cancellation of Yiannopoulos’ appearance.

“We are not affiliated with them, but were united in shutting down the Milo event,” Cruz said.

“Everyone played a part,” he said. “Some engaged in breaking windows — others held signs and made sure that the fascists and the police did not attack anyone.

“This was self-defense,” Cruz said. “Windows can be replaced. People can’t be.”

Meanwhile, on campus, Haruka Senju, the opinion editor for the student-run newspaper of  UC Berkeley, The Daily Californian, wrote an opinion piece, Violence as Self-Defense.

In the piece, he provided "a few arguments in favor of the use of violence in protests."

The points he made were delivered via quotes from others from the Berkeley community who justified the violence, including  becasue:
  •   "asking people to maintain peaceful dialogue with those who legitimately do not think their lives matter is a violent act."
  • "The bloc was made up of people with the most to fight for and the most to lose."
  • "I put my safety and my freedom on the line because letting Yiannopoulos speak was more terrifying to me than potential injury or arrest"
  • "The principle of freedom of speech should not be extended to envelop freedom of hate speech, for the unchecked normalization of hate speech will have real consequences."
And there you have it, the physical violence and destruction of property are justified by these lefties because they see some speech as a violent act that must be met with violence.

Bottom line: This is turning into a violent battle for power based on the notion that central power must be gained. This is far from an advance in the direction of liberty where NAP and private property are respected.

This is a battle between the out of power left, who will resort to the streets to do battle and the in power populist right. This no doubt will eventually lead to Trump using the power of the state to battle the left.

This is not a libertarian battle.  Libertarians must look at this battle with shock and disgust. The one saving grace is that ultimately ideas rule and the central planning thinking of these battlers, on both sides, is faulty. Libertarians uniquely understand this. It is only through a broader-based understanding of what libertarians know that the battle will cease. Judging by the predominant thinking in America today, however, the violent quest to be in control of central power will not end anytime soon.

Robert Wenzel is Editor & Publisher of  EconomicPolicyJournal.com and Target Liberty. He also writes EPJ Daily Alert and is author of The Fed Flunks: My Speech at the New York Federal Reserve Bank. Follow him on twitter:@wenzeleconomics and on LinkedIn.

8 comments:

  1. "This is not a libertarian battle. Libertarians must look at this battle with shock and disgust."

    I don't think Milo belongs to either group as you've defined them. He's a provocateur, sure, but he wields only words. Though I don't endorse all his views, I consider him a "good guy".

    You're right, of course, that Trump and his minions may get involved, but to the extent that it involves protecting speech against clubs, I'm in favor of it.

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  2. His last name is Cruz, what do you expect? The entire Hispanic world is plagued with violence & left wing ideology, and they are bringing it here.

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  3. I often wonder if, at some point, from a political survival standpoint, libertarians will have to pick a side. Neutrality in the face of aggressive violence may not be an option. I get the sense these violent leftists are fundamentally opposed to the concepts of liberty, individualism, voluntarism, and free markets. To quote Mike Tyson, "everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face."

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  4. The future does not belong to the victors, it belongs to the survivors.

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  5. There's a really hysterical reaction to this relatively minor episode going on inside the libertarian movement, and that alone serves the state's interests. Some important commentators have even said that this is the greatest battle of libertarianism right now, and they can't believe that some are sitting on the sidelines.

    This is such a minor incident on the scale of incidents that it's almost not even worth noting. I'm supposed to go crazy over this, meanwhile Trump probably had some <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/01/yemen-strike-eight-year-old-american-girl-killed-al-awlaki> little girl killed on the other side of the planet today. </a> Right, get real people. The state is the real enemy, not some bandito baristas.

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  6. I think I get it now- these window breakers have been reading Paul Krugman and they think that by breaking windows and destroying private property they can both shut down opposing viewpoints and give the community an economic boost. After all, think of all the money being brought in to replace the glass!

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  7. These protesters apparently aren't familiar with the term "blowback." When you've turned people like Milo and Ben Shapiro into characters the public empathizes with then you're team fucked up somewhere in game planning.

    The guy has many Youtube videos with over 1 million views. Him speaking at your university to a few hundred people means nothing. Now you've put this story (and Milo's name) in front of the entire country. Thousands of people who have never otherwise heard of him will now go watch his videos and see the violent tactics of the entitled, out of touch left. Nice job weirdo Weather Underground wannabe losers, you are the best recruiters for the alt-right since Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.

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