RUTHFULLY YOURS

Last year Breitbart editor Milo Yiannopoulos launched his “Dangerous Faggot Tour” on campuses across the United States. As it turned out, the tour did prove dangerous for Yiannopoulos and all supporters of free speech.

At Rutgers, where Yiannopoulos titled his lecture “How the Progressive Left Is Destroying American Education,” protesters smeared themselves with fake blood. “What they’ve demonstrated,” Yiannopoulos said, “is that they are incapable of being exposed to new ideas.”

At DePaul University, Black Lives Matter literally took over the event. Enraged activists harassed Yiannopoulos on stage and chanting “black lives matter,” “dump that Trump” and “build a wall.”

South Florida Gay News reported that “Florida Atlantic University is too dangerous for a ‘dangerous faggot.’” Student organizers “threatened to bring firearms to the talk or blow up the venue. Threats were also made to FAU students.” So Yiannopoulos was unable to deliver his speech about “How Feminism Hurts Women.”

Protesters issued similar threats at many colleges and the violence mounted a surge when Yiannopoulos brought his tour to California campuses. Those have long served as a sanctuary for political correctness, with official approval.

University of California President Janet Napolitano, a Democrat, is former Arizona Governor and Obama’s Department of Homeland Security boss. Napolitano considers statements such as “America is the land of opportunity” and “I believe the most qualified person should get the job” to be unacceptable “microagressions.” In that climate, UC students don’t want to hear different points of view from allegedly “controversial” speakers.

Under the politically correct regime, the default position is that such speakers should not be heard at all. So no surprise that soi disant progressives would deploy mindless violence against Yiannopoulos, who is on record that the campus “rape culture” is a myth. He is also critical of Islam, and the University of California maintains a Center for Race and Gender that includes “Islamophobia Studies.”

When the dangerous faggot tour showed up at UCLA, protesters blocked both entrances and taped up banners reading “Bruins Against Hate.” Other students duct-taped their mouths shut and paraded around with feminist signs. Inside protesters chanted “Build that wall.” As Ari Lieberman noted, radicals clashed with the police and a bomb threat forced evacuation of the building.

Undaunted, Milo Yiannopoulos continued the tour north to the University of California at Davis. Before he showed up, the Sacramento Bee called him and former pharmaceutical executive Martin Shkreli, “two of the past year’s most divisive public figures.” Yiannopolous was identified as “gay” and aligned with “the ultra-conservative ‘alt-right’ movement.” He was on a “crusade” against “social justice warriors” and “has already ignited violent protests on multiple college campuses.” Actually, as across the nation, it was the leftist protesters who ignited the violence.

According to a Washington Post report, protesters threatened the lives of police and students alike, and menaced UC Davis property as well. Protesters shrouded their faces in bandanas and yelled “Get the fuck out of here! Stay the fuck out!” and even “You faggots!” Another yelled “Get these fascists out of here.”

The event did not come off, but Yiannopolous denied reports that the campus Republicans had made the call. As the videos confirm, the old-line establishment media failed to convey the extent of the violence.

Campus Republicans also invited Yiannopoulos to the University of Washington, the last stop on the Dangerous Faggot Tour. On January 20, inauguration day for president Donald Trump, the UW campus hosted the tour’s most bizarre event.

“One man was shot and wounded, several people were hit with paint and officers avoided flying bricks” the Seattle Times reported on January 20, when “Breitbart News editor and provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos addressed a crowd.” An unnamed shooter reportedly turned himself in and the victim was initially unidentified.

A January 25 Guardian story by Julia Carrie Wong, reporting from San Francisco did not identify the victim, “a member of the Industrial Workers of the World, a leftwing union.” Wong cited an IWW statement that the 34-year-old attended “to oppose Milo’s hateful speech” and the “long-time anti-racist and anti-fascist activist” was “unarmed and attempting to de-escalate conflict” when he was shot.

The revolutionary IWW goes back to 1905 and includes leftist luminaries such as dues- paying member Noam Chomsky. The IWW charges that Donald Trump “has sparked fear and anger in our community, especially among those most marginalized, including immigrants, Muslims, people of color, women, the disabled, and LGBTQ populations.”

Wong did not note that the IWW has been a militant player in anti-Trump protests across the nation. She did write that “the shooter was a Trump supporter who sent a Facebook message to Yiannopoulos asking for an autograph.”

The report cited University of Washington police that two suspects turned themselves in, and that prosecutors recommended that they be released. The victim was later identified as computer engineer Josh Dukes. According to his attorney, he doesn’t want to press charges, and seeks to “engage in dialogue and a restorative justice process.”  For a shooting at a public, politically charged event, it was all very strange.

According to the Seattle Times the “provocative far-right editor” briefly left the stage after the shooting then returned minutes later saying “If we don’t continue, they have won.” That brought cheers from members of the audience, harassed by leftist protesters chanting “Nazi scum,” “No Trump, no KKK, no fascist USA,” and so forth.

After the speech “police told the audience to remove their pro-Trump hats and other gear before leaving the lecture hall.” They faced protesters with signs reading “We’re not OK with fascism” and telling reporters, “I don’t think this should be allowed.”

Campus leftist thought they prevailed but in the end they had no clue how thoroughly the “Dangerous Faggot Tour,” had trumped them. Despite the shouting, slogans and threats, Milo Yiannopoulos succeeded in exposing the campus left as totalitarian in thought and practice. Politically correct campus bosses remain a big part of the problem.

By establishing “free speech zones,” Thomas Sowell explains, they act as though granting a special favor. “The irony in this is that the Constitution already established a free speech zone. It covers the entire United States.”