The public voices opposing the campus mayhem are writing only about freedom of speech. They point out that freedom of speech doesn’t include the freedom to occupy a campus or use violence.
That’s better than nothing, but it misses two points: on any private property, the free speech right is that of the owner, and any speaker on his property speaks by permission, not by right.
If there’s a pre-existing contract between the owner and the speaker, a contract governing this, then that rules. But I can’t believe there’s any contract between any private university and the students that gives them the right to do what they are doing.
Columbia and MIT are private universities, and they can eject any of these rabble-rousers at any time. (Note they are not “protestors” or “demonstrators,” they are agitators or hooligans or some such value-laden term.)
A government school is a different case, but even with government property, as Ayn Rand has pointed out, taxpayers are stand-ins for the owners, and the actions of the agitators are contrary to the very purpose of an institution of higher education.
But free speech is not the only issue, and not the main one. The issue is this: To side with Hamas against Israel is immoral. To side with the sub-humans who committed the atrocities of October 7 is obscenely evil. And Hamas is the elected government of Palestine.
Have any of the editorials and opinion pieces opposing the campus “protestors” made this point? I have seen defenses of Israel against Hamas, but none that denounce the position of the campus goons as an evil not to be sanctioned or debated. You don’t debate whether or not one should side with those who gleefully roasted babies in ovens.
