Violence can work wonders, making colleges afraid to allow controversial speakers on campus, lest they suffer the fates of the University of California-Berkeley and Middlebury.
So why would “intersectional” anti-Trump activists at George Washington University want to give it up?
The GW Hatchet obtained the minutes from the first meeting of a group calling itself the GW Coalition for Intersectional Justice:
On Nov. 10, members of at least 25 student organizations came to the first meeting for the group …
But the group fractured in their second meeting Nov. 20 when some student leaders opposed mandating nonviolence, which kept protesting students from burning flags and practicing self-defense in potential altercations with President Donald Trump’s supporters.
Anti-Trump student coalition splits over disagreements about adding a nonviolence clause to its mission statement https://t.co/OW7aaSQtF3 pic.twitter.com/4pmP0otD2b
— The GW Hatchet (@gwhatchet) March 7, 2017
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An official with the Mexican Students Association said it was his group’s idea to renounce violence in the meetings to form the coalition, which drew about 50 student organization leaders:
He said the Mexican Students Association’s executive board had discussed the idea before coming to the meeting.
“We didn’t want this protest to be either violent or misconstrued to be violent,” [Jesus] Montes said. “We didn’t want our organization or GW to be defaced if something were to happen.”
The suggestion opened up a series of debates, with some attendees saying student protesters should be able to use self-defense if, for instance, a Trump supporter struck them during an event – something that happened during some campaign rallies when Trump was a candidate.
Other student leaders countered that not adding the clause could open the coalition up to receiving potential blame if an unaffiliated, random person became violent and their actions were blamed on the group, Montes said.
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At a second meeting attended by “at least” 38 students, the groups agreed on the “intersectional” name and condemned “violence in all forms against marginalized people” – but not those they didn’t consider marginalized:
Although not explicitly in the mission statement, a note regarding the need for “nonviolent active resistance” appeared in a subsection of the statement.
The coalition fell apart during December exams, with official meetings ceasing, according to Montes.
The Hatchet said seven of the original 25 organizations represented in the minutes either denied comment or denied involvement.
Campus Reform spoke to a member of the coalition who played down the “nonviolence” dispute, saying it “wasn’t largely influential in the dissolution of the coalition” and that “many of us” didn’t remember talking about it.
The bigger problem? The coalition was too intersectional.
Read the Hatchet and Campus Reform stories.
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