In case you missed it, and there is no earthly reason why you should care, the Met Gala was held last night. For those of you with lives and who, therefore, may not be aware, the Met Gala is a yearly gathering at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. Various celebrities don outfits that resemble attire suited for a high-end Halloween party/Mardi Gras parade, or perhaps for posing for a Hieronymus Bosch painting. Ostensibly, the event is held to raise money for the museum, although its true purpose is to allow the rich and famous to bask in one another’s glory for an evening.
Toiling under the notion that their task in life is to stick it to the man, or woman, depending on the preferred pronouns, anti-Israel protesters took it upon themselves to march on the Met Gala to terrorize the denizens of the jet set. However, the Met Gala is sacred ground, and, according to the New York Post, the NYPD was diligent in keeping the hordes away from the doors and the tender sensibilities of the sacred beasts, with their hors d’oeuvres and cocktails.
Denied the pleasure of attacking resplendent demigods of couture, the protesters opted to vent their rage elsewhere. They burned an American flag at the 107th Infantry Memorial in Central Park and scrawled the word “Gaza” on the base of one of the statues. Some protesters covered the bronze statues with stickers featuring the Palestinian flag and the words “Stop the Genocide. End the apartheid. Free Palestine.” Others climbed on top of the statues and covered them in Palestinian flags. A statue of Civil War General William Tecumseh Sherman was draped in a Palestinian flag and “Free Gaza” was written in red graffiti across the base.
Israeli ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan commented:
Words are being weaponized to spread bigotry, to incite violence, (and) to inflame the targeting of Jews. Columbia, Harvard, and UCLA are new hotbeds of Nazi-like ideology, branding Israel as the root of all evil and the Jewish people is a global scourge. Did we see encampments to protest Russia’s war crimes in Ukraine? Did rioters barricade buildings to protest Assad’s brutality in Syria? Did we see Chinese students attacked because China is torturing Uyghurs? Were quads vandalized while Iran murdered women and protesters? Of course not.
I listen to podcasts during the day, and one podcaster wryly commented that the right is rarely seen protesting en masse. One person quipped in response that the reason is that normal people have jobs and cannot take time off from work to protest, even if they are paid for it. But that is only part of the equation. While colleges and the White House have danced around, and in some cases, coddled the anti-Semitic protesters, they would under no circumstances allow the right anything approaching such latitude. This is, of course, because the current protests have the tacit approval of people in power. And so, the well-heeled attendees of the Met Gala were shielded from the depredations of the mob. And they shall remain so for the moment.
Related: Columbia Law Students Are Too ‘Shaken’ to Pass Their Exams. Iran Offers to Help.
I was listening to an interview with Bill Whittle, in which he was discussing his latest project. In his new outing, Whittle discusses the horrors inflicted on the people of the Soviet Union by Stalin. The violence and persecution, argues Whittle, were not the results of a flawed approach to communism or socialism. They were precise and intended results of the Communist Manifesto. Violence and aggression are the proverbial features of these movements, not bugs. Whether it was Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, or Ayatollah Khomeini, there were people who, at the start of these men’s ascent to power, believed that the upheaval of the day would pass, and the status quo would be restored. But fear and destruction are the aims of such movements, and the violence, chaos, and treachery do not abate, even after the stated objectives have been achieved.
The only ones who enjoy the status quo, or enjoy anything for that matter, are the most well-placed members of the inner party.