USF arrests five protesters for trespassing, violating coronavirus policies

[Sancho]

https://www.tampabay.com/news/education/2021/02/10/usf-arrests-five-protesters-for-trespassing-violating-coronavirus-policies/

Laura Rodriguez, a junior at the University of South Florida and member of Students for a Democratic Society, was on her way from class to attend a protest Tuesday when she saw someone being arrested.

Five people, students and former students, were detained outside the Marshall Student Center on charges of trespassing and served notices to appear after being told to disperse, according to the University Police Department.

They were there for a rally calling attention to the climate for free speech on college campuses in Florida. Participants were protesting state legislation that proposes increased penalties for protesters who block traffic or participate in “disorderly assemblies.”

Meanwhile, she said, the university allowed campus demonstrations from Kaitlin Bennett, a controversial online figure and gun rights activist who roused a crowd on campus last fall, and a group of extremist preachers a few weeks ago.
“It’s clear hypocrisy,” Cook said.

It's interesting how Florida is cracking down on "protests", but sometimes it's selective.

[Baitball Blogger]

1. It's more than hypocrisy. It's discrimination.

[ancianita]

2. Florida's just one of the many states now doubling down on 1A controls on the left.

This is more than about one state. We'll see news from now on about all kinds of clamp-downs on leftist activism.
From statehouse to street, law enforcement = left enforcement. It looks like trumpcult stuff, and it is, but it also comes from corporate battles that have been playing out at state levels. Corporations are anti-activist.

What's variable is whether corporations want to hide from public view or not.
When they do, they use ALEC.

ALEC has been in the background of a lot of policy changes at law enforcement levels.
ALEC is behind all legislation that is conservative.

'Stand Your Ground' gun laws expanded to 30 states through the support of ALEC, after Florida passed its law in 2005.[70][71][72] After the Florida law had been passed, ALEC adopted a model bill with the same wording.[3] In the wake of the shooting of Trayvon Martin in 2012, ALEC's support for Stand Your Ground laws ultimately led to the departure of high-profile corporate members such as Coca-Cola, Microsoft, Bank of America, and General Motors.

ALEC model bills was introduced in many states to mandate or strengthen requirements that voters produce state-issued photographic identification. The bills were passed and signed into law in six states.[5] Voter identification bills introduced in 34 states would have made voting more difficult for students, the elderly, and the poor.[14] According to research by Columbia University political scientist Alex Hertel-Fernandez, "Of the 62 ID laws states considered during the 2011 and 2012 legislative sessions, more than half were proposed by lawmakers who... were all participants in the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC. In exchange for their payments of $50 per year in membership dues, those legislators had access to a draft proposal for strict voter ID requirements".[74]

ALEC does not disclose its membership list nor the origins of its model bills.[8][42] Lawmakers generally propose ALEC-drafted bills in their states without disclosing the ALEC authorship.[5][13]

ALEC produces anti-immigration policy in the form of anti-sanctuary cities.
ALEC produces anti-LGBTQ policies.
ALEC produces anti-eco policy that puts environmental activists on terrorist registries.
ALEC, according to Paul Krugman, played a significant role in producing the prison industrial comples.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Legislative_Exchange_Council

[OldBaldy1701E]

4. Yep! (n/t)

[Jay25]

3. It's haassment and intimidation also.

[KY_EnviroGuy]

5. They also unleash their goons on any leftist protests or organizations....

via public and social media. These brainwashed animals love to disrupt and infiltrate peaceful protests and post death threats by phone, mail, email and on social media.

Their basic mindset is that the right can do no wrong and everything the left does is evil, despite mountains of evidence showing just the opposite.

Billionaire sponsored right-wing media and think tanks are slowly destroying our society and our government.....

[ancianita]

6. Gotta call them out, follow the money. There's profit in slamming and smearing the left.

The Kochs already bought hundreds of university endowments, mostly in economics departments, just to shift economic goals to austerity economic ends. This is how universities aid and abet corporate plantation goals, and running a nation like a business.

[Chainfire]

7. I recently worked at Florida State University

There was a place on campus called the "free speech zone." Anyone could come, set up a podium and spout whatever came to mind.
It was usually occupied by Hellfire and Brimstone Preachers or Anti-abortion groups. If the speakers stirred up too much hate, there would be a Campus Cop, on the perimeter ready to referee any physical disturbance.

Some of those preachers needed protection because they were some really hateful bastards. They wore body cams in case someone wanted to give them what they deserved. They would scream about homosexuals and accuse the young women of being whores. To them, everyone was hell-bound and they needed to be told about it. MY office was within a hundred yards of the place, so I would sometimes grab a take-out take in the show at lunchtime.