Yale Law Students Disrupt, Try To Intimidate Conservative Speaker
This is just more evidence of the decline of legal education and the collapse of values. “Social justice” and feelings trump free speech and debate.
We have been here before, intolerant students trying to purge and punish people with whom they disagree. It’s not just an undergraduate problem, it’s happening in law schools also, with faculty and administrators condoning or even encouraging this cancel culture.
The most recent example was the shout-down of Ilya Shapiro at UC-Hastings Law School, which involved a student getting within inches of Shapiro as he tried to speak in a clear attempt at physical intimidation. I covered the story in these posts:
- Ilya Shapiro Shouted Down, Prevented From Speaking At UC-Hastings Law School: “Get Out!”
- Nineteen UC-Hastings Law Faculty Object To University Statement In Support Of Free Speech After Ilya Shapiro Shoutdown
Now something similar has happened at Yale Law School. The Free Beacon broke the story:
More than 100 students at Yale Law School attempted to shout down a bipartisan panel on civil liberties, intimidating attendees and causing so much chaos that police were eventually called to escort panelists out of the building.
The March 10 panel, which was hosted by the Yale Federalist Society, featured Monica Miller of the progressive American Humanist Association and Kristen Waggoner of the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), a conservative nonprofit that promotes religious liberty. Both groups had taken the same side in a 2021 Supreme Court case involving legal remedies for First Amendment violations. The purpose of the panel, a member of the Federalist Society said, was to illustrate that a liberal atheist and a conservative Christian could find common ground on free speech issues….
When a professor at the law school, Kate Stith, began to introduce Waggoner, the protesters, who outnumbered the audience members, rose in unison, holding signs that attacked ADF. The nonprofit has argued—and won—several Supreme Court cases establishing religious exemptions from civil rights laws, most famously Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission in 2018.
As they stood up, the protesters began to antagonize members of the Federalist Society, forcing Stith to pause her remarks. One protester told a member of the conservative group she would “literally fight you, bitch,” according to audio and video obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.
With the fracas intensifying, Stith reminded the students of Yale’s free speech policies, which bar any protest that “interferes with speakers’ ability to be heard and of community members to listen.” When the protesters heckled her in response—several with their middle fingers raised—she told them to “grow up,” according to video of the event obtained by the Free Beacon.
From the video the Free Beacon posted, the disruption wasn’t as loud and continuous as at UC-Hastings, but it was enough to prevent the speaker from being heard for a significant time until the protesters left.
Yale Law Professor Kate Stith did something few law professors or administrators have the guts to do, stand up to the mob:
BEASTMODE: Yale Law professor Kate Stith tells protesting students to "grow up"
Full story from @aaronsibarium: https://t.co/JsTkQxynzL pic.twitter.com/81wGuKXk1C
— Washington Free Beacon (@FreeBeacon) March 16, 2022
As the Free Beacon described, but is not fully audible on the inside video, a lot of the physical intimidation took place outside the room:
The protesters proceeded to exit the event—one of them yelled “Fuck you, FedSoc” on his way out—but congregated in the hall just outside. Then they began to stomp, shout, clap, sing, and pound the walls, making it difficult to hear the panel. Chants of “protect trans kids” and “shame, shame” reverberated throughout the law school. The din was so loud that it disrupted nearby classes, exams, and faculty meetings, according to students and a professor who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
Ellen Cosgrove, the associate dean of the law school, was present at the panel the entire time. Though the cacophony clearly violated Yale’s free speech policies, she did not confront any of the protesters.
At times, things seemed in danger of getting physical. The protesters were blocking the only exit from the event, and two members of the Federalist Society said they were grabbed and jostled as they attempted to leave.
“It was disturbing to witness law students whipped into a mindless frenzy,” Waggoner said. “I did not feel it was safe to get out of the room without security.”
As the panel concluded, police officers arrived to escort Waggoner and Miller out of the building. Three members of the Federalist Society say they were told that the Dean of Yale Law School, Heather Gerken, called the police, though the law school declined to comment on who asked for extra security. The Federalist Society did not call the police, the group’s president confirmed.
Yale law students are upset. Not at the distruption and intimidation, but that the police were called, via Yale Daily News:
Over 400 law students — more than half of the current Law School student body — have signed an open letter condemning the presence of armed police at a student protest at the Federalist Society meeting….
The letter was primarily concerned with the presence of armed police at the protest, but additionally condemned law professor Kate Stith, who moderated the event and told the protesters to “grow up.” The letter, which was initially submitted to Law School administrators with over 130 signatures and has since more than tripled in signatories, notes that signatories are “a coalition of queer students and allies deeply concerned with the presence of armed police at a peaceful protest of law students.” ….
“Future lawyers should have the critical thinking skills, intellectual curiosity, humility, and maturity to engage with ideas and legal principles that they may disagree with,” she wrote. “Unfortunately, some students who attended the Federalist Society event refused to allow others to speak and acted in an aggressive and hostile manner towards me, Professor Kate Stith, and Monica Miller from the American Humanist Association.” ….
Several student protesters characterized the armed response as disproportionate, given what they viewed to be the peaceful and non-disruptive nature of the protest. Sources with the Federalist Society and close to the speakers disputed this, saying that the protest, although peaceful, disrupted the event.
You can read the student letter. If the Free Beacon’s description of what went on outside lecture hall is accurate, then it certainly was reasonable to provide police escort and protection for the speakers as the exited.
This is just more evidence of the decline of legal education and the collapse of values. “Social justice” and feelings trump free speech and debate.
More scandalous behavior at Yale Law School. Law students–at any law school–who grossly violate others' free speech rights should be expelled. The idea that those preventing others from speaking or listening were merely exercising their own free speech rights is laughable. https://t.co/9Gi7c6chN6
— Robert P. George🇻🇦🇺🇸🪕 (@McCormickProf) March 16, 2022
These are future lawyers, for fuck's sake. The stupidity on display here is almost unthinkable. https://t.co/WwWgBHFpyU
— Samantha Harris (@samk_harris) March 16, 2022
"Yale Law students are our future attorneys, judges, legislators, and corporate executives," she said. "We must change course and restore a culture of free speech and civil discourse at Yale and other law schools, or the future of the legal profession…is in dire straits."
— Aaron Sibarium (@aaronsibarium) March 16, 2022
Not just Yale. Yale LAW SCHOOL. These people want the privilege of a law license, which allows private professionals to wield governmental power. They intend to do so as antagonists of the freedom of speech. https://t.co/AqWDgflS1F
— Dan McLaughlin (@baseballcrank) March 16, 2022
UPDATE:
Incidentally, Judge Laurence Silberman just sent this email to the listservs for all Article III judges in the United States. https://t.co/kfoyQGIGqW pic.twitter.com/TyM0xVhVHo
— Mark Joseph Stern (@mjs_DC) March 17, 2022
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Comments
The police escorted the wrong people out of the building. They should have escorted the disruptive babies, who if they resisted should have been arrested.
I was going to say just about the same thing. The absence of consequences to the “protesters” (I personally prefer the term “thugs”) is one of the reasons they keep getting bolder and more violent.
and suspended/expelled.
Never gonna happen. Too much tuition/future donor money at stake. Gotta keep feeding the grist mill otherwise all those administrators and extraneous law school profs would have to get real jobs.
They are babies in the sense that Mussolini’s black shirts could be called that. They are ideological college students who made a calculated decision to launch a show of force to improve the status of their ideology and lower the status of their opponents.
I was going to say that the police should have already been there to quickly drag protesters out by their hair …
I’m afraid you don’t understand.
Arresting the thugs would have resulted in building takeovers and riots. The only effective response would be to close the university and send the children home. This will never happen. QED.
Let them finish their degree, take the bar exam, then collect their paper and rip it in half
They will only repeat the action if nothing is done
I had to log in to give you a thumbs up!
When are the conservative students going to start the beat downs?
They have no institutional power, they like us would end up spending 15+ years in jail. If we want institutional power (which would make things like this never happen and make such a beat down pointless) we will have to take it via state government and next time we have it federal government (i.e. use the power voters give to us) and abandon this “MUH GOVERNMENT BAAAD!!” stuff currently holding us back.
Agreed. The right has to get aggressive in using the power of government.
There is no “right”, no political spectrum. There’s only the totalitarian left – and the few who oppose it.
Yeah, we know how that ends and the answer is “not well”. Allowing government to invade every facet of private life was your mistake in the first place. You can’t remedy that with more government power.
^^^ This ^^^
Are you arguing that the swamp should not be drained? That reform of public sector unions shouldn’t happen? That the next r President leave in place all Biden appointees and policies? Those are all examples of using the institutional power of govt to advance our agenda.
Placing a simple free speech requirement on receipt of Federal funds would solve the heckler veto issue.
That is NOT what Danny was suggesting, based on reading his actual words.
GWB,
Danny seems to me to suggest that refusing to utilize the organs of govt is foolish. He alludes to this by reference to those who exhibit the ‘Muh govt is bad’ syndrome.
Was he specifically suggesting the points I listed? No, otherwise I would have put them in quotation marks. However I doubt he disagrees with my list. What do you believe he was suggesting? Specifically?
Florida’s Stop Woke legislation
“will strengthen state civil rights laws and prohibit schools, corporations, and government agencies from promoting race essentialism, collective guilt, and racial scapegoating in the classroom or the workplace”
I don’t know about you but I love it, I wish Trump had tried something like that as president.
Our choices are use government regulations to reinforce our freedoms and stop the onslaught of wokism, or we could reject all of our victories on every issue (all of which have come via government) and the only policy that isn’t unconditional surrender (The left controls every major institution in this country besides government) and go back to the Bush doctrine.
If you are against use of government you are for unconditional surrender. The left has every other power structure which views us the same way it views Putin.
Florida’s Stop Woke legislation is good as tactics, but ineffective as strategy. It identifies the problem of wokeism and takes a stand against it, but does not prevent the woke products of the Ed Schools from engaging in subversion. Only school choice will do that. The government schools are corrupt and cannot be reformed.
Similarly, we should be looking for ways in which the higher ed industrial complex can be replaced or rendered obsolete. Higher ed is corrupt and cannot be reformed.
Where are you (and the rest of us) on the five stages of grief?
Denial
Bargaining
Anger
Depression
Acceptance (do something which might actually solve the problem)
Gibbie,
It’s good strategy. Here’s why; the bill and similar companion legislation the left mislabeled for propaganda as the ‘don’t say gay’ bill sets out a marker for the left to be compared with.
This comparison is the first step on the journey to a political shift among the broader public. When Disney and others waste ink and energy in opposition people begin to ask ‘what are they for, does the left want to have adults telling children K-3 about sexual practices and gender ideology?’
Parents especially don’t want this; no matter what ethnicity they overwhelmingly oppose it and other forms of radical indoctrination; see opposition to CRT/Equity and irresponsible placement of ‘trans’ males into female locker rooms and lavatories.
Now that parents are on board in opposing these things they are more open to opposing the groups pushing these agendas; the teacher unions, leftist board members and leftist politicians. IOW they now have another reason to evaluate how who they vote for translates into real world policies they strongly disagree with.
This results in a preparation and shaping of the political battlefield for the true answer to defang the left; school choice achieved by funding the Student not the System. That is the only permanent way to fix the issue of public schools. By funding the Student the public schools must compete by offering a product that Parents want. If they fail to offer a desirable product then the Parents can and will choose an alternative.
CommoChief, There are at least two pieces of legislation. The one I’m talking about forbids teaching CRT/equity. I think you are talking about the anti-sex-ed for K-3. Or perhaps both.
Neither will stop rogue teachers. Both show parents and churches where to look. Both bring the leftist crazies out of the woodwork (they can’t help themselves). But I’m especially fond of watching people insist that K-3 children should be taught about sex. The left thinks that’s a real winner!
I agree that funding the student is the proper long term strategy, although the left will attempt to control what kind of schools will be able to receive those funds, and will attempt to outlaw homeschooling. They must be opposed tooth and nail.
Meanwhile, the most important tactic is to get the kids out now. This will make it harder for the left to reverse the momentum.
Screw “institutional power”, I’m talking about real physical beat-downs. Nothing adjusts an attitude like a broken tooth.
I really wonder when people being surrounded by this insanity are going to say “enough!”
Prof. Kingsfield: Mr. Hart, here is a dime. Take it, call your mother, and tell her there is serious doubt about you ever becoming a lawyer.
Law student Hart: [pauses as he is leaving the room] You… are a son of a bitch, Kingsfield!
Kingsfield: Mr. Hart! That is the most intelligent thing you’ve said today. You may take your seat.
It’s a lot worse than the decline of legal education and the collapse of values: these people are further flooding the ranks of lawyers, judges and administrators.
Our country is very near implosion. Biden just might be the last president.
People (before Trump/Covid/Biden) used to give me shit because I said by 2030 we’d break into a civil war but now it looks like I was still wrong but because I overestimated how long the country would last.
Biden is either the last president or 2nd to last. We might get one more.
Oh, hell, I lost a bet that the US would break out into a shooting civil war by end of 2021.
If another democrat becomes president after Biden (or during Biden’s term), it’ll be a fait accompli.
One canary in the coal mine is the enraged support by so many grifting people of fellow grifting degenerate Jussie Smollett.
We really are here.
I said in 2007 that if Obama was elected, our country was over, because he was a communist, and once they get into power there are never real national elections again. Trump’s win was a fluke, that verged on a miracle – but he was sabotaged by a bureaucracy that’s almost 100% hardcore leftist.
History always repeats: not necessarily in the same place, not necessarily with the same actors
The only thing we learn from history is that we learn nothing from history.
Those who study history weep as they watch the ignorant repeat it.
How long before Kate Stith the person who told the protestors to grow up is chased out of the school?
This has been festering at Yale for years.
Even the Simpsons made fun of Yale and SJW’s in 2017. “You’d be creating a space for violence to happen.” – Actual Yale student quote that was in the show. Season 28, episode 19 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1s3C__3YIA
I can’t see America lasting much longer without widespread violence breaking out. Leftism is a cancer upon this country. It’s killing the country.
Leftism has finally gotten a stranglehold in the “justice” system. Between degenerate Soros DAs, Himmler clones Mayorkas and Merrick Garland, and unqualified, dangerous judges at every level (there are tons of Sotomayors in courtrooms across the nation), there is no justice system. It merely exists as a tool of oppression and exacting of political revenge.
Terrifying. And clearly law is not taught.
Colleges have been turning out way to many lawyers for years. They see the law as a means to advance their pet cause or as a political stepping stone. Yale, Harvard, etc have been churning out SJW lawyers for years. We are seeing the fruits of those efforts play out everyday. My guess is that none of the protesters will ever draw up a will, read through and red line a real estate transaction or lease. Or any other common legal assistance for a client. They will almost all end up in a foundation or political job.
And that foundation or political job is in furtherance of destruction of our nation. LITERALLY.
So many future Yale Leftist Seminary Law students will have no tolerance for opposing views.
Karl Marx would be proud
Because Progressivism is a religion. Much like Islam, it is one that brooks no tolerance for other worldviews.
Free speech is in danger and has been at Yale for years
So now we’ll see if law is just a prestige stack, or if it’s a profession with standards. If the latter, these disruptors will be denied law licenses.
There’s hope. People like Bill&Hillary Clinton (Yale Law grads) and Barack&Michelle Obama all seem to have been disbarred or otherwise surrendered their law licenses. Perhaps there are actual standards.
Well, we need more actual standards, standards to keep really dumb people out of office.
Saying “grow up” is not fighting back. Dragging their asses out of there and then throwing them out of law school is fighting back. When we figure this out maybe we can begin to save the country and freedom.
Yale LS is well known and for decades has been perceived as more radical and woke than its competitors in the so called Ivy League
Some of these brats just need a good knuckle sandwich.
none of the clowns that do this crap should be permitted to get a bar license
The students depicted are Nazis and C0mmunists and should not be confused with law students
Yale has become a joke–their students don’t recognize the first thing about free speech, and the administration either believes in this garbage or are too afraid to do anything.
Yale Law students are our future attorneys, judges, legislators, and corporate executives
Dear Lord in heaven above, I certainly hope not!
Honestly, I would have called police as soon as they made any initial refusal to leave the premises and had every single one arrested for disturbing the peace. If they left after the call but continued that stupidity in the corridor, same thing: arrest them all.
And this sort of environment would be a good one for carrying a stun gun. If they lay hands on you as you attempt to depart, let them know that’s unacceptable behavior. Unfortunately, it’s probably illegal to carry one there, and you would suffer lawfare as a result, regardless of legality.
(That paragraph is based entirely on the concept that if they are going to act like savages, then the return actions should be responding to savages, not civilized beings.)
The letter itself is a prime example and exhibit of woke narrative rhetoric in place of facts
The students’ letter is a run on sentence or woke rant Hard to believe that these are crème de la crème of future legal community
The amazing 1969 prophecy that racial preferences would cause the exact grievances of protesters today
https://heterodoxacademy.org/blog/the-amazing-1969-prophecy-that-racial-preferences-would-cause-the-exact-grievances-of-protesters-today/
VIDEO: Yale SJWs gone wild against free speech
https://legalinsurrection.com/2017/03/video-yale-gone-wild-against-free-speech/
https://legalinsurrection.com/2015/11/yale-students-go-berserk-defending-their-right-not-to-be-offended/
https://legalinsurrection.com/2016/05/social-justice-warriors-drive-innocent-faculty-couple-from-yale-campus/