How Columbia Protest Ends ( lemmy.world )

With the greenlight of Columbia President Minouche Shafik and her administration, NYPD has entered Hind Hall through the windows and begun to mass arrest students inside. Let this be remembered as Columbia and Shafik’s legacy: one of mobilizing the violence and terror of the state against their own students and faculty, solely to prevent an end to Columbia’s complicity in a genocide.

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BreadOven ,

I think they're still going strong at McGill.

tearsintherain ,
@tearsintherain@leminal.space avatar

Columbia University's Shafik, the Neoliberal
https://www.salon.com/2024/04/28/columbia-crisis-another-massive-failure-of-liberalism/

"If you wanted to choose one individual as the face of “neoliberalism” for an encyclopedia entry, you could do a lot worse. Shafik holds an economics PhD from Oxford and a résumé of high-ranking positions at the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the Bank of England, three institutions that have been instrumental in driving developing nations into unsustainable debt in pursuit of a disastrously failed model of progress. She came to Columbia after six years of pushing fiscal austerity as director of the London School of Economics, where just last spring she helped defeat a student/faculty strike, reportedly by slashing salary payments and lowering graduation requirements to hustle student protesters out the door."

blahsay ,

I read the stats on how little America students care about the Gaza conflict but then you look at lemmy and every post is about these small protests.

The islamic/tankie propaganda teams are working hard on this.

Immersive_Matthew ,

I really have not noticed that it is Islamic/tankie people per your words, but rather just everyday people who hate to see others getting killed be it Jewish people or Palestinians. I know I fall into that camp and just wish for the violence to stop. If you read the comment history of most here, there is no evidence of the types you claim outside of a small %. You have to look to know.

blahsay ,

Just a hugely disproportionate coincidental number of concerned citizens who have pro-hamas/Palestinian talking points. Nothing to see here. Got it.

Immersive_Matthew ,

I am really not seeing it at all. Sure there is the odd pro Hamas and the odd pro Israel post/comment, but from my perspective here, it is mostly people just calling for peace. Unsure why your view is different. Perhaps the areas you subscribe too versus mine? Love to see some stats of this if you or anyone else knows of any.

tearsintherain ,
@tearsintherain@leminal.space avatar

some stats in here for you:
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2017/06/israel-occupation-50-years-of-dispossession/

I_Has_A_Hat ,

What are your thoughts on Ghana? If you have none then you don't actually give a shit about people dying and are just attached to the atrocity of the month that social media is feeding you.

Immersive_Matthew ,

Just as atrocious if not more. We can both play that game though, even right down to someone in your very neighbour who is being exploited right now. Your point is valid, but also is a little whataboutism. There are so many conflicts right now and more brewing even in Europe and by the looks of it, North America. I guess the real question though is why are you so confrontational on most of your comments? What is your story? Why you so angry? There is also lost of positivity and beautiful things in the world. Seek yours.

RIPandTERROR ,
@RIPandTERROR@sh.itjust.works avatar

You're acting like a 🤡

tearsintherain , (edited )
@tearsintherain@leminal.space avatar

So perhaps you care little about the Gaza conflict, why are you calling out other people for caring? I suppose less people should care because, 'islamic'? Your 'stats' are doubtful, the impact the protests have had is greater than it's been for many, many decades.

People who talk about 'stats' all the time forget, or very well know, that statistics is both art and science. Often the realm of self-serving or misguided intellectuals or marketing depts. This is not some science experiment.

I recommend watching the documentary "Fog of War", and pay attention to Lesson #2: Rationality will not save us.

wetnoodle ,
@wetnoodle@sopuli.xyz avatar

Maybe, just maybe, the stats you read saying nobody gives a shit, were completely fucking wrong. 👍

DoomBot5 ,

NYPD going in through the windows is much better than a bunch of protestors breaking down the doors and locking themselves in there.

KevonLooney ,

This protest is not a thing that matters. No one will remember this in a year, probably less than that. Because you can't just break random rules as a protest. You have to break the specific rule that is unjust. This building is not the center of Israeli government or the IDF.

If these students went downtown to the Holocaust museum and held up signs saying "Gaza is a modern Holocaust", that would work better. They could protest outside the Israeli Consulate too. It would also be more efficient to just call a bunch of representatives and senators every day. Get 100 students to spend one hour making calls per day and you can tie up the Congressional switchboard. Do that for a month and you will get a response.

These students are mainly protesting to feel good about themselves. They are taking the easiest and coolest route. Actually organizing for change is tougher than just occupying your own school. It's your school, you aren't taking it from anyone.

DoomBot5 ,

Breaking and entering has never been a form of protest that's acceptable. At this point the protest has just devolved into doing everything they can to get arrested like that.

KevonLooney ,

No they just want to be cool and have control over some part of their lives. Like we all do. I completely understand but it's not an effective way to protest.

Breaking and entering can easily be a good form of protest but it matters where you break into. The Jewish dude who broke into an American Nazi meeting in Madison Square Garden was a great protester.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1939_Nazi_rally_at_Madison_Square_Garden

DoomBot5 ,

No they just want to be cool and have control over some part of their lives.

They're protesting about someone else's lives, not their own. Last I checked this isn't Vietnam where those same students are being conscripted to fight a war.

Breaking and entering can easily be a good form of protest but it matters where you break into.

Breaking into a random building is not a good form of protest. I would even argue your example isn't great either, nor really a protest.

z00s ,

I have been trying to verbalise this for a while. Thank you for this comment, it's a perfect explanation and precisely encapsulates how I feel about these protests.

I agree with their intention, but they're not actually helping their cause.

Maalus ,

Says a random person on the internet that did fuckall for Palestine in their entire life.

z00s ,

If I'm a random stranger, how do you know what I've done or not done?

Maalus ,

I know because of what you type on the internet, it lays bare who you really are. That's why it's so easy for me to know you did fuckall for Palestine.

z00s ,

Lmao "I'm 14 and this is deep"

Maalus ,

Try reading it again

z00s ,

Enjoy summer break!

Woozythebear ,

Found the genocide supporter

z00s ,

Try reading it again

themeatbridge ,

I have been trying to verbalise this for a while.

Sometimes it's better to remain silent and let people think you are a fool than to speak your mind and remove all doubt.

z00s , (edited )

You don't seem to understand the nuance of the situation; are you interpreting my comment as meaning that I don't support Palestine?

I think you may need to re-read the initial comment that I replied to.

themeatbridge ,

I'm interpreting your comment as meaning you agree with the person you responded to, who entirely mischaracterized the protests and the protestors and painted a picture that can only be described as lying.

z00s ,

I don't think that the comment I replied to was really doing that. I'm on mobile so I can't check right now

Philharmonic3 ,

These protests have a list of specific demands, especially a demand to divest Columbia's money from arms manufacturers supplying the genocide. Do not infantilize this. It is an organized maneuver with a specific goal.

KevonLooney ,

Columbia was founded by slavery money. Most Ivy League schools are. They weren't clean before and divesting from arms manufacturers is not going to make them clean.

Did these students care about that when they enrolled? No, they were all excited to go to a "good school" to get a high paying job. They don't care about the investments. This is just a thing to do.

doublejay1999 ,
@doublejay1999@lemmy.world avatar

Too early in the day to address a strawman so large

match ,
@match@pawb.social avatar

it's almost like a bunch of minors went somewhere and then learned things that changed their opinions somehow

KevonLooney ,

Good point. But the real question is, are they going to give the money back?

themeatbridge ,

Wait, so students aren't allowed to protest what their Universities do because they enrolled in those Universities, because of slavery? Do you realize how stupid you sound?

blazeknave ,

A bunch of white guilt rich kids who can afford to get bailed out.. I'm sorry, these people aren't noble. No sympathy

RIPandTERROR ,
@RIPandTERROR@sh.itjust.works avatar

Hahahahahahahaha

Ahhhhh...

Get drone striked

https://sh.itjust.works/pictrs/image/62e599b2-0665-4c7b-88c2-e8d7288be978.gif

doublejay1999 ,
@doublejay1999@lemmy.world avatar

They are protesting the University’s investments in Israel…..

Objection ,
@Objection@lemmy.ml avatar

objection

I'd like to present this piece of evidence: MLK's Letter from a Birmingham Jail! In particular, I believe this section is most relevant:

First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and that when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress. I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that the present tension in the South is a necessary phase of the transition from an obnoxious negative peace, in which the Negro passively accepted his unjust plight, to a substantive and positive peace, in which all men will respect the dignity and worth of human personality. Actually, we who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.

Nobody ,

They took Occupy in the night, too. Coordinated strike on the remaining camps. It always comes down to the government’s monopoly on violence.

The Panthers were right. Revolutionaries should be armed.

themeatbridge ,

You're not wrong, but if they had been armed, there would be more dead people in this story.

Nobody ,

Maybe. It's also possible that the administration would have negotiated a settlement with the protestors to avoid escalation.

Brickhead92 ,

Seems like escalation is all that the higher ups know how to do these days.

Soup ,

If they ever descalate they may find themselves living in the system they created and whoa-ho do I kinda get why they’re so goddamn afraid of that. If only they hadn’t made it so awful down here.

ArmokGoB ,

Meaningful change is written in blood.

themeatbridge ,

Perhaps, but sometimes bloodshed is just tragic and does not change anything meaningful.

JayleneSlide ,

The Panthers were right. Revolutionaries should be armed.

If I recall correctly, the tenet was that every movement needs a non-violent faction and a radicalized faction. The non-violent faction is the carrot to the radicalized faction's stick. A comparison might be labor unions: unions are supposed to be a reasonable compromise to managers not getting dragged out of their houses and beaten to death in the middle of the night (or assassinated in other ways). See: Renault CEO Georges Besse.

Unfortunately, so many pro-citizen, pro-labor movements have been overrun by the "strictly non-violence!" mindset and thereby defanged. Additionally, we're the labor, for fuck's sake! We could absolutely hit every oligarch and politician right where it hurts, yet here we are.

Cryophilia ,

Everyone remembers either MLK or Malcolm X, but both were needed for the success of the civil rights movement.

Icalasari ,

However, the steady escalation from peace is good. When it eventually gets to violence, people can point back and go, "We tried peace, they kicked our faces in. They started the escalation, we're just responding in kind"

TropicalDingdong ,

You want to step in Biden and show us where you stand?

underwire212 ,

We know where the neoliberal stands. He stands on the side of power.

muse ,
@muse@fedia.io avatar

Yeah that guy is not stepping in until after the election.

riodoro1 ,

… until after it’s too late.
FTFY

riodoro1 ,

Quiet! They’re gonna label you a trump supporter.

Serinus ,

It is kind of weird to expect the President to step in here.

riodoro1 ,

Who should then? Puppy murdering congresspeople? It’s a nationwide issue and the president is a nationwide authority. I think that it’s mostly his silence and support for Israel that sparked those protests

GluWu ,

The national guard. Its May which means its open season on college students.

Branch_Ranch ,

Four dead in Ohio...🎵

Woozythebear ,

I like how when Biden is in office he doesn't have the power to do anything other than eat toast and pass the time but apparently if Trump is president he has the power to end democracy as we know it.

Which is it?

pop ,

Which is it?

whichever conveniently deflects responsibility of bad actions and take responsibility of good ones.

TheFriar , (edited )

Well, I’m not jumping in to support either of these ideas, but I will say that both of those could be true. Historically the democrats play by the rules, to their own demise, while republicans break every rule they think they can get away with.

Don’t be lulled into complacency by liberals going mad over trump. All of the “he’s a hitler, no HE’S the next hitler! Hey, that guy is hitler!” and the “these masks are fascism!” And the “socialized medicine is fascism!” has desensitized us to the actual calls of fascism.

But it’s still entirely plausible. Humans have gone through cycles of general peace and prosperity and the worldwide rise of authoritarian movements sprouting up simulataneously. I gotta refind the article I read about it years ago, but it’s clear to see it’s happening again. Germany, Poland, Italy, India, Philippines, China, Russia, Brazil, Argentina, Colombia, Spain, France…I’m forgetting a few others, but authoritarianism is on the rise worldwide. We’re incredibly vulnerable right now.

So it’s entirely possible that any US president could end democracy as we know it. Especially right now. But at the same time, the president doesn’t have power over the nypd. So…yeah.

Then again, Biden is complicit in genocide. There’s no getting around that. But unfortunately our choice is that, or roll the dice on letting someone who openly says they would be an authoritarian with a party behind them willing to break the system to stay in power. (And eill also more enthusiastically and ruthlessly participate in genocide. The US is in bed with Israel, not just one president. Have been for quite a while.) Yeah, shit sucks. But here we are.

treefrog ,

Basically, it's whoever packs the Supreme Court and Congress gets shit done.

That's what makes Trump dangerous and why Dems haven't gotten much done in three terms.

But I doubt it was an honest question anyway, so don't bother replying.

It's also kinda beside the point here. I don't believe Biden has any intention of stopping violence against the protesters. Regardless of political ability, I don't believe there's political will considering his stance on Gaza/Israel.

callouscomic ,

This is how it always is with every president. While campaigning, they need to do everything under the sun and you need to elect them to do that, then once elected.... oh snap, they just don't have the power to do those things, ah shucks.

dtaylor84 ,

It's a lot easier to destroy the world than to improve it.

RGB3x3 ,

How is it weird? These people are specifically protesting some of the actions of the presidential administration. He needs to address it.

callouscomic ,

So then they should take their protest to the correct place? And not a private institution with nothing to do with presidential decisions.

If what you're saying is true, then the protest is a huge "sir, this is a wendy's."

Notyou ,
@Notyou@sopuli.xyz avatar

I feel you might be missing the point of the protest. They want to get the message out and they did on a global level. There are stories reporting this. Hell I don't know if you knew it, but we are talking about it right now.

People are forgetful and you have to keep bugging them for change to happen. You need to make it difficult to ignore, or else you will be ignored.

ArmokGoB ,

The protesters should have been armed so that they could repel this.

DoomBot5 ,

The protestors shouldn't be breaking into buildings and barricading themselves in them.

HorseRabbit ,

You're such a fucking hero.
I wish we were all as brave as you.

DoomBot5 ,

At least I'm not committing criminal breaking and entering.

HorseRabbit ,

Yes, you're a very good boy, and we're all proud of you.

DoomBot5 ,

Look at you attempting to be all passive aggressive. We all know you try really hard behind your keyboard. Maybe one day you can even talk to a person without hiding your identity.

beetus ,

Pot, meet kettle.

DoomBot5 ,

I actually try having discussions here, despite the tons of misinformation that flows through lemmy. That person literally had nothing to contribute beyond passive aggressive comments.

umbrella , (edited )
@umbrella@lemmy.ml avatar

oooh, no! criminal breaking and entering!

at least funding genocide is ok though, it aint a crime!

DoomBot5 ,

Were these people also committing genoside? I was only commenting about their illegal actions.

umbrella ,
@umbrella@lemmy.ml avatar

i dunno, you seem to be bothered with their protesting against it.

DoomBot5 ,

Well I was specifically bothered about the illegal activities they're using to protest, but sure, twist my words to fit your narrative.

umbrella ,
@umbrella@lemmy.ml avatar

not a narrative, if they were following what the authorities want there wouldnt be a protest.

DoomBot5 ,

So you're saying protests are illegal? Last I checked that's not true. You can still have a protest without breaking and entering.

umbrella , (edited )
@umbrella@lemmy.ml avatar

oh you sweet summer child.

you seem to be more bothered by the occupation more than a literal genocide.

DoomBot5 ,

And you seem to be more preoccupied by your image of me than the actual words I type.

umbrella ,
@umbrella@lemmy.ml avatar

you don't seem to be listening to yourself

DoomBot5 ,

No, I'm not listening to the version of me that's in your head, since it's different than the replies I've actually given.

Since you choose to repeatedly ignore my actual comments, I have no further reason to talk to you.

umbrella ,
@umbrella@lemmy.ml avatar

great, piss off

goferking0 ,

That's because they don't give a shit about others

umbrella ,
@umbrella@lemmy.ml avatar

thats what its looking like yea

njm1314 ,

I don't know why this is downvoted. I guess people just have believed the neoliberal lie that peaceful protest accomplish anything. Things get accomplished when there's violence. The reason you aren't all locked onto an assembly line in a factory somewhere from age of 8 to 80 is because your ancestors had guns and fought. It wasn't peaceful. There was a war we fought.

Philharmonic3 ,

Fuck this

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