Berkeley Wimps Out

It took just weeks for UC-Berkeley to wimp out on its renewed commitment to free speech. The school’s chancellor last month proclaimed a Free Speech Week that would protect the rights of conservative speakers to appear on campus without harassment.

This in the wake of canceled speeches by right-wing provocateurs Milo Yiannopoulos and Ann Coulter, as well as mainstream conservative Ben Shapiro.

Now Shapiro has been rebooked for a Sept. 14 appearance at a campus facility that seats 1,978 — with 2,500 people expressing interest in buying tickets, according to event organizers.

But the school has just announced that it’s ordering the hall’s balcony closed — cutting the maximum audience nearly in half. The reason: fears of “significant injury” if something is thrown from the balcony or anyone falls over the railing.

Now let’s be clear: Anyone inclined to pelt Shapiro with missiles from a balcony won’t be someone who agrees with him or at least wants to hear what he has to say.

No, it will be the same antifa and other hard-left types who insist on preventing anyone from voicing an opinion they dislike. The same people, in other words, who forced the earlier cancellations.

Apparently, Berkeley officials agree with Mayor Jesse Areguin, who recently expressed fear that a Free Speech Week would “provoke” hard-left thugs into using such events “to create mayhem.”

Score another pernicious victory for the hecklers’ veto.

Campus officials insist the same rules apply to all student groups — but conservatives don’t disrupt liberal speakers, and certainly not on a regular basis.

So free speech at Berkeley remains hostage to those who don’t believe in it.