Chris Enloe:
HBO “Real Time” host Bill Maher heavily criticized liberals and the University of California at Berkeley on his show Friday after the school decided this week to cancel an upcoming talk by Ann Coulter and then later re-invite her.
Coulter’s speech, which was scheduled for April 27, was cancelled over concerns that her presence on campus would trigger another series of violent protests, something the city of Berkeley has become accustomed to in recent months. The school later reissued the invitation to Coulter, this time for May 2, a time when students are busy studying for final exams or have already gone home for the summer.
“Berkeley used to be the cradle of free speech, and now it’s just the cradle for f**king babies,” Maher said on his show Friday.
Maher explained that this is not an issue isolated to Berkeley. According to Maher, colleges across the country are cancelling talks because conservative speakers don’t offer opinions and ideas that are “exactly what liberals want to hear.”
“And they want to shutter [conservative ideas],” Maher said.
“I feel like this is the liberal version of book burning — and it’s got to stop,” he added.
Maher went on to tear into former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, who alleged earlier this week that hate speech isn’t protected by the First Amendment.
The liberal ideology as deteriorated to the point that they FEAR open debate.
Liberal and especialy those at U.C. Berkeley are so darn stupid their trouble is they dont think at all before sticking their foot in their mouths i mean this is just another leftists run indoctrination center that needs its budget cut by 100% save the money for the homeless vets rather then wasting in on these worthless little mocrobes
I told my niece as she is in her first semester, just write down what they say, puke it back at them. You dont have to agree because most of it doesnt make sense in the real world. Get your degree and on with real life. But it might not be bad for her she is taking up engineering not a useless degree.
It’s likely that Ann Coulter’s appearance on the Berkeley campus would trigger another round of potentially violent protests, which is exactly the sort of response she wants. This is not something we need more of.
If you specifically choose to make inflammatory comments at venues where you know they’re most likely to provoke widespread outrage, your point isn’t really about freedom of speech, or about presenting your side of an argument; your point is to provoke outrage. Coulter is a provocateur. Outrage is how she draws attention to herself. It’s the only thing she’s selling.
@Greg:
Sure we do, it shows just how terrified the Dimocraps are of conservatives. They’re afraid if a conservative gets to talk it will convert all the socialists.
@Greg: That’s a damn fine way to silencing free speech, isn’t it?
Guess you tell rape victims “they deserved it”, too.
No, having someone speak on issues from a point a view differing from prevailing channels of propaganda isn’t provocative, it’s mature and necessary for a healthy republic.
Coulter won’t “trigger” anything. If people get violent, it’s because they decided to be violent, hateful, and break the law. That’s on them.
Berkeley isn’t a “venue”, it’s a college. There should be no homogenized ideologies made into mob-enforced law.
“Disagree with me, and I’ll beat your ass!” You should think about the kind of backwards thinking your supporting, Greg, dragging everyone back with regressive, bigoted views. I support your right to have and say them (since hate speech like yours is still free speech), but I have to help the lost out by pointing them to their glaring flaws in thinking.
Coulter has been warned off by Berkeley officials because they’ve got entirely legitimate concerns about the potential for violence and property damage. They’ve warned her off because they understand the reality of the situation.
Shall we be truthful? Of all places this harpy could have chosen to publicly state her views, Berkeley has got to be among the least likely to want to hear them. She’s going there not despite that, but because of that. She wants a highly negative reaction and all the exploitable media attention it could bring. Freedom of speech is not the point. You know that perfectly well. The point is capturing the spotlight.
I get so damn weary of all of the transparently disingenuous bullshit.
@Greg:
It’s more than likely because this is the entire strategy of the left; use violence to silence opposition. You can’t cite successes of liberalism or your beloved socialism, so you have to employ fascist tactics to try and silence other views.
But, if this is exactly what Coulter wants, why don’t you leftists frustrate her and let her speak? Unless you are afraid of her message, let her make a fool of herself by exposing how weak conservatism is compared to liberalism?
Why? Because that would be disastrous for liberalism. THAT’S why. So, fascism it is. More of Obama’s legacy.
She was invited. There are laws against destroying other people’s property and violence. Authorities could put a stop to this… if they wanted to. Fascism rules the left. The left rules through fascism.
Berkley cops are the new for of the SS. look at the idiot brown the gov., aside from warren and kasick the list of assholes just grows, but warren and kasick are in a special group of full blown idiots.
U.C. Berkeley would make realy nice city park all you would need is a few bulldozers crane and wrecking ball and you have one less eyesore in america next would come the Useless Nations
@Bill… Deplorable Me, #8:
What of it? Someone might invite the local chapter of the Hells Angels MC to attend prom night, or the American Nazi party to march in Skokie. That doesn’t mean the community as a whole will be pleased when they show up.
Indeed there are, as there should be, but I haven’t noticed this prevents such things from happening. When you know you’ve got a volatile situation, it’s wise to try to avoid provocations and triggering events.
Of course they could put a stop to it—by preemptively locking down Berkeley and depriving those Coulter calculates to outrage of their right to freely assemble in public places and protest her presence.
Coulter is a g-d fascist. Her appearance in Berkeley is a calculated provocation. She wants to provoke a violent reaction. Provoking reactions is what she’s all about. She wants to create a situation that pits police against protesters, so the resultant chaos can be politically exploited. Unfortunately there’s a lawless minority of like-minded extremists on the far left who will happily oblige her. They also like their media attention. It makes them feel as if they’re accomplishing something of importance by breaking a window or setting a trash can on fire.
All political extremism comes to the same thing in the end. It hardly matters if it’s far right or far left. You want to pretend that I’m taking an opposing political position by calling out Coulter as a posturing provocateur, but I’m not. Rational, law-abiding Americans—right or left—are always caught somewhere in the middle, with extremist idiots trying to polarize them and force them to take one side or the other. They use hostile polarization as a means of control, and as a means of shutting down any intelligent, meaningful discussion. They abhor compromise, because it deprives them of personal power.
The snowflakes are falling even though its spring birds are singing,leaves are coming out the flowers are blooming and the bees are buzzing but still the snowflakes are falling at U.C. Berkeley
@Greg:
Well, guess what? Even if they don’t like it, they don’t have the RIGHT to destroy the community to keep someone from exercising THEIR Constitutional right to address a subject. Mind you, the only thing that makes the subject objectionable is that cry-baby losers are too sensitive to hear an opinion other than their own… kind of like Nazis, if you would recall.
No, you are correct; when liberal government chooses to ignore enforcing some laws that they find do not further their ideological agenda, the law itself does not stop crime. ENFORCEMENT is the key, and the police in Berkeley are ordered NOT to impede the leftist rioters.
Well, there’s another way; they could do their F**KING JOB and arrest violent rioters, like they are expected and charged to do. If these leftist losers suffered some consequences, no doubt we would see a rapid and precipitous decline in their ardor and dedication to their fascist pursuits.
You are very, very confused. You might want to read up on what fascism is and what the fascist’s tactics are. Coulter is the opposite of a fascist; she is standing up to the fascists, which you are here supporting, making lame excuses for. The only provocation is someone willing to exercise her RIGHT (again, she has the RIGHT to speak and has been invited by people who have just as much a right to want her there as these fascists have to be upset by her presence). You support their tactics; support the rule of violence and intimidation. Coulter is too courageous for your fascists and to silence her, you’ll have to kill her… which fascists are capable of doing.
Exercising the right of free speech is not “extremism”. It is what makes America great, exceptional and superior to all other nations. What the Berkeley thugs, your heroes, the representatives of the new Democrat party, the fascists that are trying to further the leftist, socialist, liberal agenda through violence and intimidation are doing is exactly what Stalinist Communists, Nazis, Maoists and every other despotic, totalitarian regime have done; kill free speech and thought.
So, here is where your strategy is heading; your liberals are so desperate due to the collapse of their corrupt ideology that violence is now their only resort. The only natural progression in this strategy is that the violence is going to be met with violence, because YOUR side strives to destroy discussion; only submission is acceptable. The end result will be that the side that destroys the other will survive. This is YOUR doing; the result of YOUR party, the people YOU support. Only by widespread denunciation of your tactics (instead of the weak excuses) will the inevitable cycle of violence be stopped.
If someone’s property is damaged or destroyed, or if innocent people get hurt, their primary concern won’t be the motives of whoever did it. It won’t make them feel any better that Ann Coulter had the satisfaction of speaking her piece, whenever and wherever she wanted, over the objections of local officials who warned her that serious trouble could follow.
And there we have it. That’s what you want to be able to self-righteously assert.
Is it lost on you that many liberals took issue with efforts to keep Coulter from speaking, even though they think she’s totally full of it? They also put her right to speak ahead of legitimate concerns about public safety.
@Greg:
The responsibility lies solely with the perpetrators, which included the Soros-funded puppeteers that instigate the violence. No, the motives aren’t the ultimate concern; the concern are the violent, criminal acts. There IS no legitimate provocation, no excuse for the violence.
YOU would blame and punish the victims, not the criminals. YOU encourage yielding to violence and intimidation. Well, that might appeal to liberals, but that is not how America works. Surrendering to fascism is not the American way, as much as the left would like their tactics to be successful.
WE are talking here and YOU are not denouncing the fascism of the left. The fact is if the left disagreed with it, denounced and condemned it and DEMANDED the authorities did their job to end it, there would be no more. As I said, it is the desperation of the left that promotes the violence.
What is not lost on me is that ALL liberals, who are self-declared tolerant, are not denouncing the violence. The violence originated with the Sanders supporters, carried on by Hillary supporters and continues as a mainstay of the Democrat party. You leftists accuse everyone else of violence, racism, fascism and intimidation yet if you were to look, only the LEFT employs these tactics.
@Bill… Deplorable Me, #15:
If you know that publicly burning a Koran is likely to incite mob violence, but you go right on ahead and do it anyway, you share in the responsibility if people get killed as a result. You could argue that it was your personal property, and you have a right to do with it as you wish; that it’s an act of self expression, protected by the First Amendment. This may all be true, but you’ll still have blood on your hands.
We’re all morally responsible for the results of our words and deeds, insofar as we’re aware of the likely consequences when we speak or act. Charles Manson was convicted of first degree murder, despite the fact that he didn’t personally kill anyone himself.
@Greg: Though Coulter speaking in support of the Constitution in no way compares with burning a Koran, any reaction is STILL the sole responsibility of the perpetrators, for THEY and they alone are responsible for their free will. To try and justify a violent response to someone voicing an opinion is nothing but an open support of fascism. Was it the Social Democrats of Weimar Germany fault that Nazi Brownshirts attacked their rallies and bashed their heads? Was that “provoking”? You seem to believe it was because they dared to support an ideology other than National Socialism.
Keep trying if you like, but you cannot justify a violent reaction to freedom of speech. You and your party are embracing the very essence of fascism.
@Bill… Deplorable Me: Are you saying the right never resorts to violence? Seriously??
I agree with Maher–protect Coulter’s right to speak–she is the worst possible example of Conservatism–she deserves all the scorn and mockery that befalls her–IMO a truly ugly woman.
@Bill:
It’s not a matter of justification. Violence and the unlawful destruction of property are wrong, no matter whether they’re on the part of the right or the left. It doesn’t really matter whether you’re burning down a Starbucks or a Planned Parenthood clinic.
Nor is it really a freedom of speech issue. Coulter is free to say what she wants, and generally free to do so where and when she wants—but that part about where and when involve a right, not a carte blanche license. Most reasonable people will agree that there are occasional appropriate and justifiable limitations to each of our guaranteed rights. We don’t let idiots like the followers of the late Fred Phelps stand directly alongside the open graves of American soldiers and harass their families during the funeral services. They’ll argue that their freedom of speech has been curtailed, but their argument is b.s. They’re not the only ones who have rights.
—
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, republicans are trying to strike bad bargains with democrats to avoid shutting down the government. If it’s shut down it will all be the fault of democrats, of course—never mind the fact that republicans have controlling majorities in both the House and Senate.
So, here’s the boil down: We’ll agree to one dollar of health care for the poor for every one dollar you’ll allow to wall off the Mexican border. Are you listening, Kentucky?
This week: Congress returns to government shutdown fight
@Rich Wheeler:
I’m not saying that, but you are welcome to provide some of your examples of conservatives (not far right) shutting down the right of speech of any group. While you are at it, provide the numerous and easily found examples where conservatives advocate for the restriction of free speech or peaceful assembly.
Oh, boy… am I going to get it now!!
See how that works? You are welcome to hold that view… even say it out load, anywhere you choose without being beaten, threatened or intimidated. Your view in that regard hurts no one but possibly Coulter’s feelings, and I seriously doubt even that. However, Greg’s point of view is that if your opinion infuriated people enough, they would have every right to storm your home or business, pillage it and beat you to death, if that satisfied their angst. I don’t think that is quite justified.
Wrong. This IS a freedom of speech issue because your leftist thugs are determined to kill the free speech of anyone that opposes them. Milo Yiannopoulos, Mark Stein, Coulter… anyone that is not guaranteed to reinforce the falsehoods inherent in the liberal ideology are to be blocked from uttering a word… with violence. This is fascism, Greg.
No, wrong again. Phelps and his idiots cannot enter private property and disrupt a private service; they have not been invited by anyone to be there. Yet, their right to spout their stupidity is allowed anywhere else.
Good luck changing the subject from your losing argument; I’m not taking the bait. You support a party that has accepted and is complicit in fascist tactics. That is what the Democrat party has become as liberalism fails and erodes away. The true socialist character, replete with totalitarianism, has come forth as liberals desperately watch their dream of a socialist utopia fade away.
You might as well become accustomed to the idea that the right isn’t going to be allowed to narrow the national discussion down to distractions such as the appalling mistreatment of Ann Coulter, Milo Yiannopoulos, or Mark Steyn. People are far more concerned about things that actually affect their lives.
Maybe someone should send a memo about that to Trump and the republican-majority Congress.
@Greg:
Yet, that happens to be the topic we are discussing. You are trying to divert attention from your support of fascism.
Ann Coulter is a fascist.
Want to test that assertion with a checklist? You might also want to see how many blocks you can tick off with regard to the Trump administration.
I saw someone mention and connect the linked incident to the current incident with Coulter: Porn Movie Excerpts Shown at University of Maryland Despite Legislator’s Threats
Typical leftist there, trying to control what colleges can show?
@Greg: You are ignorant about fascism. Completely.
@Bill: Fascism is by definition is an “authoritative, nationalistic, right wing system.” I’d add extreme.
Leave it to Hannity to coin “left wing fascism.” LOL
Kinda like coining “alt-left.”.
@Rich Wheeler: No, it isn’t “by definition” right wing. It could be either, but it was left wing in Germany and Italy. It is characterized by violent suppression of opposition and dissent. Now, what do we see from the left? What do we NOT see from conservatives?
The fascists call the victims fascists. That’s the liberal way.
Relabeling fascists and Nazis as leftists is just another instance of the right attempting to distance some of their own tendencies from inconvenient historical realities. The fact is that you’re attempting to change long-established and generally recognized historical terminology.
Nazi Germany and fascist Italy have traditionally been viewed as being on the extreme right of the political spectrum, with Stalin’s Russia and Mao’s China on the extreme left. The actual failing of this classification system has to do with the absence of a vertical Authoritarian/Libertarian axis. We really do need a new political compass to sort out and clarify positions. Right and left are only part of the story.
Political spectrum
@Greg: You leftists really get a kick out of redefining words to mean what YOU want them to mean. You want to label Coulter a fascist because you don’t like her and you know fascists are bad. Yet, you have no idea, apparently, what fascists are or what they do.
They are and do exactly what your little crybabies are doing at Berkeley. Fascists cannot STAND for anyone to hear an opposing point of view. Coulter is smart… brilliant… and she is exactly the type that you and your fascists cannot afford to allow her commons sense and sensibility to eat away at the crumbling ruins of your liberalism.
@Bill… Deplorable Me, #29:
You’re the one who first threw out the word fascist, bucko, up in post #8. You’re the one who hasn’t got a frickin’ clue what a fascist’s defining characteristics are. Did you somehow miss that 14-item fascist checklist?
How many of the fourteen characteristics apply to Coulter? How many apply to the Trump administration? There’s a reason why I threw the word back at you. There are, in fact, around 14 of them.
@Bill… Deplorable Me: Coulter “brilliant”–You can’t be serious Bill. How bout Palin-she brilliant as well?
Coulter is a female Hannity, though pretty boy Sean is admittedly much better looking than 3 iron Ann.
Ann Coulter Says She Will Pull Out of Speech at Berkeley
She has been denied a highly problematic time and venue, not the right to free speech. As the chancellor of Berkeley observed:
He didn’t want a riot on his campus so that someone could make a point. It’s as simple as that.
Here’s an inside look at the right-wing side of the potential trouble he was worried about. Don’t claim it isn’t real, because it is. There are people like this both on the right and the left, and they’re all looking for a place to act out. They’re more alike than they would care to admit. They’re all lawless idiots.
I Went Behind the Front Lines With the Far-Right Agitators Who Invaded Berkeley
@Greg:
I read the Mother Jones POS you linked to, the Freedom of speech rally had a permit, only those with a permit were checked and disarmed, the Antifa bitch was photgraphed throwing bottles, A rally guy was brained by a professor with a U-lock, also not disarmed. It would have not been violent if the masked assholes had not shown up to “take scalps” as the poor punched girl had posted before her misadventure.
Had the police unmasked everyone under threat of arrest the basement dwellers would not have the guts to pull what they did.
If Our conservative view hurts their widdle feelings tough.
Yes there are those in the movement we would like to just STFU, but the 1st is what is being defended.
What is the line between I love my race I am proud to be White and White supremacist? Its like the line between feminists and Man-haters and all the levels between.
@kitt, #33:
You seem to be missing the point that both sides have their a-holes and lunatic fringe. Kyle Chapman and company certainly aren’t my kind of people. Do you want to claim them?
This is why Coulter got cancelled. Blame whoever you want, or make whatever goofy accusations of suppressed freedom of speech you want. Berkeley officials responded as they should have. Coulter’s appearance would have drawn bad actors like a magnet, to their campus and their community. Now we’ll be looking at one less riot on the evening news. Both extremes lost their damn photo op. Well done, I say. This idiot is not Captain America. He’s a frickin’ Nazi.
@Greg:
You are still trying to equate someone with a different view and people who would hurt or kill someone for having a different view. They aren’t equal. They are, in fact, divergent.
Coulter got cancelled for one reason and one reason only; Berkeley is a liberal enclave and they, though they receive taxpayer funds, do not allow the 1st Amendment to be exercised there. In liberal enclaves, only liberal views are allowed in order to not make liberalism look failed.
The bad actors are there; they take classes there and they have been bused in for this very purpose. But, that’s not the point because there is no justification for your leftists being fascists.
Your recipe for “peace” is for no one to say or think anything you don’t agree with. Sorry, pardner, but that’s not how it works in America. What needs to happen is for the Berkeley police to stop following an ideological path and enforce the law.
@Bill… Deplorable Me, #35:
Enforcing the law also includes filing charges against the right-wing a-hole who thought he was being a big man by sucker-punching a young woman, doesn’t it? When will it sink in that the fault for this bullshit isn’t all one-sided?
Berkeley is, in fact, a liberal enclave. Coulter is, in fact, a far-right provocateur. Speaking there was a calculated provocation. Berkeley authorities made the right call, for the sake of public safety. They shut her event down, and dodged the violence that could have followed. Deal with it.
@Bill… Deplorable Me: Greg will never understand. What will happen in the real world to these children of one view point when they run to HR crying that one of their co-workers has an American flag displayed on their desk, or hears the rumor that the supervisor is a Republican, or the Janitor is pro-life, the receptionist that wears a cross necklace every day! The next day gets a pinkslip for keying the car in the lot that has a Trump bumpersticker, oh lawsuit heaven.
I seem to recall republicans getting hysterical because the Dixie Chicks publicly criticized George W Bush. There wasn’t much support on the right for their freedom of speech. They were publicly vilified. They were taken off radio play lists. Multiple radio stations refused to sell advertising time to promote their tour. Boycotts were organized. Multiple concerts were cancelled. Remember? All because they dared to express an opinion. They didn’t even do it in a place calculated to outrage the locals. They expressed an opinion on stage in London.
In Coulter’s case, local officials actually had entirely legitimate concerns about property damage and violence right there, on the spot. Sure! Let’s let that happen.
You can’t correctly figure this out without your persecution complex setting in?
@Greg: The Dixie Chicks were entertainers with a musical not political audience, expressing political opinions, they lost their following, no one attacked them, or stopped them from preforming where they wanted to. The just lost all appeal. Have you seen Starbucks stock after they said they would hire 10K refugees? Only stores attacked Berkley and DC, by Antifa, not for the announcement, but just because the Antifa are a$$ho!es. Conservatives just closed their wallets.
@Greg:
My God, this is TOO easy. I don’t think Coulter has the vocal range to shatter windows with her voice. Therefore, her WORDS do not destroy property, fascists who want to deny people their right to speak or hear are destroying the property.
And here they go again:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2017/04/27/portland-rose-parade-canceled-after-antifascists-threaten-gop-marchers/?utm_term=.0bbf5235f4b5
That’s fascism, Greg, and you endorse it.
Did anyone ever attack a Dixie Chicks concert or participants? Nope, yet not only has the left done all you describe to any conservative that dares speak out, but when that is not sufficient to deny 1st Amendment rights, violence is employed. Again, you cheer it.
@Bill, #40:
Words are not harmless. Words can be weapons. Words can incite riots. They can influence people to commit murder. (Refer back to Charles Manson.) Hitler’s words led to the destruction of over 6 million Jews and reduced much of Europe to rubble. There’s no automatic disconnect, completely separating what a person says from responsibility for what happens as a result.
Freedom of speech is a right, not an absolute, carte blanche license. If you start shouting “FIRE!” in a crowded setting people can get hurt or killed trying to escape. You have no right to do this. If you think you do, you will come up against authorities who will properly tell you otherwise.
No, but a right-wing goon recently came to Berkeley and did this, as the video clearly shows. Berkeley authorities decided the risk of a repeat performance was too high to accommodate Coulter’s desire to speak her piece at the place and time she wanted, so they declined to allow her to do so.
Any reasonable person should be able to grasp their reasoning. Unfortunately, some people don’t want to. They’re not fooling anyone but themselves. The right’s gullibility and capacity for self-delusion is far greater than I had ever imagined.
@Greg:
Really? So, certain words simply automatically incite violence, without personal responsibility, self control or personal choice playing in? Speech can PROMOTE or SUGGEST violence (as much of it did during the Obama administration by Obama drones) but it still takes a human will to enact the violence.
This explains when Hillary calls all Trump supporters racists, hateful and deplorable, those people targeted with that accusation did not explode in riotous violence. It further explains thoroughly why when Trump cites FBI data that shows a lot of criminals enter this country through our porous borders and commit crimes, your leftists alter those words to say he hates immigrants THEN chooses to riot over his “hateful rhetoric”.
The left has lost all hope of gaining power through Constitutional means so they are now relying on violent overthrow, but they have to contrive the motivation.
No, he was ATTACKED and meted out retaliation in defense of himself. THIS is what your leftist fascists are instigating and it will get far worse if it continues. In the Texas legislature, leftists brought piss and shit to throw on Republicans because they were supporting a bill to limit abortion. We see the leftists in Berkeley and elsewhere, when they are unmasked and searched, bringing weapons to what is supposed to be a peaceful gathering. Your liberal agenda has failed and your gang of useful idiots are doing their best Van Der Lubbe imitation to promote the violent intimidation of the opposition.
@Bill… Deplorable Me, #42:
Yeah, I can plainly see with my own eyes that the young woman has attacked this well-behaved, conservative gentleman with her unacceptable attitude. He really had to choice but to smash her in the face.
There’s not a jury in the country that would see it otherwise—so long as it’s comprised of people who think as you do.