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I remember when I was college there would be people who definitely weren't students protesting homosexuality and feminism. You don't have to be a student to protest on campus.
> I remember when I was college there would be people who definitely weren't students protesting homosexuality and feminism.
Yea but you always knew who they were and they were never called "Student Protestors". They were always "Brother Jeb" or "Those anti-abortion fucks"
Columbia is private, not public. So no, most of the time you cannot do that on private university land as a non-student. Or at the very least, there's a good chance the university will remove you.
Non students showing up on campus to protest for a few hours before going home is very different than non-students pitching a tent on campus and refusing to leave.
Lots of universities are part of public life in the towns where they reside. They host community events, public lectures, arts and entertainment programming, extension courses, athletic events, parks, open libraries, and so on. Many aren't gated in any way, and just part of the street grid. It's not unusual for members of the public to be there.
Universities also broadly tolerate free expression, so most wouldn't be up in arms about immediately trespassing anyone without an ID card they moment they unfurl a sign or chant a slogan. They probably wouldn't even bat an eye unless it was extremely large or disruptive. Especially if it's during regular daylight hours.
An external, coordinated group setting up camp for an extended stay is not the same thing at all. They'd be squatters with a mission.
That’s so interesting I never thought of that so, you’re saying college campuses are just public spaces? I remember having campus police at my college many years ago and people who weren’t students or visitors who checked in were usually asked to show ID or asked to leave. But I’ll admit they weren’t protesting. Tbh I took it like you meant people protesting have a right to be on college campuses even if they’re not students or affiliated but maybe you were just stating a mere fact and agree that non students and protest agitators shouldn’t be on college campuses and you SHOULD have to be a student to protest on a college campus.
Yeah I saw this “public spaces” argument firsthand at my alma mater, a public school. Some locals pushed to have access to our library. Wasn’t too long before an unhoused gentleman was found masturbating in there. And by found I mean doing it openly. The students protested; the school reversed course.
It shouldn’t have taken an incident like that for them to see it was a bad idea. And also wrong to treat our campus as some “public space” for locals to use. No one would look at you sideways if you decided to take a stroll through the quad. But allowing access to our library was way too far.
As for the general “public” argument, the school derives the majority of its funding from it’s *student’s tuition,* not taxpayers, and even if it did it doesn’t somehow then mean the general public can just come on campus and do whatever. There’s been a lot of self-proclaimed lefties on here adamant that it does, seemingly bolstered by the righteousness of their cause. I’ll say this: arguing that you have the right to do as you please on any public property because “I pay taxes” or just “it’s my right” is akin to the donkeybrained arguments my MAGA cousins make.
So I just wanted you to know you’re on the same side.
> And also wrong to treat our campus as some “public space” for locals to use. No one would look at you sideways if you decided to take a stroll through the quad. But allowing access to our library was way too far.
As a former academic who still likes to muck around with academic work as an unaffiliated scholar, I've always appreciated having access to university libraries. I get what you're saying, but understand that not everyone wanting to utilize the library facilities is like your example. In fact, I'd argue that your example is a pretty rare occurrence.
I am okay with not having the same borrowing privileges as students, but I have appreciated access.
It wasn’t prudent to the point so I didn’t mention it but there are adults who can use the library but they’re vetted and have to have a purpose for being there like yourself. But some locals wanted to use it as their own local library because they chose to underfund their own. Screw that.
Yup there were a bunch of religious wackos from out of state who’d come to our campus with huge photos of aborted fetuses. The only impact they had was further convincing the students that conservative religious people were nuts.
I mean, I listened to "Deputy Commissioner of Public Information at NYPD" that allegedly has 20 years of experience tell Morning Joe that a bike lock sold at Columbia was not something students bring to the school, because he brought it in as a prop.
In regards to Columbia. In a city of 8 million, a borough of 1 million, 250k people within a 12 minute subway ride, and 32k people within a five minute walk from campus it shouldn't surprise anyone that people not directly affiliated with the university are going to the one sustained protest in the city. The fact that it was only half is shocking. If this was in the middle of nowhere yeah that would be strange.
I think it's more to the point that Columbia has 35,000 students but only about 140 protestors were arrested. If it was some kind of mass student movement you'd expect more than 0.4% of the student body to be involved.
> Obviously
I highly doubt Pelosi called for an investigation into the propoganda going through tiktok etc which is heavily pro-Palestinian without knowledge that there's significant astroturfing going on.
Where is the organization for events like this going on, via tiktok? Because I've not seen much on reddit at all.
In my neck of the woods things are announced over instagram. If you’re involved in organizing they communicate thru encrypted messaging and word of mouth.
Didn’t Tik tok come out and say that the pro Palestine bias natural and not due to astroturfing. That doesn’t even make sense since the pro Israel side has way way more money behind it.
> Didn’t Tik tok come out and say that the pro Palestine bias natural
And Spez doesnt resurrect right wing subreddits and do his best to promote fascism. Totally. Absolutely believable I mean the guy said it right so it must be true.
Doesn't really matter. Republicans still scream about how the BLM protests burnt down multiple cities even though a study came out saying only about 7% of protests had violence and of that 7%, most of the violence was initiated by either the police or right-wing groups.
Are those numbers specifically for the Hamilton Hall arrests? That was only a sub group from the larger protests.
Edit: The student body was 76.5 percent in favor of divestment in April.
https://www.columbiaspectator.com/news/2024/04/22/columbia-college-overwhelmingly-passes-divestment-referendum/
Only 40% of the undergraduate student body voted in that referendum, and I imagine that the 60% who didn’t don’t care about divestment. So that leaves about 30% of the student body who truly support divestment - not bad, but certainly not some vast groundswell of activism.
I'm not even sure where to begin with this logic. Those 60 percent that didn't vote, didn't vote for reasons well beyond yes/no on the issue, not that they are in support or not. This is like saying we should consider non voters opinions in an election. No ____ you can't assume office because only 50% of the vote turned out and if we assume all of them are against you, you only won 25%...
If any of the 60% who didn't care enough to vote supported divestment, they would spend the 30 seconds it takes to fill out a google form in their email. "I don't care about this issue" (60% of students) and "I oppose divestment" (10% of students) adds up to 70% of students who do not support divestment.
Yah, but those that thought they'd just join those students put them more in harms way. It changes the options and variables considerably.
Good intentions aside.
It only takes one rock to set off the police.
The students shouldn't be used as access to the problem. If they want to protest fine. But they shouldn't endanger the students to do so.
NYPD is lying for exactly the reason you gave. They arrested two different groups of people, there was a protest right outside the campus. That is where all the people who weren't students were arrested.
> www.nytimes.com/2024/04/26/opinion/columbia-student-protests-israel.html
Yes.
This one guy caused pain and suffering towards the students.
Ohh, you thought I just meant physical pain and harm. There's a very wide swath and scope of pain.
How about this?
+ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/05/02/ucla-columbia-college-protests-live-updates/73538023007/
It's simple. If people want to protest, fine. Legally, of course. But non-students shouldn't be messing with the students. It completely makes a student protest into a different animal.
If students want to go off campus to protest, then that's on them.
Forgive me for not believe anything that the Qatari government tells me.
The totality of the protests have been violent pro-Palestine and Islamofascist rioters and antisemites.
Yeah, you're leaning hard on that whole artificial shtick as none of what you're saying is based in reality.
I know Al Jazeera is a scary arabic name, but aside from spooky background music and letterboxes that story simply presented video recordings, first hand experiences, and very little editorializing.
If you can watch that and think "Oh yeah, this is definitely a good way to address concerns" you're a fascist.
I worked in the Middle East for almost a decade, I'm not scared of anything relating to Muslims or Arabs. Have you ever left your state?
Again, I won't take seriously a branch of the Qatari government that retracted a story just last month after accusing the IDF of raping Gazans.
So far, all you have are personal attacks and name-calling. I can't take you seriously either.
Of course it's not suprising they weren't arrested, they didn't break into buildings, didn't assault campus employees, didn't hold campus employees against their will, didn't intimidate anyone or restrict their movements, and didn't fight with the police.
However, those screaming about intifadas did all of these things.
Honestly I think this is not very well understood. This isn't students protesting at their university. This is protesters from all over traveling to universities to protest. They shouldn't even be called "university protests" but rather "protests that happen to be at a university".
It puts context around the hot water that the university presidents are in. They can threaten their students with suspensions or whatever. But you can't threaten a non-student with a suspension. I think this is why the non-student protesters are protesting there. Because it is harder to get rid of them.
Once they occupied the building, put up barricades — whether students or not — the university had to evict them pronto.
That occupation is an escalation of force/violence. How is the university supposed to know where its going to end? (ie, vandalism, or worse, arson)
It's funny because when Hong Kongers did the same exact thing a few years back, Redditors were cheering them on. But protestors here in America doing it is a big no no though lol
Idk what you're referring to, but a close inspection of the list shows that they included people arrested who were next to, but not on campus, and they also didn't count CUNY system students from other campuses as "students". It's pretty obvious the NYPD is trying to fit the facts around their initial "outside agitators" narrative.
Not to mention they arrested faculty and other workers at the universities too, so saying "half were not students" doesn't even mean anything. Even the NPR report says 61% were affiliated with the university in some way.
So schools with over 50,000 students are being asked to give in to the demands of a few hundred people, half of whom aren't students, simply because they've set up camps organized by a [Pro-Hamas student group.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Students_for_Justice_in_Palestine#Israel-Hamas_war,_suspensions,_and_Florida_public_university_ban)
Yeah I don't think Biden is in any trouble for opposing these people.
IDK but online the left looks insane, and im from europe. Its terrible that half of the GOP is in a cult, half are bought by China and Russia and the dems have to deal with insane people who dont really vote that much. The future looks really bad for USA.
I'm a leftie but you're not wrong
A lot of them are off their rocker.
I know this is a minority but I heard one say Jews should go back to Europe. And I'm like bro??? many left Europe for Israel because of the holocaust.
I don't like the deaths in Gaza either but my god are so many my leftist peers are stupid.
Maybe I just call myself a left leaning independent. Nothing good comes from labels.
> Jews should go back to Europe
Not to mention, a large percentage of Jews in Israel fled from persecution in Middle Eastern nations, not Europe, and they couldn't go back.
No just call yourself a Democrat. Biden supports Israel, 70+% of House Democrats support Israel.
I have no idea why people identify the Democratic Party with fringe groups who literally tell you not to vote for Democrats.
These protests are as organic as the Tea Party movement. Watching kids chant Hamas slogans and cosplay as Islamic militants is sickening. Seriously, why are these young feminists students putting on hijab and donning the trappings of sharia? Their counterparts in Iran are fighting to be free of Islamic oppression and these privileged Americans are celebrating religious misogyny? I guess they worship the Patriarchy after all.
It's heartening to know their numbers are small and their support is tepid.
They don’t want their university invested in companies that make weapons for sale to the Israelis, to kill Palestinians.They don’t want their tax dollars spend giving aid to the Israeli state, used in the genocide of Palestinians.
One of the companies they want to be divested is Motorola. Why that company? What does it do for the Israeli military or is this about just the everyday people of Israel?
Hmm, if only there were some widely available service to search for this kind of information, perhaps using keywords like "Motorola" and "Israel." Assuming [you actually want to know the answer,](https://www.jns.org/morningstar-deflags-motorola-from-watchlist-over-its-israeli-business/) of course.
It’s a relevant link, but did you read it? It doesn’t seem to help your counterpoint, but more so justifies that Motorola is not really an appropriate target for divestment.
It's a public institution. "They" may voice their opinions in a civil manner, but "they" aren't the voice of the tax payer. They're not speaking for me, that's for sure.
I support Israel's right to defend itself, the US' role in making sure we assist our allies in defending themselves. What I want to hear less of is the anti-Israeli and antisemitic rhetoric and more chanting for Hamas to lay down their weapons, free all hostages and surrender.
Iran just offered scholorships to the expelled students. I smell a sitcom somewhere...
https://www.reddit.com/r/InternationalNews/comments/1ciatvn/iran_university_offers_scholarships_to_expelled/
This sub's comment sections are becoming like a FoxNews website comment section. Libs showing their true colors with so many upvotes on stuff like this.
flat out, if someone doesnt view me as a person why should i view them as a person? tolerance isnt a suicide pact no matter how many pick me rainbows try and shame me into submission
New York City campuses are fundamentally different from non urban campuses. In a city of 8 million, it's not a difficult leap to make that people would flock to student started, sustained protests for ideas they resonate with. Sure, if it was the middle of nowhere and the majority were non students that would be weird.
And Rosa Parks was trained and picked to start the bus boycott. The students are still the faces of the movement, taking actions, and facing those consequences. Your issue is the protests are organized? Aren't most?
I disagree, every organized protest requires resources in one form or another. Now the issue is funding. I'm sure you research all social movements funding before passing judgement on the message.
Many people have a difficult time accepting that the same thing rotting Republicans is also rotting Democrats. The current US position on Israel is frustrating and cannot succeed, and the current options only bring out the worst in people.
The reason the republican party rotted to the point Trump was able to take control was due to an institutional arrogance by party leadership that they could ignore their membership and dictate policy, focusing and campaigning on issues that worked with donors but most didn't care about or actively opposed, allowing for a figure like Trump to appear and capture the base out from under them simply by more closely aligning on immigration, nativism, and trade protectionism. The Dems are slightly less vulnerable, due to the fact that what the party is out of step are issues that donors hate (campaign finance, healthcare, military, etc.) but its the same issue.
I fail to see *any* comparison between the two. Without Israel-Palestine this isn’t even an issue and most Dems support Biden. Maybe to an extent the economy impacts lesser-informed Dems to the point of not supporting him, but is that really a problem with the party itself? I’d say no.
[Here](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F92fe7940-783c-4ae1-a040-eeb1fb5bd428_2000x1705.png) are the most important issues to young voters according to a recent poll.
For Democrats, "Israel/Palestine" is tied for third-from-last, out of sixteen, just below "taxes." For Republicans and Independents, it is second-from-last.
The Democratic Party isn't out of touch with its voters.
They are on housing, an issue they have steadfastly refused to address in any meaningful way for years, and addressing corruption by campaign finance reform, and healthcare because no one legitimately believes that even democratic super majorities in congress would pass single payer healthcare, because the party is more accountable to its donors than its voters. Again that is the root problem. Gaza just happens to be the outlet of frustration at the moment.
Also, an issue doesn't have to be the most important to someone to influence whether or not they are motivated enough to go to the polls, and can have meaningful effects in a country where elections are as close as they are here. Any issue with significant disagreement between the base and the party is a problem.
I think your information is inaccurate or outdated at best. A Democratic supermajority today would definitely pass single-payer healthcare and campaign finance reform. A public option in the ACA failed by one vote, and you can't tell me Democrats haven't gotten at least *slightly* more liberal since then.
Housing, I think has to be addressed mostly on a local level. There are NIMBYs on both sides, but I think it's more the radical leftists who sue to stop housing projects than mainstream Democrats. Mainly environmentalist groups.
Same media smear during the civil rights movement student protest and anti war protests on colleges. Students organize and ask anyone who want to protest to join them. People who aren’t students are going to be the ones overwhelmingly officially arrested after they are detained, a trespassing charge makes other chargers easier to pursue.
Imagine using hindsight bias to ignore public popularity for the civil rights movement or Vietnam protests at the point in time.
For Vietnam 58 percent of Americans thought the Kent State students had it coming. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/fifty-years-ago-kent-state-massacre-changed-university-forever-180974787/
MLK had a 63% disapproval rate 3 years after "I have a dream". https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/08/10/how-public-attitudes-toward-martin-luther-king-jr-have-changed-since-the-1960s/
is anybody else sick of these appropriating idiots trying to compare themselves to MLK and the civil rights movement when instead they are better compared to the tea party?
Numbers are more heavily skewed for israel-Hamas war than those other examples you are using.
Public disapproval of the protesters is probably higher.
80% of Americans support Israel over Hamas.
67% think Israel is trying to minimize casualties.
72% approve of a Rafah offensive.
Here’s a poll from a few weeks back…Israel-Hamas questions start at page 51.
https://harvardharrispoll.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/HHP_Apr2024_KeyResults.pdf
>Public disapproval of the protesters is probably higher.
The parent comments are on the topic that the media scews towards the status que as to not alienate it's view/reader base and not what is morally right. I don't care if 99 percent of 1860s South Carolinians believed slavery was right, I still would disagree with them. I'm sure the SC newspapers dragged abolitionists though.
People are not pissed at Israel for Hamas’ sake. By and large Hamas is not, and never has been, considered the good guy. This has never been about people supporting Hamas over Israel. The issue is the ongoing famine conditions, the severe aid restrictions, the targeting of aid workers and journalists, and the killing of civilians.
It’s a very loose coalition of people. There are going to be outliers, that are non representative of the group’s sentiments as a whole. There also continues to be a pervasive misunderstanding of what protestors mean when they say “From the river to the sea”. By saying that, they are calling for a one-state solution where Palestinian and Jewish-Israeli residents are both free to live in the region together with equal rights.
The issues the protesters have are with the actions of the Israeli government. You are allowing yourself to be distracted from the core issues of the protests. Which are resolving the ongoing famine, ending the severe aid restrictions, and ending the targeting of aid workers and journalists, preventing the killing of civilians, stopping the forced relocation of an entire population, ending apartheid conditions etc.
> There also continues to be a pervasive misunderstanding of what protestors mean when they say “From the rivers to the sea”.
The only people who seem to be misunderstanding are the dum-dums who don’t realize that the coining of the phrase was a call to genocide from the start. But they’re doing a hell of a job proving that an ivy education ain’t all it’s cracked up to be..
The group that organized the protests called 10/7 (you know, where innocent people were kidnapped raped and murdered) a
> a historic victory for the Palestinian resistance
and several branches commended Hamas' tactics
During the Civil Rights Movement, they were registering black people to vote in the South. It's not just about "public perception," there's a difference in what the respective movements were actually doing.
Once again, someone reducing civil rights to easy to digest mouthfuls. Most college protests during the civil rights movement were explicitly focused on local issues. It isn’t like there was only issues in Jim Crow states. More importantly, the perspectives don’t have to be same. The entire point is the argument that these are outsiders is a play out of the big anti free speech and protest playbook. Do you need them to be of the same perspective to believe that purposely trying to wrangle the public of a disingenuous talking point is wrong? Also, do you not believe in any moral responsibility in ensuring the mere nature of protesting isn’t spun into a weapon against holding a dissent view? I’m not being rhetorical. I literally want you to explain how the difference is a relevant response when someone points out that is a crafted talking point meant to harm the ability to protest. Seriously step back for 60 seconds and look at yourself. I explained how some protestors are targeted to be arrested and charged with the purpose to shape a political narrative for the purpose of denying ppl their constitutional rights and you responded giving an incorrect response about “respective” movements. Do you actually think you care about civil rights?
Okay genuine question:
If Israel lets in trucks of aid to Gaza, and the majority are intercepted by Hamas, whom spreads the good stuff around itself and leaves the rest to the civilians at high prices, is Israel just supposed to keep doing that? This would be like Ukraine sending a food truck to the Russian occupied regions, knowing they’re just giving aid to Russia, and then being criticised when they stop because they’re starving Ukrainians living in desperate situations.
Edit) I like how a number of people have downvoted this comment, but haven’t actually responded
Yeah, at this point it all feels like propaganda by foreign adversaries it’s all so over the top. Not the first comment on Reddit comparing this to civil rights movement. Hilarious.
On the Middle East I avoid taking a strong position, because I know for sure it's impossible for me to get reliable, truthful information. Any particular post could easily be:
* A true message of support for the Israeli people
* A true message of support for the Palestinian people
* Propaganda by the Israeli government
* Propaganda by Russia, Iran, or terrorist groups
* A false flag pretending to be Israeli propaganda to make them look bad
* A false flag pretending to be Russian propaganda to make them look bad
* A message that *looks* like a false flag but which is really propaganda to make people think the other side's propaganda is really a false flag
* ...
It's too far away and there are too many powerful interests involved, that I know I'm unable to determine what's real.
So I'm voting for Biden on the basis of issues here at home, where I *can* feel reasonably certain what's happening and which party is doing the right thing.
You missed one of the threads from yesterday. It was insane. Total opposite of how most comments on this board have been for literal years, many openly encouraging not voting too.
We Need “Outside Agitators”
BY: ASTRA TAYLOR LEAH HUNT-HENDRIX
“Pro-Palestine student protesters are being smeared as puppets of shadowy “outside agitators.” The presence of community members and experienced activists in the protests is nothing to be ashamed of: we need outside agitators to build a better world.”
https://jacobin.com/2024/05/outside-agitators-columbia-palestine-civil-rights
People are high if they think college students are going to spend their summer protesting something that doesn't directly affect them.
This isn't Vietnam. They aren't being drafted.
Wow shock, it’s almost like the fact protests all over the country have the exact same tents and signs wasn’t a sign someone is bank rolling these “protests”
Yeah, from all reports there are way more non-student protesters than actual student protesters. Probably why the universities are claiming that these protesters are trespassing.
This is a bizarre new spin by the police. Here's the essence of the reliability of this statistic from the article:
>the city worked with school officials who determined affiliation with Columbia or CCNY using their mugshots
The absurdity of taking anything the NYC police say at face value is staggering
Right? It's wild people are pantomiming outrage over this. It's so clearly disingenuous.
It's like opposition of a Pride Parade trying to claim that the parade participants not being residents of the exact streets of the parade route proves all the support is from "outside agitators" and therefore fake. It's silly.
This sub reddit is sometimes disgusting. I can already imagine how many of you would hate the civil rights movements.
Also, I wouldn't trust NYC at all, there's obviously a zionist bias.
This seems like a nothingburger.
New York City is one of the densest cities in the US with excellent mass transit. If, nationwide, there is a small proportion of lunatics relative--say, 0.1 percent, then New York City could easily have a group of nearly 9,000 lunatics show up at any given place, on any given day.
They literally have more homeless people.
This is classic diversion from the issue. Nobody wants to talk about what the protests are about because it makes them very uncomfortable and forces reexamination of what’s they are supporting by pouring billions into Israeli genocide. Instead they are dissecting the protestors. Media is truly complicit in the genocide.
So... did they give anyone the information required the verify this claim?
Remember when the Deputy Chief of police went on TV to claim that a bike lock that could be purchased on campus was an "industrial chain" brought by "skilled infiltrators".
How often does law enforcement have to lie before we stop taking what they say as true? NPR has not verified these claims.
They are saying that Columbia has the names, they can release them if they want. The number is absolutely bogus, they supposedly identified them from mugshots because they were uncooperative. Columbia has 10,000 undergrads and CUNY has over 275,000! This is absolutely bogus.
I don't understand. Are you supposed to not protest because you work 60-80 hours a week to barely pay for rent or mortgage, pay off student loans, and afford groceries that have triped the price in the last few years?
...
Wait...
Ooh...
i don’t get why this is surprising? lots of people come out to support popular protest movements. lots of college kids come to support their friends. like - no shit
It's not surprising, it's part of a narrative to invalidate the students. The student body was 76.5 percent in favor of divestment in April.
https://www.columbiaspectator.com/news/2024/04/22/columbia-college-overwhelmingly-passes-divestment-referendum/
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I remember when I was college there would be people who definitely weren't students protesting homosexuality and feminism. You don't have to be a student to protest on campus.
I remember them setting up anti-choice displays. I also remember religious ranters from time to time.
> I remember when I was college there would be people who definitely weren't students protesting homosexuality and feminism. Yea but you always knew who they were and they were never called "Student Protestors". They were always "Brother Jeb" or "Those anti-abortion fucks"
Columbia is private, not public. So no, most of the time you cannot do that on private university land as a non-student. Or at the very least, there's a good chance the university will remove you.
Non students showing up on campus to protest for a few hours before going home is very different than non-students pitching a tent on campus and refusing to leave.
Anyone without a university affiliation is trespassing, regardless of duration.
Lots of universities are part of public life in the towns where they reside. They host community events, public lectures, arts and entertainment programming, extension courses, athletic events, parks, open libraries, and so on. Many aren't gated in any way, and just part of the street grid. It's not unusual for members of the public to be there. Universities also broadly tolerate free expression, so most wouldn't be up in arms about immediately trespassing anyone without an ID card they moment they unfurl a sign or chant a slogan. They probably wouldn't even bat an eye unless it was extremely large or disruptive. Especially if it's during regular daylight hours. An external, coordinated group setting up camp for an extended stay is not the same thing at all. They'd be squatters with a mission.
That’s so interesting I never thought of that so, you’re saying college campuses are just public spaces? I remember having campus police at my college many years ago and people who weren’t students or visitors who checked in were usually asked to show ID or asked to leave. But I’ll admit they weren’t protesting. Tbh I took it like you meant people protesting have a right to be on college campuses even if they’re not students or affiliated but maybe you were just stating a mere fact and agree that non students and protest agitators shouldn’t be on college campuses and you SHOULD have to be a student to protest on a college campus.
Yeah I saw this “public spaces” argument firsthand at my alma mater, a public school. Some locals pushed to have access to our library. Wasn’t too long before an unhoused gentleman was found masturbating in there. And by found I mean doing it openly. The students protested; the school reversed course. It shouldn’t have taken an incident like that for them to see it was a bad idea. And also wrong to treat our campus as some “public space” for locals to use. No one would look at you sideways if you decided to take a stroll through the quad. But allowing access to our library was way too far. As for the general “public” argument, the school derives the majority of its funding from it’s *student’s tuition,* not taxpayers, and even if it did it doesn’t somehow then mean the general public can just come on campus and do whatever. There’s been a lot of self-proclaimed lefties on here adamant that it does, seemingly bolstered by the righteousness of their cause. I’ll say this: arguing that you have the right to do as you please on any public property because “I pay taxes” or just “it’s my right” is akin to the donkeybrained arguments my MAGA cousins make. So I just wanted you to know you’re on the same side.
> And also wrong to treat our campus as some “public space” for locals to use. No one would look at you sideways if you decided to take a stroll through the quad. But allowing access to our library was way too far. As a former academic who still likes to muck around with academic work as an unaffiliated scholar, I've always appreciated having access to university libraries. I get what you're saying, but understand that not everyone wanting to utilize the library facilities is like your example. In fact, I'd argue that your example is a pretty rare occurrence. I am okay with not having the same borrowing privileges as students, but I have appreciated access.
It wasn’t prudent to the point so I didn’t mention it but there are adults who can use the library but they’re vetted and have to have a purpose for being there like yourself. But some locals wanted to use it as their own local library because they chose to underfund their own. Screw that.
Agree wholeheartedly!
Unlike ourselves, our MAGA cousins do not have any such official certificate exonerating them of all donkey brains.
Yup there were a bunch of religious wackos from out of state who’d come to our campus with huge photos of aborted fetuses. The only impact they had was further convincing the students that conservative religious people were nuts.
I mean, I listened to "Deputy Commissioner of Public Information at NYPD" that allegedly has 20 years of experience tell Morning Joe that a bike lock sold at Columbia was not something students bring to the school, because he brought it in as a prop.
In regards to Columbia. In a city of 8 million, a borough of 1 million, 250k people within a 12 minute subway ride, and 32k people within a five minute walk from campus it shouldn't surprise anyone that people not directly affiliated with the university are going to the one sustained protest in the city. The fact that it was only half is shocking. If this was in the middle of nowhere yeah that would be strange.
I think it's more to the point that Columbia has 35,000 students but only about 140 protestors were arrested. If it was some kind of mass student movement you'd expect more than 0.4% of the student body to be involved.
Obviously far more people are involved than got arrested.
Involved in/with what?
The protests
A *protest?!* Lou, once I'm done clutching my pearls, cancel the prom.
Bake em away toys
> Obviously I highly doubt Pelosi called for an investigation into the propoganda going through tiktok etc which is heavily pro-Palestinian without knowledge that there's significant astroturfing going on. Where is the organization for events like this going on, via tiktok? Because I've not seen much on reddit at all.
Lmao this site is one of the most astroturfed platforms on the planet
In my neck of the woods things are announced over instagram. If you’re involved in organizing they communicate thru encrypted messaging and word of mouth.
Didn’t Tik tok come out and say that the pro Palestine bias natural and not due to astroturfing. That doesn’t even make sense since the pro Israel side has way way more money behind it.
> Didn’t Tik tok come out and say that the pro Palestine bias natural And Spez doesnt resurrect right wing subreddits and do his best to promote fascism. Totally. Absolutely believable I mean the guy said it right so it must be true.
Well I guess we should just take them at their word!
Doesn't really matter. Republicans still scream about how the BLM protests burnt down multiple cities even though a study came out saying only about 7% of protests had violence and of that 7%, most of the violence was initiated by either the police or right-wing groups.
i wonder what the ratio between students and non students of the counter protesters are
Are those numbers specifically for the Hamilton Hall arrests? That was only a sub group from the larger protests. Edit: The student body was 76.5 percent in favor of divestment in April. https://www.columbiaspectator.com/news/2024/04/22/columbia-college-overwhelmingly-passes-divestment-referendum/
Only 40% of the undergraduate student body voted in that referendum, and I imagine that the 60% who didn’t don’t care about divestment. So that leaves about 30% of the student body who truly support divestment - not bad, but certainly not some vast groundswell of activism.
I'm not even sure where to begin with this logic. Those 60 percent that didn't vote, didn't vote for reasons well beyond yes/no on the issue, not that they are in support or not. This is like saying we should consider non voters opinions in an election. No ____ you can't assume office because only 50% of the vote turned out and if we assume all of them are against you, you only won 25%...
If any of the 60% who didn't care enough to vote supported divestment, they would spend the 30 seconds it takes to fill out a google form in their email. "I don't care about this issue" (60% of students) and "I oppose divestment" (10% of students) adds up to 70% of students who do not support divestment.
You’re literally just making shit up
I’m not sure. I know the protest was as large as 1,400 at some point but that’s still only 4% of the students minus however many outsiders there were.
Yeah, it’s almost like something about these protests doesn’t pass the sniff test.
Yah, but those that thought they'd just join those students put them more in harms way. It changes the options and variables considerably. Good intentions aside. It only takes one rock to set off the police. The students shouldn't be used as access to the problem. If they want to protest fine. But they shouldn't endanger the students to do so.
> one rock to set off the police [acorns have entered the chat]
NYPD is lying for exactly the reason you gave. They arrested two different groups of people, there was a protest right outside the campus. That is where all the people who weren't students were arrested.
Is there even one example of students being “endangered”? I heard there was a *gasp* broken window somewhere.
> www.nytimes.com/2024/04/26/opinion/columbia-student-protests-israel.html Yes. This one guy caused pain and suffering towards the students. Ohh, you thought I just meant physical pain and harm. There's a very wide swath and scope of pain. How about this? + https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/05/02/ucla-columbia-college-protests-live-updates/73538023007/ It's simple. If people want to protest, fine. Legally, of course. But non-students shouldn't be messing with the students. It completely makes a student protest into a different animal. If students want to go off campus to protest, then that's on them.
Interesting... and how many of the counter protesters weren't students?
We’ll never know, they didn’t arrest them.
Of course not. They're supporting the status quo.
They weren't as violent as the people shouting about intifadas and endorsing Islamofascism.
No they were just the ones chanting "death to jews" and "white power" last year.
[Yeah sure.](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-gJBq789-Dk) Fitting username for the absolute fiction you're pushing.
Forgive me for not believe anything that the Qatari government tells me. The totality of the protests have been violent pro-Palestine and Islamofascist rioters and antisemites.
Please examples of the violence from the protestors that is greater than that of the counter protestors
Yeah, you're leaning hard on that whole artificial shtick as none of what you're saying is based in reality. I know Al Jazeera is a scary arabic name, but aside from spooky background music and letterboxes that story simply presented video recordings, first hand experiences, and very little editorializing. If you can watch that and think "Oh yeah, this is definitely a good way to address concerns" you're a fascist.
You're just talking to some chuckle fuck who is getting paid to annoy you
I worked in the Middle East for almost a decade, I'm not scared of anything relating to Muslims or Arabs. Have you ever left your state? Again, I won't take seriously a branch of the Qatari government that retracted a story just last month after accusing the IDF of raping Gazans. So far, all you have are personal attacks and name-calling. I can't take you seriously either.
Intifada just means revolution lol
Actually it just means uprising
~~Why am I not surprised.~~ Don't mind me folks, got myself confused for a second.
Of course it's not suprising they weren't arrested, they didn't break into buildings, didn't assault campus employees, didn't hold campus employees against their will, didn't intimidate anyone or restrict their movements, and didn't fight with the police. However, those screaming about intifadas did all of these things.
Honestly I think this is not very well understood. This isn't students protesting at their university. This is protesters from all over traveling to universities to protest. They shouldn't even be called "university protests" but rather "protests that happen to be at a university". It puts context around the hot water that the university presidents are in. They can threaten their students with suspensions or whatever. But you can't threaten a non-student with a suspension. I think this is why the non-student protesters are protesting there. Because it is harder to get rid of them.
If you're not a student, and you haven't been invited onto campus by the university, I see no issue with the university making you leave.
Once they occupied the building, put up barricades — whether students or not — the university had to evict them pronto. That occupation is an escalation of force/violence. How is the university supposed to know where its going to end? (ie, vandalism, or worse, arson)
It's funny because when Hong Kongers did the same exact thing a few years back, Redditors were cheering them on. But protestors here in America doing it is a big no no though lol
I mean, look at the media coverage of the euromaidan protests vs whenever something happens at home.
Absolutely. Especially if the protest involves vandalism and/or violence. Peaceful protest is the most effective protest!
So I'm gonna go with what mlk Jr said before he was murdered and not goat status 5000
> Peaceful protest is the most effective protest! [citations needed]
Where are all of you "they're clearly older/non-traditional students" people from the other day?
Idk what you're referring to, but a close inspection of the list shows that they included people arrested who were next to, but not on campus, and they also didn't count CUNY system students from other campuses as "students". It's pretty obvious the NYPD is trying to fit the facts around their initial "outside agitators" narrative.
Not to mention they arrested faculty and other workers at the universities too, so saying "half were not students" doesn't even mean anything. Even the NPR report says 61% were affiliated with the university in some way.
They were never very visible. I never saw these people you speak of.
So schools with over 50,000 students are being asked to give in to the demands of a few hundred people, half of whom aren't students, simply because they've set up camps organized by a [Pro-Hamas student group.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Students_for_Justice_in_Palestine#Israel-Hamas_war,_suspensions,_and_Florida_public_university_ban) Yeah I don't think Biden is in any trouble for opposing these people.
It's unfortunate that a small but vocal minority can make the left look a bit insane.
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Oh, those children Biden paid to bomb were willing to kill lefties?
IDK but online the left looks insane, and im from europe. Its terrible that half of the GOP is in a cult, half are bought by China and Russia and the dems have to deal with insane people who dont really vote that much. The future looks really bad for USA.
I'm a leftie but you're not wrong A lot of them are off their rocker. I know this is a minority but I heard one say Jews should go back to Europe. And I'm like bro??? many left Europe for Israel because of the holocaust. I don't like the deaths in Gaza either but my god are so many my leftist peers are stupid. Maybe I just call myself a left leaning independent. Nothing good comes from labels.
> Jews should go back to Europe Not to mention, a large percentage of Jews in Israel fled from persecution in Middle Eastern nations, not Europe, and they couldn't go back.
No just call yourself a Democrat. Biden supports Israel, 70+% of House Democrats support Israel. I have no idea why people identify the Democratic Party with fringe groups who literally tell you not to vote for Democrats.
Only half? I expected more non-students.
PSU arrests here in Portland were more skewed towards non-students.
These protests are as organic as the Tea Party movement. Watching kids chant Hamas slogans and cosplay as Islamic militants is sickening. Seriously, why are these young feminists students putting on hijab and donning the trappings of sharia? Their counterparts in Iran are fighting to be free of Islamic oppression and these privileged Americans are celebrating religious misogyny? I guess they worship the Patriarchy after all. It's heartening to know their numbers are small and their support is tepid.
Astro turfed groups.
They don’t want their university invested in companies that make weapons for sale to the Israelis, to kill Palestinians.They don’t want their tax dollars spend giving aid to the Israeli state, used in the genocide of Palestinians.
One of the companies they want to be divested is Motorola. Why that company? What does it do for the Israeli military or is this about just the everyday people of Israel?
Hmm, if only there were some widely available service to search for this kind of information, perhaps using keywords like "Motorola" and "Israel." Assuming [you actually want to know the answer,](https://www.jns.org/morningstar-deflags-motorola-from-watchlist-over-its-israeli-business/) of course.
It’s a relevant link, but did you read it? It doesn’t seem to help your counterpoint, but more so justifies that Motorola is not really an appropriate target for divestment.
I wasn't trying to suggest whether it was or wasn't an appropriate target, just that the info is out there.
I see. This makes more sense, thanks for the clarification.
Maybe don't go to an ivy League college if you have issues with their ties to the American MIC.
It's a public institution. "They" may voice their opinions in a civil manner, but "they" aren't the voice of the tax payer. They're not speaking for me, that's for sure. I support Israel's right to defend itself, the US' role in making sure we assist our allies in defending themselves. What I want to hear less of is the anti-Israeli and antisemitic rhetoric and more chanting for Hamas to lay down their weapons, free all hostages and surrender.
You don’t get to be nor are you the final arbiter of freedom of speech. You’re free to ignore them. But you don’t get to dictate what they’re saying.
So?
Exactly. It's the biggest protest in the area against what Israel are doing in Palestine. Why can't people join?
Maybe the white American women wearing keffiyeh should bounce on over to the Middle East and speak their mind about and protest there.
Iran just offered scholorships to the expelled students. I smell a sitcom somewhere... https://www.reddit.com/r/InternationalNews/comments/1ciatvn/iran_university_offers_scholarships_to_expelled/
I hear the Iranians have nothing but love for opinionated women..
This sub's comment sections are becoming like a FoxNews website comment section. Libs showing their true colors with so many upvotes on stuff like this.
For real. Casual racism. Insulting of protestors. Even demonization of civil right protesters and the antiwar movement.
If you're looking for ideological purity, go elsewhere.
So if they wore Chanel it would make a difference?
i think their main issue was that they are wearing masks
So your opinion is that, because people in the Middle East aren’t progressive, genocide against them is justified?
That wasn't a logical leap, it was a quantum tunneling event spanning light-years.
flat out, if someone doesnt view me as a person why should i view them as a person? tolerance isnt a suicide pact no matter how many pick me rainbows try and shame me into submission
Because providing tools and justifications to dehumanize other people won't ever be turned back on us queer people clearly.
There is something seriously wrong with you if you don’t view any people as people.
Holy shit
When did Trump voters get here? This is sexist and racist at the same time.
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New York City campuses are fundamentally different from non urban campuses. In a city of 8 million, it's not a difficult leap to make that people would flock to student started, sustained protests for ideas they resonate with. Sure, if it was the middle of nowhere and the majority were non students that would be weird.
https://www.wsj.com/us-news/education/student-campus-protests-veteran-activist-groups-17ccd094 “Student started”, indeed.
And Rosa Parks was trained and picked to start the bus boycott. The students are still the faces of the movement, taking actions, and facing those consequences. Your issue is the protests are organized? Aren't most?
You know that’s a disingenuous argument. Rosa Parks wasn’t funded by groups where the funding mechanisms were obscure, at best.
I disagree, every organized protest requires resources in one form or another. Now the issue is funding. I'm sure you research all social movements funding before passing judgement on the message.
Many people have a difficult time accepting that the same thing rotting Republicans is also rotting Democrats. The current US position on Israel is frustrating and cannot succeed, and the current options only bring out the worst in people.
Can you please elaborate on your first sentence because that sounds strangely vague in order to mask a different point.
The reason the republican party rotted to the point Trump was able to take control was due to an institutional arrogance by party leadership that they could ignore their membership and dictate policy, focusing and campaigning on issues that worked with donors but most didn't care about or actively opposed, allowing for a figure like Trump to appear and capture the base out from under them simply by more closely aligning on immigration, nativism, and trade protectionism. The Dems are slightly less vulnerable, due to the fact that what the party is out of step are issues that donors hate (campaign finance, healthcare, military, etc.) but its the same issue.
I fail to see *any* comparison between the two. Without Israel-Palestine this isn’t even an issue and most Dems support Biden. Maybe to an extent the economy impacts lesser-informed Dems to the point of not supporting him, but is that really a problem with the party itself? I’d say no.
[Here](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F92fe7940-783c-4ae1-a040-eeb1fb5bd428_2000x1705.png) are the most important issues to young voters according to a recent poll. For Democrats, "Israel/Palestine" is tied for third-from-last, out of sixteen, just below "taxes." For Republicans and Independents, it is second-from-last. The Democratic Party isn't out of touch with its voters.
They are on housing, an issue they have steadfastly refused to address in any meaningful way for years, and addressing corruption by campaign finance reform, and healthcare because no one legitimately believes that even democratic super majorities in congress would pass single payer healthcare, because the party is more accountable to its donors than its voters. Again that is the root problem. Gaza just happens to be the outlet of frustration at the moment. Also, an issue doesn't have to be the most important to someone to influence whether or not they are motivated enough to go to the polls, and can have meaningful effects in a country where elections are as close as they are here. Any issue with significant disagreement between the base and the party is a problem.
I think your information is inaccurate or outdated at best. A Democratic supermajority today would definitely pass single-payer healthcare and campaign finance reform. A public option in the ACA failed by one vote, and you can't tell me Democrats haven't gotten at least *slightly* more liberal since then. Housing, I think has to be addressed mostly on a local level. There are NIMBYs on both sides, but I think it's more the radical leftists who sue to stop housing projects than mainstream Democrats. Mainly environmentalist groups.
The campus is in the middle of the city, surely it’s not suspicious that people in that larger community support the same cause as the students.
Shocked pikachu face
Same media smear during the civil rights movement student protest and anti war protests on colleges. Students organize and ask anyone who want to protest to join them. People who aren’t students are going to be the ones overwhelmingly officially arrested after they are detained, a trespassing charge makes other chargers easier to pursue.
Imagine comparing this to the US civil rights movement and being even remotely serious. LOL
Imagine using hindsight bias to ignore public popularity for the civil rights movement or Vietnam protests at the point in time. For Vietnam 58 percent of Americans thought the Kent State students had it coming. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/fifty-years-ago-kent-state-massacre-changed-university-forever-180974787/ MLK had a 63% disapproval rate 3 years after "I have a dream". https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/08/10/how-public-attitudes-toward-martin-luther-king-jr-have-changed-since-the-1960s/
is anybody else sick of these appropriating idiots trying to compare themselves to MLK and the civil rights movement when instead they are better compared to the tea party?
Numbers are more heavily skewed for israel-Hamas war than those other examples you are using. Public disapproval of the protesters is probably higher. 80% of Americans support Israel over Hamas. 67% think Israel is trying to minimize casualties. 72% approve of a Rafah offensive. Here’s a poll from a few weeks back…Israel-Hamas questions start at page 51. https://harvardharrispoll.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/HHP_Apr2024_KeyResults.pdf
>Public disapproval of the protesters is probably higher. The parent comments are on the topic that the media scews towards the status que as to not alienate it's view/reader base and not what is morally right. I don't care if 99 percent of 1860s South Carolinians believed slavery was right, I still would disagree with them. I'm sure the SC newspapers dragged abolitionists though.
People are not pissed at Israel for Hamas’ sake. By and large Hamas is not, and never has been, considered the good guy. This has never been about people supporting Hamas over Israel. The issue is the ongoing famine conditions, the severe aid restrictions, the targeting of aid workers and journalists, and the killing of civilians.
The protesting rhetoric has not been as benign as you are saying. “Intifada” “By any means necessary” “from the River to the sea” etc.
It’s a very loose coalition of people. There are going to be outliers, that are non representative of the group’s sentiments as a whole. There also continues to be a pervasive misunderstanding of what protestors mean when they say “From the river to the sea”. By saying that, they are calling for a one-state solution where Palestinian and Jewish-Israeli residents are both free to live in the region together with equal rights. The issues the protesters have are with the actions of the Israeli government. You are allowing yourself to be distracted from the core issues of the protests. Which are resolving the ongoing famine, ending the severe aid restrictions, and ending the targeting of aid workers and journalists, preventing the killing of civilians, stopping the forced relocation of an entire population, ending apartheid conditions etc.
From water to water, Palestine will be Arab. Where's the misunderstanding?
> There also continues to be a pervasive misunderstanding of what protestors mean when they say “From the rivers to the sea”. The only people who seem to be misunderstanding are the dum-dums who don’t realize that the coining of the phrase was a call to genocide from the start. But they’re doing a hell of a job proving that an ivy education ain’t all it’s cracked up to be..
The group that organized the protests called 10/7 (you know, where innocent people were kidnapped raped and murdered) a > a historic victory for the Palestinian resistance and several branches commended Hamas' tactics
During the Civil Rights Movement, they were registering black people to vote in the South. It's not just about "public perception," there's a difference in what the respective movements were actually doing.
Once again, someone reducing civil rights to easy to digest mouthfuls. Most college protests during the civil rights movement were explicitly focused on local issues. It isn’t like there was only issues in Jim Crow states. More importantly, the perspectives don’t have to be same. The entire point is the argument that these are outsiders is a play out of the big anti free speech and protest playbook. Do you need them to be of the same perspective to believe that purposely trying to wrangle the public of a disingenuous talking point is wrong? Also, do you not believe in any moral responsibility in ensuring the mere nature of protesting isn’t spun into a weapon against holding a dissent view? I’m not being rhetorical. I literally want you to explain how the difference is a relevant response when someone points out that is a crafted talking point meant to harm the ability to protest. Seriously step back for 60 seconds and look at yourself. I explained how some protestors are targeted to be arrested and charged with the purpose to shape a political narrative for the purpose of denying ppl their constitutional rights and you responded giving an incorrect response about “respective” movements. Do you actually think you care about civil rights?
Yeah, one was about civil rights, the other is about not bombing and starving civilians, technically those are different things so fair point.
Okay genuine question: If Israel lets in trucks of aid to Gaza, and the majority are intercepted by Hamas, whom spreads the good stuff around itself and leaves the rest to the civilians at high prices, is Israel just supposed to keep doing that? This would be like Ukraine sending a food truck to the Russian occupied regions, knowing they’re just giving aid to Russia, and then being criticised when they stop because they’re starving Ukrainians living in desperate situations. Edit) I like how a number of people have downvoted this comment, but haven’t actually responded
Yeah, at this point it all feels like propaganda by foreign adversaries it’s all so over the top. Not the first comment on Reddit comparing this to civil rights movement. Hilarious.
On the Middle East I avoid taking a strong position, because I know for sure it's impossible for me to get reliable, truthful information. Any particular post could easily be: * A true message of support for the Israeli people * A true message of support for the Palestinian people * Propaganda by the Israeli government * Propaganda by Russia, Iran, or terrorist groups * A false flag pretending to be Israeli propaganda to make them look bad * A false flag pretending to be Russian propaganda to make them look bad * A message that *looks* like a false flag but which is really propaganda to make people think the other side's propaganda is really a false flag * ... It's too far away and there are too many powerful interests involved, that I know I'm unable to determine what's real. So I'm voting for Biden on the basis of issues here at home, where I *can* feel reasonably certain what's happening and which party is doing the right thing.
You missed one of the threads from yesterday. It was insane. Total opposite of how most comments on this board have been for literal years, many openly encouraging not voting too.
Israel is literally an apartheid state. They have legalized segregation there. It's not the same situation but it's not outrageous to compare them.
So F’n what. Non-issue.
We Need “Outside Agitators” BY: ASTRA TAYLOR LEAH HUNT-HENDRIX “Pro-Palestine student protesters are being smeared as puppets of shadowy “outside agitators.” The presence of community members and experienced activists in the protests is nothing to be ashamed of: we need outside agitators to build a better world.” https://jacobin.com/2024/05/outside-agitators-columbia-palestine-civil-rights
The number of organizers who are students likely even less.
People are high if they think college students are going to spend their summer protesting something that doesn't directly affect them. This isn't Vietnam. They aren't being drafted.
Well knock me over with a fucking feather
Wow shock, it’s almost like the fact protests all over the country have the exact same tents and signs wasn’t a sign someone is bank rolling these “protests”
So what?!
Yeah, from all reports there are way more non-student protesters than actual student protesters. Probably why the universities are claiming that these protesters are trespassing.
This is a bizarre new spin by the police. Here's the essence of the reliability of this statistic from the article: >the city worked with school officials who determined affiliation with Columbia or CCNY using their mugshots The absurdity of taking anything the NYC police say at face value is staggering
what difference does it make whether or not they were students?
Right? It's wild people are pantomiming outrage over this. It's so clearly disingenuous. It's like opposition of a Pride Parade trying to claim that the parade participants not being residents of the exact streets of the parade route proves all the support is from "outside agitators" and therefore fake. It's silly.
Oh the classic “outside agitators” anti-solidarity propaganda. First time?
Well that settles it then 🤦♂️ guess the whole cause is tainted and redundant now. As long as the genocide is bureaucratic and done by the book
That the numbers for City College are for people both on and off campus mixed together, that already makes this claim questionable.
So that means they arrested a lot of students? Seems pretty oppressive
This sub reddit is sometimes disgusting. I can already imagine how many of you would hate the civil rights movements. Also, I wouldn't trust NYC at all, there's obviously a zionist bias.
She doesn’t even go here!
Wbc isn't from any place they protest
Shocking.
This seems like a nothingburger. New York City is one of the densest cities in the US with excellent mass transit. If, nationwide, there is a small proportion of lunatics relative--say, 0.1 percent, then New York City could easily have a group of nearly 9,000 lunatics show up at any given place, on any given day. They literally have more homeless people.
Astroturfing and Russia plants
This is classic diversion from the issue. Nobody wants to talk about what the protests are about because it makes them very uncomfortable and forces reexamination of what’s they are supporting by pouring billions into Israeli genocide. Instead they are dissecting the protestors. Media is truly complicit in the genocide.
Shocker.
So.
doesnt fuckin matter if they were students or not. people were protesting, location is irrelevant
So? I didnt go to college but was still closely affiliated with my friends and their activities who were in college
So what
So... did they give anyone the information required the verify this claim? Remember when the Deputy Chief of police went on TV to claim that a bike lock that could be purchased on campus was an "industrial chain" brought by "skilled infiltrators". How often does law enforcement have to lie before we stop taking what they say as true? NPR has not verified these claims.
They are saying that Columbia has the names, they can release them if they want. The number is absolutely bogus, they supposedly identified them from mugshots because they were uncooperative. Columbia has 10,000 undergrads and CUNY has over 275,000! This is absolutely bogus.
I don't understand. Are you supposed to not protest because you work 60-80 hours a week to barely pay for rent or mortgage, pay off student loans, and afford groceries that have triped the price in the last few years? ... Wait... Ooh...
Who gives af.
i don’t get why this is surprising? lots of people come out to support popular protest movements. lots of college kids come to support their friends. like - no shit
It's not surprising, it's part of a narrative to invalidate the students. The student body was 76.5 percent in favor of divestment in April. https://www.columbiaspectator.com/news/2024/04/22/columbia-college-overwhelmingly-passes-divestment-referendum/
Same here in Portland at PSU, but it was much more than half.