Free Speech on Lockdown

Mild-mannered conservative commentator Ben Shapiro spoke at UC-Berkeley Thursday night, and the world didn’t come to an end.

But the campus was on near-lockdown in what officials called “unprecedented” security, with a half-mile perimeter of concrete barriers and a “highly visible” police presence.

That, it seems, was enough to deter Black Bloc, Antifa and other hard-left types from trying to physically suppress Shapiro’s freespeech rights, as they’ve done before, on Berkeley and other campuses.

Still, campus sidewalks were littered with graffiti declaring Shapiro “not welcome” and denouncing him as a “fascist” — which he most certainly is not.

But he is a conservative — and to those on the hard left, that’s now the same thing.

Yet it was a “terrific” evening, by Shapiro’s own account, featuring a lively debate with fully engaged students, left and right. Which was the whole point of his appearance.

Meanwhile, 133 Berkeley faculty members (at last count) have signed an open letter calling for a complete boycott of classes and campus activities this month when conservatives appear during a “Free Speech Week.”

The profs demand the canceling of classes and the closure of all buildings on campus — and a guarantee that anyone “afraid” of even coming on campus during the four-day event not be penalized.

This, after the university actually offered “support and counseling” for those student snowflakes traumatized by possible exposure to opinions they don’t agree with.

“No one should be made to feel threatened or harassed simply because of who they are or for what they believe,” Berkeley Provost Paul Alivisatos said last week.

He was referring to his fragile students, but the sentiment applies better to Berkeley’s guest speakers.