In The Fray

 Some people were surprised when Geraldo Rivera's show erupted in violence when he invited self-described racists onto his talk show to talk on the same stage as civil rights leader Roy Innis and Rabbi A Bruce Goldman. That was in 1988.

When the Charlie Kirk Memorial tour made its way through Berkeley, California earlier this week, would we have expected any different? 

The trouble started when protesters showed up to the big show, featuring alleged comedian Rob Schneider and author Frank Turek, a Christian mentor of the organization's late founder, Charlie Kirk. Among the "thoughts" shared by Mister Schneider was this bit: He said California paying slavery reparations was akin to "paying child support for a child you never had to a woman you never (had relations)."

He brought this brand of witty repartee to Zellerbach Hall, just a few yards from Sproul Plaza where in 1964 the Free Speech Movement began. Maybe a little history lesson might have helped fill in the void that apparently exists between the expectations organizers of the event had about just what Free Speech means. 

Shouting "fire" in a crowded movie house is not free speech. Standing up on a stage with a microphone in an auditorium on a campus that exists as almost a cartoonish parody of the liberal bastion found in the Golden State and declaring that being woke is wrong. Oh, and if he had a dime for ever gender, "I'd have twenty cents." 

Certainly I respect the right of Mister Schneider to speak his mind, not matter how tiny it is, but to imagine that there would not be some sort of blowback from making a show of those ideas is disingenuous. Say what you might about Charlie Kirk, but he put himself in a place where he encouraged debate. That's not what is happening on the Turning Point Tour that is supposed to be inspired by his legacy. Interestingly, the other guy on the bill, Frank Turek once suggested, "Conservatives try to adjust their behavior to fit the facts of nature. Liberals try to adjust the facts of nature to fit their behavior." It seems like he might have that backwards, but I respect his right to put it on a T-shirt. 

I just don't have to buy it. 

And when you show up on a college campus that has been the headwaters of liberal thought for more than six decades hoping to rub their collective nose in some of this "free speech," you're probably going to end up paying for it in one way or another. That said, I agree completely with Governor Newsom when he reminded us all that non-violence is the way to have your voice heard. Not easy to remember in the fray.