Colson Whitehead Cancels His Commencement Speech at UMass Amherst
New York TimesMay 07
Police Clear Pro-Palestinian Camp, Retake Occupied Building at UC Irvine
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The Facts
Police have arrested several pro-Palestinian protesters at the University of California (UC), Irvine, who had established a weeks-long protest encampment and occupied a lecture hall for several hours.
This comes as UC Irvine called in the Irvine Police Department and Orange County Sheriff's Department on Wednesday, as the campus was thrown into chaos after demonstrators barricaded the adjacent Physical Sciences Lecture Hall.
The Spin
Right narrative
UC Irvine had engaged discussions with the protesters before their rash decision to barricade and vandalize a lecture hall, prompting a police response to restore order. As they refused to disperse peacefully, the school were forced to bring in the police. Anti-Israel activists do have a right to protest, but UC Irvine also has a right to choose neutrality during the conflict for the sake of its academic mission, and resist the bullying that has roiled over campuses nationwide.
Left narrative
Colleges in America have shown their true faces to the public with their violent crackdowns on peaceful pro-Palestinian student demonstrations. Protests have always been messy, and building occupations are nothing new in the history of campus demonstrations, with the overreaction from authorities doing little but enflaming tensions. Civil liberties have been undermined, with militarized police being used to disperse peaceful and conscientious student protests.