My head says that these students were an embarrassment to this state and to their university.

My heart is just disappointed that they didn't come prepared with tar, feathers, and a rail. Tom Tancredo is a terrible waste of life, and I wouldn't want him in my house either.

So I'm kind of conflicted.

[Edited on April 15, 2009 at 10:29 PM. Reason : ]

4/15/2009 10:29:13 PM

Quote :

""Fascists are fascists," Tancredo said. "Their actions were probably the best speech I could ever give. They are what's wrong with America today. ... When all you can do is yell epithets, that means you are intellectually bankrupt.""

4/15/2009 10:57:46 PM

Quote :

"My head says that these students were an embarrassment to this state and to their university. My heart is just disappointed that they didn't come prepared with tar, feathers, and a rail. Tom Tancredo is a terrible waste of life, and I wouldn't want him in my house either. So I'm kind of conflicted."

GET OUTTA MY HEAD, MAN

It's pretty much guaranteed that the people protesting are pretty much the same as the groups on State's campus that protested the ROTC years back. Remember that?

Also, the group that held the event is pretty classy, too:

http://www.splcenter.org/blog/2009/02/26/white-nationalist-linked-right-wing-youth-group-debuts-at-cpac/

Quote :

"A well-funded new organization whose stated purpose is to launch a “right-wing youth movement” will make a splashy debut tonight at the Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC, in Washington, D.C. CPAC is billed as “the largest annual gathering of conservative students, activists and policymakers.” According to CPAC materials, the group, Youth for Western Civilization, is one of the official co-sponsors, or major donors, of this year’s conference. The group has a booth in the CPAC exhibition hall, and its “Inaugural Reception” is scheduled to begin at 8:30 p.m. EST in the Palladium Ballroom at the Omni Shoreham Hotel. In the past, CPAC organizers have shielded the reputation of their mainstream conservative enterprise by forbidding racist organizations like the Council of Conservative Citizens from participating. They may want to take a closer look at Youth for Western Civilization. One of the group’s founders, Marcus Epstein, is a frequent contributor to the white nationalist hate website VDARE.com. “Diversity can be good in moderation — if what is being brought in is desirable,” Epstein wrote in one VDARE.com essay. “Most Americans don’t mind a little ethnic food, some Asian math whizzes, or a few Mariachi dancers — as long as these trends do not overwhelm the dominant culture.” Epstein is also the head of the Robert A. Taft Club, a Washington, D.C., group whose events regularly feature prominent academic racists like Jared Taylor, the editor of the overtly white supremacist journal American Renaissance. Another Youth for Western Civilization founder, Kevin DeAnna, has posted several times in recent years to the Spartan Spectator, the website of the Michigan State University chapter of Young Americans for Freedom, or MSU-YAF. In 2007, the Southern Poverty Law Center identified MSU-YAF as a hate group after it organized a “Catch an Illegal Alien Day” game, sponsored a “Koran desecration contest,” jokingly threatened to distribute small-pox infected blankets to Native American students, posted “Gays spread AIDS” fliers, called Latino students and faculty members “savages,” and invited Nick Griffin, the chairman of the neofascist British National Party, to speak on the MSU campus. “The point is that all Christians, and white Christians in particular, don’t owe any deference to the self-defined racial separatist customs of other people,” DeAnna posted to Spartan Spectator in July 2007. DeAnna was supporting another Spartan Spectator blogger who attacked the African-American holiday Kwanzaa for being “Satanic,” because it’s “designed to lead black Americans from traditional Christian holidays like Christmas and replace it with paganism.” Somewhat ironically, online membership records show that last September, DeAnna joined a Fairfax County, Va., group of followers of Asatru, a neo-pagan religion popular with neo-Nazis whose adherents reject the divinity of Christ to worship Norse gods like Odin. “I listen to a lot of heavy metal music,” DeAnna informed Hatewatch by way of explanation. DeAnna’s interest in Asatru may explain why there’s nothing in Youth for Western Culture’s mission statement that identifies the group as pro-Christian. “The purpose of Youth for Western Civilization is to form a right-wing youth movement,” it reads. “Youth for Western Civilization educates, organizes and trains activists on campuses across the nation to create a subculture that promotes the survival of Western Civilization and pride in Western heritage.” Youth for Western Civilization appears to be a project of the Leadership Institute, an Arlington, Va.-based right-wing activist factory, whose training program graduates have included Christian Coalition founder turned über lobbyist Ralph Reed, über lobbyist turned imprisoned felon Jack Abramoff, and gay prostitute turned White House correspondent Jeff Gannon. Youth For Western Civilization Executive Director Nicole Gonzalez Knowlton was recently the Leadership Institute’s Campus Services Coordinator. DeAnna is currently the Deputy Field Director for its Campus Leadership Program. The Leadership Institute has a history of backing radical right student groups. In 2006 college-aged Leadership Institute-trained activists began reviving and radicalizing chapters of the Young Americans for Freedom at universities across the country, including MSU. DeAnna is the former leader of the Virginia State University chapter of YAF. Youth for Western Civilization didn’t wait for CPAC before throwing its first event. Yesterday, the group sponsored a lecture by immigrant-bashing former Congressman Tom Tancredo on the campus of American University in Washington, D.C. Tancredo spoke on “Immigration Reform and the Need for Assimilation.” The same topic is addressed in a recent VDARE.com essay that’s featured on the Youth for Western Civilization website. It lashes out at political analyst Michael Barone for “…claim[ing], despite plenty of evidence to the contrary, that the Great Wave of European (Italian, Irish, Jewish, et. al.) immigration of 100 years ago was assimilated without any real hiccups, and without changing the character of the country. “But anyone who has watched machine politics in action in cities like B. Hussein Obama’s Chicago, or knows anything about the Mafia, or is at all familiar with how largely Jewish intellectual elites have utterly transformed American social and political discourse, knows that is nonsense.”"

Was Our Boy Salisbury there?

4/15/2009 11:43:16 PM

And to be fair, the thread title should be "UNC has riot over fucking nazi"

Or something like that. As has been pointed out many times, even Republicans hate this piece of shit.

4/16/2009 3:10:52 AM

all viewpoints are equal. give them the same respect.

4/16/2009 4:07:31 AM

It doesn't matter. No amount of dislike for this individual justifies what happened. If you think what the protesters did was right or warranted, then you too need to re-evaluate your principles as an American in a free country.

4/16/2009 8:09:16 AM

Definitely not a noble or well-reasoned response to the speaker...

...but who wouldn't have seen this coming? You don't put right-wing vitriol in front of a young, impulsive left-wing crowd and expect them to sit still. Same goes for any group. Hell, I would be plenty pissed at the thought of a single cent of my tuition going in this guy's pocket.

This "repression of free speech" claim is BS. Tancredo has not been arrested, fined, censured or deported for expressing his views. He only got yelled off stage by people who didnt agree with him. This happens all the time and is not newsworthy.

4/16/2009 9:37:55 AM

^Maybe you didnt see the same video as I did........but i'd say 3/4's of the audience was in complete disbelief and had come to hear what the man had to say. The retarded protesters were by far the minority in the room.

It was absolutely a push to silence the voice of the former congressman, who wheather you like him or not, does represent some portion of America.

Bottom Line: If the university invites the guy to speak, atleast let him talk and let the people who show listen. Protesting is fine, but shutting an event down by breaking windows is unacceptable.

4/16/2009 10:23:04 AM

Protesting isn't the problem. It was the manner in which is was done. If you want to make a scene and be an embarrassment to your school and your cause, then do it like these idiots did. If you want to make a point and get people thinking about the real issues, then come prepared with questions to ask, have signs printed and held, heck, even chant outside, but do it in a way where you come off looking like the classy person with a cause. I bet these people don't even realize it takes some serious fucking up to make Tancredo come off as a victim, and they achieved that.

4/16/2009 10:33:20 AM

Quote :

"all viewpoints are equal. give them the same respect."

Neither statement is true. Not all of them are equal. Perhaps they should all be able to be presented in a free society, but that has nothing to do with respect.

Quote :

"Maybe you didnt see the same video as I did........but i'd say 3/4's of the audience was in complete disbelief and had come to hear what the man had to say."

I don't think I saw the same video as you, either. The video I saw showed Tancredo walking out to overwhelming boos and only sporadic applause. It included a number of voices shouting unkind things at the bastard. If protesters were in the minority, then so were active supporters. Maybe there were a large number of quiet people in the room who didn't give a shit but needed extra credit. I don't know.

4/16/2009 1:00:15 PM

Quote :

"If you think what the protesters did was right or warranted, then you too need to re-evaluate your principles as an American in a free country."

Sorry, but if this were 1955, I wouldn't have had too much sympathy if, say, a meeting of some communist apparatchiks on campus were disrupted by protesters. You and many others here are dead wrong. The problem with the 'hypocrisy' of the left on the matter of free expression isn't that they chose to intervene in this case; rather, it's that the whole idea of equal time for equal viewpoints is a fallacy -- especially on a University campus, which is by definition more than a mere 'commons.'

"Free country" means freedom from undue interference by the government. It doesn't mean "tolerance of all viewpoints in all venues." The protesters who used violence were wrong, and the police reacted accordingly. But if the protesters with the banner, for example, had completely and thoroughly disrupted him, they would have been perfectly right according to reasonable principles of a "free country."

Quote :

" Bottom Line: If the university invites the guy to speak,"

I don't believe the university invited him, rather it was a specific interest group called Youth for Western Civilization. Bottom line: if the local chapter of the Klan invites the Grand Wizard to speak on campus, you think he should be given equal time and equal opportunity to speak?

4/16/2009 1:14:21 PM

I like how you quoted me and then refuted the words of someone else entirely. Honestly, my point cannot be anymore clear than how I previously stated it. If you condone the protestors actions of supressing free speech, you are walking a path that no American should ever follow. It is as simple as that.

[Edited on April 16, 2009 at 2:09 PM. Reason : -]

4/16/2009 2:06:23 PM

GG UNC

YOU (FINALLY) MAKE ME PROUD TO BE FROM NORTH CAROLINA.

TODAY, WE ARE ALL TARHEELS

4/16/2009 2:31:38 PM

Quote :

"Bottom line: if the local chapter of the Klan invites the Grand Wizard to speak on campus, you think he should be given equal time and equal opportunity to speak?"

If a university would allow a klan chapter to exist as a functioning member of the student body, then absolutely. Of course there are no student chapters of the klan at any university, so your arguement is apples to oranges and not in context with this discussion.

I dont segregate peoples right to free speech based on their beliefs. You, on the other hand, are arguing that freedom of speech is only valid for a select group of individuals.

I dont care if Hitler himself came to NCSU, if he was invited by a student organization and had the approval of the university, then he should be allowed to speak. Its my right to either choose to listen to him or not. It is not my right to obstruct other willing people from hearing his message.

[Edited on April 16, 2009 at 4:08 PM. Reason : .]

4/16/2009 4:05:29 PM

I find this all ironic considering that 5 years ago the GOP was king and anyone who disagreed was a evil liberal, terrorist sympathsizer, lefty pussy. Funny that republicans have fucked up so bad that UNC riots when they come to speak.

Guess people caught on that the GOP platform of "small gov't", freedom, and fiscal responsibility are all JUST TALK. At the same time people got tired of all the bullshit, scandal, corporate favortism, relgious moonbatism, freedom limiting, and war mongering

4/16/2009 4:55:12 PM

If you believed someone who was a source of evil came to NCSU, you'd sit there and be respectful? Give me a break. Regardless of whether Tancredo deserved this reaction, the people who acted that way believed he did, and you would have acted that way if you believed the situation called for it.

4/16/2009 4:58:25 PM

^Again, in case you missed it, you have the right not to listen to his message. No one can force you to hear his message. You do not have the right to force someone else from not hearing his message. And you absolutely dont have the right to destroy university property.

The part that scares me the most is your last comment.

Quote :

"the people who acted that way believed he did, and you would have acted that way if you believed the situation called for it."

I, or any sane adult, would never act the way these protestors did. Adults realize that you have the power to get up and walk out or better yet, gather facts and question the person. By doing so, you attack the message being presented. Silencing the guys speech only makes the protesters look bad.

Only children and foolish people think otherwise.

4/16/2009 5:22:44 PM

I think NCSU students should riot the next time the fucking pro-life moonbats erect their 40x80 ft dead fetus wall

4/16/2009 5:41:56 PM

Quote :

"If you believed someone who was a source of evil came to NCSU, you'd sit there and be respectful? Give me a break. Regardless of whether Tancredo deserved this reaction, the people who acted that way believed he did, and you would have acted that way if you believed the situation called for it."

easily in the top ten of most idiotic things I've read in Soapbox (excluding Salisbury of course)

4/16/2009 5:55:11 PM

^Agreed

I cant believe any of you people are defending these kids. I thought ya'll believe in free speech?

If you believe in free speech only for non-controversial people, thats fine. Just be honest about it.

4/16/2009 6:00:26 PM

i lold

4/16/2009 6:11:32 PM

Quote :

"I think NCSU students should riot the next time the fucking pro-life moonbats erect their 40x80 ft dead fetus wall"

seriously, i have to avoid the brickyard when those assholes come to not see dead fetuses.

4/16/2009 6:27:32 PM

^well then you shouldn't have had premarital sex, dummy!

4/16/2009 6:37:53 PM

^ your kidding right

4/16/2009 6:43:29 PM

Fuck UNC

(especially their basketball team )

4/16/2009 6:49:31 PM

Quote :

"Guess people caught on that the GOP platform of "small gov't", freedom, and fiscal responsibility are all JUST TALK. At the same time people got tired of all the bullshit, scandal, corporate favortism, relgious moonbatism, freedom limiting, and war mongering"

None of these had anything to do with the protests, which were specifically regarding the man's rabidly anti-immigration stance. I wouldn't be surprised if the even more radical beliefs associated with the organizations that invited him had something to do with it as well.

I doubt there would be brick-throwing if John McCain came to speak. Disruptions, sure -- that happened at the GOP convention last year. But I don't believe that anything threadworthy would take place.

And it's been a long time since "the GOP was king" at UNC-CH. Much longer than five years.

Quote :

"And you absolutely dont have the right to destroy university property."

Destruction of property is warranted in all sorts of circumstances. Nobody raises a fit when the police bust down a door or break a window to resolve a hostage situation or arrest a criminal. In military operations, hardly a mention is ever made of property damage.

If destroying someone else's property is ever acceptable, your disagreement with DirtyGreek is merely a question of scale. You don't think that what Tancredo does and says crosses a certain threshold of awfulness. If you did, you wouldn't have a problem with window breaking. For these kids, Tancredo was obviously over the threshold.

Quote :

"Adults realize that you have the power to get up and walk out or better yet, gather facts and question the person. By doing so, you attack the message being presented."

Unfortunately, this doesn't always work. I'm sure that people had questions for Lenin, Mussolini, and yes, for Hitler during the early parts of their political careers. I'm just as sure that a lot of those people who had questions ended up dead or in gulags, prisons, or camps.

Of course, Tom Tancredo isn't really a threat in this way. He's an unelectable moron that most Americans have never heard of, and he lacks the charisma to lure (and the determination to intimidate) much more support than he has. So these UNC students got a little too worked up over nothing. It's safe to let morons talk; they're morons.

Quote :

"I, or any sane adult, would never act the way these protestors did."

I can agree with this. Any sane adult who thought that this guy posed a big enough threat to warrant violence would have shot him. Fortunately in this case, since Tom isn't such a threat, nobody actually thought he warranted violence. I guarantee that the idiot who threw the brick didn't actually want to hurt anybody. He or she was just a hyped-up, stupid young person.

Quote :

"If you believe in free speech only for non-controversial people, thats fine."

I don't have a problem with controversy. I have a problem with ideas that, if put into action, would kill everything that is good and right in this country. When those ideas have no chance of actually coming into reality, no problem. When they start getting a chance, let the people deal with it, not the state.

Of course, I also believe that talking louder than somebody =/= violating free speech.

4/16/2009 7:30:35 PM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Massacre

4/16/2009 8:00:03 PM

"Hey everybody, sure am glad you didn't protest like that when I came to speak at Columbia University!"




But maybe these UNC students are right, we should only protest anti-immigrant people. We can leave alone the racists murders like Ahmadinejad.

4/16/2009 8:43:37 PM

I am sure the leader of a foreign nation especially one with hostilities with the US had "elevated" security not to mention a difference in culture between an Ivy league school like columbia and a public university (as much as they don't want to admit it) that is UNC.

I bet had AJ come to NCSU; he would have had some problems.

4/16/2009 9:52:38 PM

Quote :

"But maybe these UNC students are right, we should only protest anti-immigrant people. We can leave alone the racists murders like Ahmadinejad."

Yes, that is exactly how they feel.

4/17/2009 2:45:21 AM

wow, talk about tolerant.....

wait....

wut.....

yeah if i ever hear about tolerance and unc i'm just gonna start laughing...

4/17/2009 10:55:00 AM

no, some opinions just aren't worthy of being had, that's all.

4/17/2009 4:43:24 PM

If Tancredo was a minority this wouldn't have happened

4/17/2009 4:44:16 PM

Quote :

"Unfortunately, this doesn't always work. I'm sure that people had questions for Lenin, Mussolini, and yes, for Hitler during the early parts of their political careers. I'm just as sure that a lot of those people who had questions ended up dead or in gulags, prisons, or camps. Of course, Tom Tancredo isn't really a threat in this way. He's an unelectable moron that most Americans have never heard of, and he lacks the charisma to lure (and the determination to intimidate) much more support than he has. So these UNC students got a little too worked up over nothing. It's safe to let morons talk; they're morons. "

I hate to say this, but you said what I was trying to say much more clearly. This, basically, was my point. Talking doesn't always work. If you could go back in time and meet Hitler and be there for his Nuremburg speech, you'd do what, politely ask some questions and skulk off? And before I get called out for comparing Tancredo in any way to Hitler, please understand, I'm not. I'm simply saying that these people obviously think that he's a very bad person whose ideas are dangerous.

And yes, I do believe in free speech - in the government not being allowed to limit free speech. I certainly don't think that people necessarily have to allow other people to speak. I think that while we all have a right to speak without the government stopping us, we also have the right to ourselves try to stop speech that we see as dangerous. I don't think Tancredo falls into that category at all - he's just a wingnut dickhead. No harm in his speech, in my opinion.

4/17/2009 4:54:25 PM

Quote :

"I certainly don't think that people necessarily have to allow other people to speak."

True, there is no law that says this.
But, when you are the people who are always bitching about "diversity" and "tolerance" and the like, it means you ought to shut the fuck up when you won't let someone else say their piece.

4/17/2009 5:03:35 PM

^ "tolerance" and "diversity" doesn't mean letting any dipshit get his word in.

4/17/2009 5:10:19 PM

the hell it doesn't

4/17/2009 5:17:19 PM

Nope, it doesn't. That wouldn't make any sense. Demanding that people tolerate intolerance is like asking God to microwave a burrito so hot that even He can't eat it.

4/17/2009 5:19:38 PM

haha, so, you say that people should be intolerant of intolerance. Hypocrisy at its best! thank you for proving my point

4/17/2009 5:27:50 PM

An homophobes are literally afraid of gays too!

4/17/2009 5:39:11 PM

well, I'd love to see your justification that Tancredo is "intolerant" then. Omg, he wants people to FOLLOW OUR FUCKING LAWS!!! What an evil man!

and that ignores the fact that all one would have to do is LABEL someone as "intolerant" and then you could ignore what they have to say. THAT is a dangerous road, my friend, but it is, ultimately what you espouse.

4/17/2009 5:41:19 PM

^ lol

you really don't know anything about tancredo, do you?

hint: think carefully before you attempt to defend him


[Edited on April 17, 2009 at 5:43 PM. Reason : even EarthDogg doesn't like him]

4/17/2009 5:42:14 PM

I've asked you to defend your assertion of intolerance. And you resort to "heh, shouldn't you know? Even guy X doesn't like him." I'm not saying I like him, either. But that doesn't mean I will deny him the right to speak.

4/17/2009 5:58:26 PM

i'm tolerant of everyone that is exactly like me.

4/17/2009 8:31:23 PM

that's basically what the UNC tards are saying

4/17/2009 8:38:22 PM

Quote :

""Hey everybody, sure am glad you didn't protest like that when I came to speak at Columbia University!" But maybe these UNC students are right, we should only protest anti-immigrant people. We can leave alone the racists murders like Ahmadinejad."

Actually people did protest that (every Jewish group in NYC for starters) and the head of the university even took a swipe at him. The question is, were you one of the many conservatives who were chastising Columbia for giving him a platform or do you too recognize that in a free society we have the right to hear (and criticize) all views? seems the consensus among the right then was that Columbia legitimized the man and that it never should have happened because hitler and such.

Also, don't forget that these people are some fringe element. I say this because I recognize one person from the clips as someone I had classes in Philosophy with at State actually. They're basically the left equivalent of groups like...Students for Western Civilization.

Hell, I don't agree with them I'm sure, but I'd voice my opposition to Tancredo too, although probably through some really dickish questions about why he's palling around with a group run by VDARE acolytes.

[Edited on April 20, 2009 at 1:11 PM. Reason : .]

4/20/2009 1:03:24 PM

Yes I was critical of Columbia and was against his invitation/visitation. Would I have done all I could to disrupt/prevent the event?

No.

4/20/2009 1:08:44 PM

Quote :

"Yes I was critical of Columbia and was against his invitation/visitation."

why don't you think we need to hear what he has to say? do we only apply our principles as a nation to American citizens or those we like? the right to free speech is the right to be offended.

you say you wouldn't have done anything after he was already there, but the point really is that we should hear all sides, even the evil ones.

[Edited on April 20, 2009 at 1:13 PM. Reason : .]

4/20/2009 1:12:38 PM

Precisely, we should hear all viewpoints, regardless of their context in order to remain an enlightened society. By squelching those we disagree with, we are willfully limiting our resources for knowledge and betterment as a people, despite the stance. We are a free people and free people are allowed to make up their own minds about the thoughts conveyed by anyone, it is not American to silence anyone's words, no matter how toxic in nature. Doing so, will eventually corrupt our rights to free speech, and after that fails, all bets are off.

4/20/2009 1:25:54 PM

It's not about squelching those we don't agree with, it's about squelching those we feel will actually lead to harm. I'm sorry, but I think that citizens, for instance, would not be in the wrong if they tried to stop something like a KKK march. The government should in no way ever be involved in preventing such a march unless it's for safety or other such reasons, but the people should always keep that right.

4/21/2009 10:14:56 AM