You have commented 339 times on Rantburg.

Your Name
Your e-mail (optional)
Website (optional)
My Original Nic        Pic-a-Nic        Sorry. Comments have been closed on this article.
Bold Italic Underline Strike Bullet Blockquote Small Big Link Squish Foto Photo
Home Front: Culture Wars
UC Berkeley offers counseling ahead of talk by Jewish conservative
2017-09-10
[IsraelTimes] Ben Shapiro calls school's offer, in letter outlining heightened security measures over speech, 'total insanity'

The University of Caliphornia, an impregnable bastion of the Democratic Party, at Berkeley sent out a letter on Thursday informing students, faculty and staff that counseling services would be made available ahead of a talk at the campus next week by a conservative Jewish commentator.

In the letter, which outlines preparations being taken by the school ahead of Ben Shapiro’s visit, the executive vice chancellor and provost of the university Paul Alivisatos wrote that the school is "deeply concerned about the impact some speakers may have on individuals’ sense of safety and belonging" and therefore "offered and encouraged" faculty and staff to take advantage of the support services offered by the school.

"No one should be made to feel threatened or harassed simply because of who they are or for what they believe," he wrote in the letter, which included links to services such as mental health counseling provided by the school.

The letter also detailed the extensive security measures being taken ahead of Shapiro’s talk after previous scheduled appearances at the university by conservative figures were met with violent protests.

A spokesperson for the school said that the provision of counseling services was not only for Shapiro’s appearance but also for "conservative students who have told us they are worried not about the speakers headed our way but, rather, by the possibility that members of the Antifa
...the armed wing of the Democratic Party...
paramilitary group will return to the campus," in reference to the far-left, anti-fascist
...anybody not a leftist...
movement.

"I can assure you that if, in the future, we hear concerns in advance of ANY other speaker coming our way, we will issue a similar communication," the spokesperson told Newsweek.

The spokesperson also said that while the school is not aware of anything Shapiro may say that would lead students to feel threatened, there are guest speakers who use "provocative rhetoric" in order to cause "discomfort and concern."

In response, Shapiro tweeted that the offer of counseling services was "total insanity."

Shapiro, a conservative commentator and Orthodox Jew who now is editor-in-chief of The Daily Wire, was previously an editor at Breitbart News, where he worked under former top aide to US President Donald Trump
...New York real estate developer, described by Dems as illiterate, racist, misogynistic, and what ever other unpleasant descriptions they can think of, elected by the rest of us as 45th President of the United States...
, Steve Bannon.

Despite working under Bannon, Shapiro was in the camp of anti-Trump Republicans and reportedly left Breitbart after the website did not support a news hound who alleged to have been assaulted by former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandoswki.

Earlier this year, UC Berkeley cancelled a talk at the school by the polarizing former Breitbart editor Milo Yiannopoulos out of safety concerns after protesters hurled smoke bombs, broke windows and started a bonfire, leading to widespread property damage.

Conservative pundit Ann Coulter later canceled a planned speech at the university amid concerns of the potential for violence.

The city of Berkeley has been at the center of violent festivities since the beginning of the year between far-right and far-left demonstrators.

Last month, black-clad anarchists stormed into what had been a largely peaceful Berkeley protest against hate and attacked at least five people, including the leader of a politically conservative group who canceled an event a day earlier in the Socialist paradise of San Francisco
...where God struck dead Anton LaVey, home of the Sydney Ducks, ruled by Vigilance Committee from 1859 through 1867, reliably and volubly Democrat since 1964...
amid fears of violence.

The violence at the most recent Berkeley rally came shortly after the deadly white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, last month in which a woman was killed after a man with alleged Nazi sympathies plowed a car into a group of people protesting the rally, which attracted neo-Nazis, white nationalists and white supremacists under a "Unite the Right" banner.
Posted by:trailing wife

#7  They need counseling and meetings to plan their riots, pass out pepper spray, sharpen knives, pass out bike locks, and make coordinate their assaults with the Berkley P.D., etc...
Posted by: CrazyFool   2017-09-10 22:09  

#6  It's a kind of dog whistle.
Posted by: gorb   2017-09-10 18:05  

#5  Notably missing from the executive vice chancellor and provost's assurances was any kind of assurance that students would be protected from Antifa.
Posted by: Abu Uluque   2017-09-10 10:06  

#4  "No one should feel threatened or harrassed..." Berkeley Liberal Indoctrination Institution aka Home of Antifa

Posted by: Threatch Jeamp8135   2017-09-10 09:47  

#3  If they need counseling, they have no business being there. Before they were paper mills, the institutions were suppose to weed out the population of hopefuls and leave the capable who could perform.
Posted by: Procopius2k   2017-09-10 08:20  

#2  would you hire a Berkley grad? U. of Mo.?
Posted by: Frank G   2017-09-10 07:19  

#1  
Posted by: g(r)omgoru   2017-09-10 07:06  

00:00