Students respond to Shapiro protests

Wednesday night’s lecture got heated

“Let us in.”

“Diversity is not a problem.”

Protesters chanted outside the doors of 121 Sparks Building, Wednesday night during Ben Shapiro’s lecture.

Ben Shapiro is a political commentator, author and attorney. He has spoken at many colleges on issues such as the “Black Rights Matter” movement, race and diversity.

His lecture on Wednesday, “When Diversity Becomes a Problem: The Fascist Nature of Liberalism” spoke about diversity and more.

“Ben Shapiro claims that we ought to judge people not by their race, but by their virtues,” said Rashmit Arora, a senior majoring in Criminology at Penn State.

“He also claims that white privilege is a fad. And he also claimed that what the protesters were doing is a fine example of the fascism endorsed by the left.”

Some other students who attended the lecture believed Shapiro wasn’t showing racism and he was just voicing his beliefs.

“As far as I heard he never said anything racist. What he meant by when diversity is bad is that we consider diversity to be only skin color. Not diverse ideas and thoughts or emotions and when we see diversity as only skin color that in itself is racism. There were many diverse students sitting inside and none of them protested or anything, he never said anything outright racist,” said Arshdeep Hanjra, a freshmen majoring in Finance.

As the lecture unfolded the university police would not allow protesters in, saying that the place was “full” according to the protesters.

According to Arshdeep, who attended the lecture, said at one point protesters who were close to the entrance threw over the table that the College Republicans Club set up during the event.

“I was very surprised by the amount of people who showed up to the event, not only those who were there to protest it, but the students wearing Trump hats and Ted Cruz t-shirts telling us that they were offended by our presence,” said Abby Pierce, who protested at the event.

The protesters continued to chant during Shapiro’s lecture and their protests made him inaudible.

“I wasn’t expecting to stop Ben Shapiro’s speech, and I knew that protesters would only prove his point,” she said.

 

“We were nonviolent, to which Ben Shapiro responded by saying that UCLA protesters were more aggressive, as if he was daring us to become more like them.”

Students also responded to the protests with their opinions on what should be taken away from this protest.

“What he fails to recognize is that our virtues and our values have a lot to do with where we come from. The definition of “good” in and of itself is subject to where you come from and how you perceive the world. Our race impacts our virtues. Our cultures impact our virtues,” said Rashmit.

“If there is one thing I can come away from the event saying it is that diversity is not a problem, but Penn State has a diversity problem,” said Abby.

Some of the people who attended the event said that Shapiro was practicing his first amendment right.

“From what I’ve come to know about Shapiro is that he’s just trying to be factual.  He’s trying to give a different perspective on the social issues at hand,” said Jordan Blaschak, a junior majoring in History.

Jordan said he disagreed with the protests.

“We just have to be open to different perspective because each is valid.  I just hope to the people that are outraged and that protest reflect on the subject and see the insight and beauty of another point of view and value that to expand on their own personal path in life,” he said.

However, Rashmit disagrees with this statement.

“The protesters were protecting the first amendment. Racial struggles have been fought all this while because the oppressed weren’t awarded their first amendment rights. The protest is an exercise of democracy, it’s not a violation of free speech. People protest when they disagree with ideas – in specific, ideas that will move us back in time, not help us, as a society, progress,” he said.

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