There's much truth to the charge that fascism is a current threat, but the locus of that threat is seriously misjudged. The alt-right is both small and relatively impotent; the most virulent fascists on today's socio-cultural scene are on the left.
It's a technique of radicals, especially radicals on the left, to deflect attention from their own behavior and goals by projecting traits that they themselves exhibit onto those they deem to be their ideological enemies, and it's a technique of fascists everywhere to shout down those who would expose them thereby denying them a public forum for their opinions.
It's also a technique of fascists to use violence to intimidate and harm those who resist and oppose them so that the opposition is cowed into silence and acquiescence.
One of the traditions, indeed, a venerated constitutional right, enjoyed by Americans for over two centuries is the right to freely express political views, but that right is under more serious assault today than at any time in our national history, and the battlefield is our colleges and universities.
Recently U.C. Berkeley spent over $600,000 to provide security for a conservative speaker named Ben Shapiro whose views are mainstream conservative and shared by a majority of Americans. It wasn't a fear that Shapiro's speech would provoke a violent reaction among conservatives that motivated Berkeley to spend the money but rather that it would provoke a violent reaction on the fascist left. Organizations like Antifa and Black Lives Matter have explicitly embraced violence to both further their ends and to suppress opposing viewpoints, and Shapiro's speech was feared to be a ripe target for their brutish tactics.
These methods have been employed at many universities across the country. Students, faculty, and speakers at Berkeley, Evergreen, Middlebury and others have all been subject to the thuggery of campus fascists. Events at the University of Minnesota this year as recounted by Matt Lewis at The Daily Beast are another example of how it works:
Madison Faupel is the president of the University of Minnesota's College Republican chapter. Her group sparked controversy last fall when it reserved space and painted a mural on the Washington Avenue Bridge to promote their student group.This is all troubling enough and illustrates the barbarism of at least some of those who oppose her views, but even the university's administration failed to uphold any commitment to political diversity, tolerance and free speech:
Her group settled on three slogans: “College Republicans, The Best Party on Campus,” “Trump Pence 2016,” and “Build the Wall.”
Within an hour, the panels had been vandalized, and protesters had surrounded the panels. Some of the vandalism included the following statements: “STOP WHITE SUPREMACY NOW” and “Hate Speech is not Free Speech.”
The notion that Madison is a white supremacist is about as laughable as the notion that Ben Shapiro is one. In their insistence on tolerance, leftists are increasingly intolerant of anyone who may not like their choice of candidate or political ideas. The charge of "racism" is becoming an easy way to shut down robust political discussion.
Supporting a border wall might be politically incorrect, but it hardly qualifies as “white supremacy” or “hate speech.” Moreover, a border wall does not, in and of itself, denote anti-immigrant sentiment. One can be pro-immigrant—and also believe that a nation must vigorously control its borders. That’s what Madison told me when I asked her why she included the provocative mural.
But frankly, I would be defending her group’s right to post the slogan regardless. College is at least partly about encountering diverse ideas, and free speech is inherently about protecting unpopular speech—especially political speech. Regardless of how you feel about building a wall (I'm against the idea), the president ran (and won) advocating it—and the House recently voted to fund it. This is not an idea wildly outside the political mainstream. In 2006, Democrats like Hillary Clinton supported a border fence. Like it or not, it's a legitimate policy debate.
As the protests grew, so did violent threats against the College Republicans and Madison, in particular. The group's members were scared for their safety on campus. Madison and the rest of the executive board didn’t go out at night and tried to never be alone on campus. Many used campus security to walk home.
Rather than condemning vandalism and standing up for the First Amendment right of freedom of speech, many supposed adults in the administration instead lashed out at the College Republicans. Heather C. Lou, assistant director of the Multicultural Center for Academic Excellence, said that the panel included a “xenophobic and racist” statement and that “the UMN bias incident team has been contacted.”In other words, mob rule has supporters even in the higher administrative echelons of the university. But the intimidation and fear of violence directed at these students was not at an end:
Catherine Squires, communications professor and director of the Race, Indigeneity, Gender and Sexuality Studies Initiative, encouraged faculty members to get involved, “especially faculty of color—many of us have been through these sorts of situations when we were students.”
University officials were essentially inciting anger toward a young, female student who pays tuition.The College of Education and Human Development sent out a college-wide e-mail stating: “The rhetoric and xenophobic messaging negatively impacts many of our Latino students, immigrants, and others who see this as an act of hate against non-whites.”
The University of Minnesota did call for a “Campus Climate” conversation about the recent controversial events, but this, too, devolved into chaos. About 15 minutes into the event, more than 200 protesters came into the room chanting, “Hey hey, ho ho, racism has got to go,” surrounding those students who had come to the event to engage in a civil conversation.Later in the semester, Antifa got into the act. You can read about the frightening reprisals they've employed against Faupel at the link.
The protesters took over the stage as the student body president stood at the front of the room with her fist in the air, leading the chants. Students took turns lamenting how their feelings were hurt, how writing “Build the Wall” amounts to hate speech, and how they want to be included in conversations on campus. At the end of the event, one of the protesters stood on stage and asked the crowd if any College Republicans had attended. Madison stood up and raised her hand.
When the “event” ended, she was swarmed by the mob. “They were completely surrounding me; I was unable to leave the event. They were screaming in my face calling me racist, xenophobic, and other unmentionable names. They were aggressive, and I just wanted to get out safely,” said Madison. “One girl was holding another girl back saying, ‘She’s not worth it. Don’t hit her.’”
We normally think of university students as comprising the cream of American society, and many of them are, but the people who are attacking Madison Faupel are the dregs. They don't belong in an environment in which the free exchange of ideas is supposedly valued. They're too intellectually and culturally primitive to appreciate freedom, too eager to deny it to those who do appreciate it, and too fond of violence to be tolerated on our campuses and streets.
Their methods are similar to those of the Nazi brown-shirts of the 1930s, they're every bit as fascistic and evil as their Nazi predecessors and, like contemporary neo-Nazis and Klansmen, they need to be both condemned and ridiculed until they retreat back to the rocks from under which they've emerged.