Columbia University’s Nanny Police State -- designed to coddle some students by crushing others -- collapsed and died last week. The cause was contradictions.
When Columbia president Minouche Shafik called in the NYPD to arrest more than 100 peaceful protesters because opponents said they felt "unsafe," it galvanized the university in support of the protest. The occupation mushroomed in size, doubled down on its demands, and spread to Yale, NYU and campuses across the country.
No violence or injuries have been reported, but Shafik said “students across an array of communities have conveyed fears for their safety“ amid “too many examples of intimidating and harassing behavior.” Meanwhile Shafik is being harassed and intimidated by members of Congress demanding a crackdown on campus protests. Behind it all: Big-money donors to politicians and schools.
Students, faculty and staff are protesting US and university support for Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza. As of Monday their demands were for Columbia to divest from companies with ties to Israel, bar police from campus, grant amnesty to all protesters, and end seizures of land and displacement of people, “whether in Harlem, Lenapehoking or Palestine.”
Just a walk through or past the occupied lawn would let anyone know there is little to fear. It’s a different demo from 1968, when Vietnam war protests were led by fiery activists like Mark Rudd and Stokely Carmichael. This occupation is mostly female and/or non-binary, and organized co-operatively, with no hierarchy of leaders. This afternoon, in the area set aside for press interviews, all the media-trained representatives were women and most were women of color. Many were from Barnard, the Columbia women’s college which has suspended and evicted students for protesting. I interviewed a Barnard student, a third-year Psychology major, of Asian ancestry. She called Palestine a “compass” — pointing the way for all kinds of intersecting liberation movements, including feminism. The struggle, she said, is against the “violence of the patriarchy.”
Monday night, as observant Jews marked Passover in homes and dorms. about 100 students and faculty gathered on the occupied lawn for an improvised seder. Earlier I asked a group of Jewish students gathered in front of their tent if they’d seen any evidence of anti-Semitism among their fellow student protesters. They all said no.
Meanwhile, the protests were spilling over into the street outside Columbia’s gates at 115th and Broadway. Students with bullhorns inside the gates led supporters on the sidewalk in chants which inluded: “One two three four, Apartheid no more!” and “Genocide no more; “ And then — “five, six , seven, eight, Israel is a racist state.” A few feet away, separated by police barriers and cops in riot gear, a much smaller pro-Israel group called the protesters “terrorists” and “Hamas lovers,” and one woman yelled, “Go home! Go to Hell!” Police surrounded the entire campus and a police helicopter hovered noisily above.
Most of the nastiness is on the street, outside the closed campus. Recently I was walking up Broadway with a friend when a large young man wearing a Nazi-style helmet came careening down the sidewalk on a motorized scooter. As he veered past, we both heard him say “Sieg Heil!” Then there was a guy outside Columbia’s gates draped in Israeli colors, marching up and down before the pro-Palestinian crowd, with a sign advising them to behead their children.
So far, the only casualties have been the truth — twisted by both sides — the lawn, trampled by campers — and the public, which is indefinitely barred from the campus. I talked my way in as a member of the press.
The encampment covers one of Columbia’s many lawns. Across the path, workers were preparing another field for a graduation tent. Commencement comes in May, and protesters say they’ll stay put until Columbia divests. President Shafik is pleading for peace, dialogue and “respectful engagement.”
Columbia could re-arrange the seating and and let the students hold their ground. The students could agree not to disrupt the ceremonies. But can anyone hold their tongue?
Copyright 2024 by Tom Phillips
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