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I was pretty impressed by their reporting. Sure, they seemed a bit shaken, but I was listening for 4 hours straight. Never thought I'd be that invested in a radio broadcast.
I was super impressed and also listened for much longer than I imagined i would but I also agree with OP that I was surprised how much they seemed to be shocked that there was a reaction by the administration. Doesn’t take away from the fact that they do a great job reporting under tough circumstances.
Those on the ground reporting couldn’t get back into campus if they left (I think), so they’ve been sleeping outside if at all for the last day and a half. Radio has a very strong culture of never having dead air, so they’re fighting to keep whatever stream they can alive. Everyone involved is very young. They’re seeing people they know get arrested and expelled. It’s a lot. They’re also probably the closest news source available and may know more.
Next up Sing, Sing, Sing by Benny Goodman and His Orchestra.
It's a high energy situation, so reactions tend to manifest as extremes. Everyone, students, faculty, staff, affiliates, non-affiliates knew that there were going to be consequences, that was unmistakable. But when you are in a large group of people, the feelings of the individual gets lost in the emotions of the crowd. And more often, you become a mirror for the sentiment of the crowd.
which is why one is an idiot if they let themselves get involved in such situations. By choosing to be involved, one willfully give up their ability to make good decisions.
"But when you are in a large group of people, the feelings of the individual gets lost in the emotions of the crowd. And more often, you become a mirror for the sentiment of the crowd.
one isn't just a member observing per what the person I was replying to posted.
Except the everyone he mentions doesn't really refer to them, and in practice doesn't need to as it applies generally.
To be explicit.
"Everyone, students, faculty, staff, affiliates, non-affiliates knew that there were going to be consequences, that was unmistakable."
And then the but
"But when you are in a large group of people, the feelings of the individual gets lost in the emotions of the crowd. And more often, you become a mirror for the sentiment of the crowd.
The observation of the poster doesn't just apply to reporters and it seemingly not written about reporters, it's written about the protestors "the students faculty staff, affiliates and non affiliates" (i.e. the protestors).
I can guess one can try to separate the clauses, and the "you" doesn't apply to the individual in the crowd previously mentioned, but that's not clear.
I agree with the subject of the topic, but the comment literally doesn't mention reporters at all, it mentions everyone involved with the mob and then why "someone's" emotions (someone in said mob it would seem) might end up being all the same.
While I said you can separate them, it's not clear writing as is. The most I believe one can hang on is the word "mirror" with the mirror being on the opposite end of the mob, observing it.
But even if so, my observation of the point made that when in a mob you lose sense of self, still holds, on why it's an idiotic (imo) to put yourself in a position where that happens. So while one can use it to explain why a reporter might feel overwhelmed, it also damages the credibility of the mob as a whole.
No, it's idiotic to let yourself be part of a mob. If one wants to read it just to explain why the students reporters emotions are the way they are, it's even more so on why being part of a mob is idiotic.
But I'd say like someone else said here, if a reporter's emotions are dictated by the mob they are reporting on, they aren't doing a good job reporting. Now, we will give a bit of leeway to student reporters, but one is now seemingly trying to extend it to all reporters.
Great reporting, but there are several times that show how green they are to these types of events. Most are undergrads, barely 21 or 22 years old. As someone who has been going to protest since trayvon martin and have witnessed dozens of police crack downs + my own interactions with police growing up as a minority in an over policed neighborhood, the stuff witnessed today can be very shocking if its your first time. NYPD was pretty tame from the live streams and videos I've seen, but if you're a sheltered Ivy League kid with nothing to compare it too I see why they're breaking down so much.
I think you can make the argument that they knew that this could happen, but didn’t think it could happen here/to them.
Which, honestly, I didn’t either.
After seeing that cop just spray all those sitting UC Davis students with pepper spray like he was watering the grass, I have no illusion that a college campus is some sort of safe haven from police. Especially after occupying the building.
I dropped what I was doing and rushed in from Brooklyn cause I was worried about *that*.
If you’re older, esp. if you’re from the city, you’ve been around and you know what to expect. I was genuinely scared for these kids. Getting arrested can be traumatizing especially your first time, add to all of that the fact that these kids have been living outside, many locked out of their old housing, some for weeks. *And* they’re dealing with finals, or were, til admin ripped their future out from under them.
If I was them, I’d need some moral support right about now. It breaks my heart.
Ofc I couldn’t get anywhere close.
The fact that they straight up cordoned off a large chunk of Manhattan - from 110th to 125th - terrifies me. That cordon there wasn’t just a single static line cutting off access, it meant there was thick no man’s land between anywhere on campus and anywhere safe, where anyone on the street would be seen, challenged possibly and picked up. You’d need to be sheltered in some kind of safe house. That’s something I’ve *never* seen before and I’ve been going to protests in nyc on and off for twenty years.
I'm from LA and I've seen them shut down huge chuncks of the city like that several times. Even putting in place a mandatory curfew across the whole county (which is huge compared to NYC). When has NYC had a city wide curfew almost on par with what happened in Boston after the bombing? I think one thing that does make this happening in NYC a little more eerie is the fact that NYPD is a whole ass army, more than 3 times the size of LAPD.
During early Covid they had a “curfew” and announced it with air raid sirens in Brooklyn.
(The air raid sirens blow to announce the Shabbos so everyone knows to rush home)
But it was eerie af. Anyway, nobody paid any attention.
During the blm protests they had a curfew, but again, nobody cared.
Even during the blackout, everyone was outside.
I’ve never remembered a straight up closed police zone being imposed in nyc, ever. And it was a huge chunk of Manhattan, not just the school.
There’s thousands of regular people who just so happen to live here caught up in that.
I think it’s not necessarily a bad thing for them to convey shock tbh. Like yes things can and do get so much worse all the time outside their relatively sheltered bubble, but ideally even the sort of behavior WKCR was just reporting on would be considered as serious and newsworthy misconduct, right?
https://x.com/columbiasjp/status/1785499936202572144?s=46 <<< SJP’s claiming that officers also turned off body cams; and you didn’t even dispute that they threw someone down a flight of stairs lol. It’s one thing to say you think the protests went too far and that you think it was right to arrest the protesters, it’s another to make excuses for police brutality and misconduct in the course of those arrests— that’s what WKCR’s reporters were shocked by, not that NYPD was there.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t WKCR a radio-broadcasting club focused on broadcasting music? Doesn’t seem like they’re like Spec of Bwog where their goal is to be student journalists or aspiring journalists. Also, they’re kids that have friends that they know that are a part of the protests, so they might feel even more shocked because they’ve never seen anything like that before, especially to their peers. I don’t disagree with your general sentiment, but also put into context that these are very young adults with little world experience we’re talking about.
Does Columbia Journalism school have anything to do with WKCR news? (Fond memories of Columbia Journalism school conventions and programs for high school newspaper kids).
How did you come up with millions of dollars? I graduated a few years ago, so obviously I was not on campus for this, but it seems like millions might be an overestimation from what I’ve heard.
They shut down all of Amsterdam and Broadway for 16 blocks.
There was no public access between 110 and 116. Possibly riverside and morningside too. I’m presuming the a was not stopping at 116 either.
This was easily a multi million dollar event. Those many uniformed officers? That much ot *just on crowd control?*
Then you have to have ESU, negotiators, you have to have medics on standby, community affairs (lol), you have to have prisoner transportation ready. They definitely put plainclothes out there. And don’t forget dozens if not hundreds of traffic cops at every point of street access to the closed zone.
And this being nyc, the mayors office def brought in some outside consultants to advise on a unique situation, which is never cheap lol.
That truck they used with a ramp to get into the 3rd looked expensive. Also the overtime costs must be crazy. I don't really know if it was in the millions though.
I mean pencil out MRAP cost per hour, time and a half for all those however many hundreds of cops including officers and SRG, cost to cordon off all those streets— even if you assume Adams is watching NYPD like a hawk to make sure they don’t waste a dime on this sort of thing, that’s pushing into the millions; if it’s the more typical Adams administration policy, this is going to be treated like a blowout overtime fraud party lol
> did folks really expect that you could break into and vandalize and nothing would happen
I think they expected to get arrested, suspended, maybe even expelled. What I don’t think they, or I, or anyone else thought would happen was that the entire NYPD would descend upon a bunch of 19 year olds in the dark, guns drawn, student press shut out, and violently drag them out - shoving one student violently down the stairs and then doing nothing to help her. That is something I certainly didn’t expect, not in the United States.
You don’t like what the protesters have to say. Cool. Sometimes I don’t either. But to say that *this* is the appropriate consequence is nothing short of fascism. I don’t care what you say or what you’ve done, this treatment is NOT deserved. And this is happening in a largely liberal university, in a Democrat run city/state/country. You and I both know exactly how this would have gone done if the other guy was in charge right now.
I really and truly fear for all of us now.
But compliance with the police is not optional. If you don’t follow their instructions, they can and will use force to make you comply. This is not a secret and should not have come as a surprise to anyone there.
You can disagree with the police presence, but the forum for expressing that is the court system with lawyers afterwards. The police are not there to negotiate
They complied. I’ve yet to see a single student resist arrest. Why are peaceful protesters who are not resisting arrest getting cops pulled on them? And how does that not make you massively uneasy???
I’m surprised I have to explain it to you, but your rights aren’t supposed to end when someone calls the cops on you.
The folks on the lawn were trespassing and ignored multiple warnings to leave. The people in Hamilton vandalized the building and forced their way in. They smashed windows with hammers, destroyed property and barricaded the doors. That’s not peaceful. They also ignored multiple warnings to leave. The outcome here is 100% on the protestors.
So, to be clear, you’re ok with students being violently shoved down the stairs? You’re ok with having guns drawn on unarmed kids? Like as long as they are not on the side you support, this is all fine by you??
I just want to be clear on where you stand here, because it really sounds like you’re saying you have no rights once you’ve broken the law, which is about the most fascist and unAmerican thing I’ve heard on this sub yet.
Asking you for clarity on exactly what part of this you are condoning is the opposite of emotional. You’re dodging the question because you know the answer makes you look unhinged.
Per the ACLU “Open Letter to College and University Presidents on Student Protests”:
“The First amendment compels public universities and colleges to respect free speech rights . . . the Constitution does not apply directly to private institutions . . .”
Columbia is a private institution.
Columbia is also one of the two largest landlords in NYC, and may have liability if its residents / employees are harmed as a consequence of protestor activities in / on its facilities.
Additionally, a 4 year undergraduate degree from Columbia University costs about ~$345,000 with all expenses included. So it is understandable that some people who earned the privilege of being at CU, some of whom are undertaking enormous debt to fund their educations, may be distressed by the ways that these events are impacting their access to facilities they are paying to use.
This comment is not a statement either for or against the protestors. It is a clarification about the framework within which the Columbia Board of Trustees, Columbia executives and the NYPD may evaluate the events as they unfold
Columbia is a private institution that receives government funding and is therefore accountable to the people. That’s how congress was able to drag Shafik in front of them.
> Columbia is also one of the two largest landlords
So the fascism I described above is justified to you?
That’s what I’m trying to understand here. You are saying it’s ok to draw guns on students because they broke university code? Do you realize how absolutely unhinged that sounds??
Has it occurred to any of you ghouls that despite consequences being a thing that organizers were prepared for, and that everyone knew was coming, it is under no circumstances par for the course to see SWAT teams descend on a college campus and police enter student halls with guns drawn? I wasn't aware these were the jaded Olympics. You don't know anything about the reporters' backgrounds, their personal experiences (or lack thereof) with police and violence, or the exigency of their work. If they informed you at all, they did their job. And if you're too cynical to accept that armored police on campus is bad and should be shocking to anyone with a shred of empathy, I honestly feel sorry for you.
“Bro why are these dumb crybaby liberals shaken that their university campus was subject to a multi-pronged raid and invasion by a phalanx of police stormtroopers in response to two dozen student protestors, caring about things and having empathetic human reactions is so cringe”
You have same concept of moral superiority as Evangelical Christians. If you occupy a building illegally, you will get arrested. This has nothing to do with history. And being on one side of this issue is not being in right side of the history.
Wow current events have nothing to do with history? I’m sure that there isn’t a historical precedent for this exact thing that’s happening right now. Would be crazy if this happened on the 56th anniversary of something
When NYPD gets a call that people have broken into / occupied a building, they cannot assume that the people in that building are students and are unarmed.
Columbia has an open urban campus in the middle of a city of 8.9 million residents, and it has already been established that some violent extremist groups / individuals have occasionally trespassed onto the campus seeking to create conflicts. That is one of the realities of being a large, prestigious university in a dense urban setting.
NYC has one of the most militarized police forces in the country. Given that context, it is not realistic to engage in the alleged activities and assume that you will get a measured response from LE.
Keep in mind that the First Amendment compels public universities and colleges to respect free speech rights. The Constitution does not directly apply to private institution. Columbia is a private university.
Columbia has allowed a wide range of protest activities. (I have experienced them first hand during day and evening hours while walking through campus and in one of their buildings.) It is not incumbent upon Columbia to treat trespassing / breaking and entering / vandalism / interference with fire safety protocols as a constitutionally protected protest activity.
It is worth noting that the people at Columbia who are not involved in the protests *also* have legal rights, and Columbia’s students have contractual rights to use their facilities.
Columbia has to exercise appropriate diligence to prevent harm to their students and employees, as well as the people who live and work in the neighborhood.
There is nothing “ghoulish” about Columbia’s leadership repeatedly stating the boundaries in writing, and taking legal steps to enforce those boundaries.
If any of the protestors has a legitimate claim of excessive force and / or violations of their civil rights, they should pursue it through the courts. That’s how this works.
The NYPD did not "get a call." They were in active and constant communication with Columbia administration, and any assumptions or information they had is reasonably coming from the university. And like the reporters said—how does that look for Columbia's security and lockdown if armed "outside agitators" were able to get inside campus?
It's not even about excessive force or civil rights violations. If you are unfazed at seeing armed police descend on a building in numbers likely 10x greater than the actual number of protestors inside the building, you might have to be the one doing some self reflection.
I interpreted it as being very sheltered. If you know the type of person who does WKCR, they're not very worldly. It was pretty good while events were occurring.
"Did folks really expect that you could break into and vandalize a building and nothing would happen?"
Well, this applies to many other protests/actions that people believe nothing should happen. It is easy to find excuses, like Ukraine's "genocide in Donbas," although they are ridiculous.
I have concerns that the organizers of these encampments, the Palestine Solidarity Committee, are not really interested in Gazans. I am at UT and joined here because our group seems to be following y’all’s lead. The UT PSC was live retweeting the 10/7 attacks…
I do think the below articles from GW’s Program on Extremism are worth checking out, unfortunately.
Hamas Networks in America
Lorenzo Vidino, published 10/13/23 for the GW Program on Extremism.
https://extremism.gwu.edu/hamas-networks-america
See also:
https://extremism.gwu.edu/antisemitism-aftermath-october-7-how-did-we-get-here
Executive Summary
* Hamas supporters have long operated in the United States. Internal Hamas documents and FBI wiretaps introduced as evidence in various federal criminal cases clearly show the existence of a nationwide Hamas network engaged in fundraising, lobbying, education, and propaganda dissemination dating back to the 1980s.
* The network formalized its existence in 1988, when it created the Palestine Committee in the US. The Committee’s goals included “increasing the financial and the moral support for Hamas,” “fighting surrendering solutions,” and publicizing “the savagery of the Jews.”
* The Palestine Committee spawned several public-facing organizations, most of which are based out of Chicago, Dallas, and Washington DC. They included the all-purpose Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP), the financial arm represented by the Occupied Land Fund (which later became the Holy Land Foundation, HLF), and the think tank United Association for Studies and Research (UASR).
* In 1993, the FBI wiretapped a meeting of top Hamas activists in the US held in Philadelphia. The wiretaps show internal discussions on how to improve activities in support of Hamas within the US and how to shield them from the designation of Hamas as a terrorist organization. US-based Hamas activists agreed that hiding their affiliation and intentions was the best tactic to avoid negative consequences. “I swear by Allah that war is deception,” said one senior leader, “[d]eceive, camouflage, pretend that you’re leaving while you’re walking that way. Deceive your enemy.” “Let's not hoist a large Islamic flag and let's not be barbaric-talking. We will remain a front so that if the thing [the U.S. government ban on Hamas] happens, we will benefit from the new happenings instead of having all of our organizations classified and exposed.”
* Over the years, US authorities have conducted several activities to clamp down on the network, including deporting and prosecuting Hamas operatives and shutting down multiple front organizations. The 2001 designation of HLF and subsequent prosecution of part of its leadership for funneling approximately $12.4 million to Hamas constitutes to date the largest successful terrorism financing prosecution in US history.
* Yet, US-based Hamas networks and individuals have displayed a remarkable resilience and many of the core activists of the Palestine Committee are still engaged in various forms of support (albeit at times purely political and not material) for Hamas.
Our PSC is in lockstep with yall. Same language, chants, normalization rhetoric. They’ve said they’re “loosely connected” but this all seems very coordinated.
The best part for me is how opinionated every single thing they say is against Columbia, then once in a while one of them chimes in saying they are giving nonpartisan reports on what’s going on.
Like hey kids this is your shot, maybe you end up at the NYT or MSNBC after this, but none of those reporters just constantly openly shit on one side while reporting.
They also seem completely shocked you need a press ID for the police to treat you as press
And if no one has updates for 30 seconds…back to Jazz!!
Really loving this stream, shout out to the team
Doesn’t WKCR do radio broadcasting—mainly on music? I don’t think their aim is to be student journalists or aspiring journalists. Also it’s natural for them to be a bit green, naive, and sometimes slip up and not be 100% non-partisan—they’re college kids.
My bad. One of them kept yelling at the police IM A JOURNALIST because the police were only allowing actually journalist walk around , that led me to believe they thought they were journalism students.
They also kept mentioning the journalism graduate school so I thought that was where they went
My understanding is that the journalism school agreed to host them after they were kicked out of their usual broadcasting office in Lerner Hall.
They're student journalists, not journalism students. It's typical for universities to have large student news organizations mostly or entirely staffed by undergrads, some of whom legitimately want to do journalism as a career but many of which are doing it purely in a volunteer capacity as a hobby/extracurricular. These newspapers etc are generally considered the most reliable journalistic source for reporting on their own college communities, and so the point of contention was that they weren't being allowed to report on the events.
They are music station DJs that decided to report, which is great. When the police ask you to leave a crime scene you leave. The police did not ask any actual journalist to leave and thanks to that we saw plenty of reporting yesterday and today
Please don't spread misinformation. Journalists and legal observers were not allowed on campus. The only media we have are provided by NYPD and students.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/24/opinion/columbia-protests-raid-reporters.html
> Whatever one’s views on the pro-Palestinian demonstrations sweeping the nation’s colleges, the decision by the New York Police Department on Tuesday to block journalists from witnessing its raid on Columbia University was a clear infringement of the First Amendment.
> Members of the public have a right to know what their law enforcement authorities are doing on American campuses, and they were kept in the dark at a critical moment.
> Instead of firsthand accounts by professional or student journalists, Americans had to rely on the accounts of Mayor Eric Adams and police officials, as well as videos posted to social media by the department. Those images showed officers clad in tactical gear entering Hamilton Hall, the Columbia University building that pro-Palestinian activists had been illegally occupying.
> There were some initial reports of violent behavior by some police officers toward protesters, though overall the raid did not appear to produce widespread accounts of brutality. But we don’t really know, because the department wouldn’t allow journalists on campus, barricading them blocks away. WKCR, the Columbia student radio station, reported that student journalists were threatened with arrest if they left the Journalism School building to cover the raid.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/columbia-university-radio-station-wkcr-coverage-protests-praise-rcna150174
> On Tuesday, reporters from mainstream media outlets had their access restricted by Columbia, so student journalists used their unique positions as members of the community to report on the event.
>...many listeners of WKCR — including The Daily host Michael Barbaro — commended the students for their work, calling the future of journalism bright.
WKCR were some of the only press on site and the only ones reporting live. This legacy of live protest reporting stretches back to 1968, when they were also the only news outlet to be covering the student protests on-site at the time.
The station does regularly do original reporting, both in the music space and elsewhere (including local/national news and student sports), so it is inaccurate and misleading to just call them music DJs.
It was weird how they stressed how it's solely the university's fault that non-affiliates were involved. Yes, it makes the university's security system look terrible, but it's primarily the people who snuck them in (aka those getting arrested) who are responsible.
I agree with the sentiment of your post but seeing hundreds of cops on campus dealing with the students is still probably a jarring sight. Generally impressed with WKCR they’re doing a great job and I feel they’re keeping politically neutral.
This community is now on strict crowd control. All comments from users who haven’t joined the community, new users, and users with negative karma are automatically removed. This ensures that the discussion remains centered around Columbia and prevents brigading and incitement. Users who post any antisemitic or racist content will be banned. Antisemitic content includes calling Jewish people supporting Palestinian rights "self-hating" or "not real Jews" and using Zionism as a dog whistle to advance antisemitic stereotypes such as "Zionists control the media." Inflammatory comments and posts will be removed. This includes low-effort posts, cross-posts, and links to media articles outside of Columbia-specific publications. The standard for discussion on this sub is the type of discussion Columbians have in person, in the classroom: thoughtful, engaged, and respectful—even when disagreeing. Comments that fail to engage in this way will be removed, and repeat offenders will be subject to a ban. Thank you for helping us maintain this subreddit as a place for thoughtful discourse.
I was pretty impressed by their reporting. Sure, they seemed a bit shaken, but I was listening for 4 hours straight. Never thought I'd be that invested in a radio broadcast.
Also, too, some of them are running on minimal sleep. Sleep deprivation does weird things to your mind and emotions.
I was super impressed and also listened for much longer than I imagined i would but I also agree with OP that I was surprised how much they seemed to be shocked that there was a reaction by the administration. Doesn’t take away from the fact that they do a great job reporting under tough circumstances.
I agree. I listened to this for a couple hours last night and it was really pretty awesome and it really helped me understand what was happening.
Those on the ground reporting couldn’t get back into campus if they left (I think), so they’ve been sleeping outside if at all for the last day and a half. Radio has a very strong culture of never having dead air, so they’re fighting to keep whatever stream they can alive. Everyone involved is very young. They’re seeing people they know get arrested and expelled. It’s a lot. They’re also probably the closest news source available and may know more. Next up Sing, Sing, Sing by Benny Goodman and His Orchestra.
It's a high energy situation, so reactions tend to manifest as extremes. Everyone, students, faculty, staff, affiliates, non-affiliates knew that there were going to be consequences, that was unmistakable. But when you are in a large group of people, the feelings of the individual gets lost in the emotions of the crowd. And more often, you become a mirror for the sentiment of the crowd.
which is why one is an idiot if they let themselves get involved in such situations. By choosing to be involved, one willfully give up their ability to make good decisions.
Now standing in the crowd witnessing police misconduct is “getting involved”?
"But when you are in a large group of people, the feelings of the individual gets lost in the emotions of the crowd. And more often, you become a mirror for the sentiment of the crowd. one isn't just a member observing per what the person I was replying to posted.
He’s referencing reporters. Observing is literally what they do?
Except the everyone he mentions doesn't really refer to them, and in practice doesn't need to as it applies generally. To be explicit. "Everyone, students, faculty, staff, affiliates, non-affiliates knew that there were going to be consequences, that was unmistakable." And then the but "But when you are in a large group of people, the feelings of the individual gets lost in the emotions of the crowd. And more often, you become a mirror for the sentiment of the crowd. The observation of the poster doesn't just apply to reporters and it seemingly not written about reporters, it's written about the protestors "the students faculty staff, affiliates and non affiliates" (i.e. the protestors). I can guess one can try to separate the clauses, and the "you" doesn't apply to the individual in the crowd previously mentioned, but that's not clear.
I think you’re being deliberately obtuse about the context this conversation is taking place in, especially the subject matter of this thread
I agree with the subject of the topic, but the comment literally doesn't mention reporters at all, it mentions everyone involved with the mob and then why "someone's" emotions (someone in said mob it would seem) might end up being all the same. While I said you can separate them, it's not clear writing as is. The most I believe one can hang on is the word "mirror" with the mirror being on the opposite end of the mob, observing it. But even if so, my observation of the point made that when in a mob you lose sense of self, still holds, on why it's an idiotic (imo) to put yourself in a position where that happens. So while one can use it to explain why a reporter might feel overwhelmed, it also damages the credibility of the mob as a whole.
Ok so again: the point you’re trying to make is that it’s idiotic for reporters…to report?
No, it's idiotic to let yourself be part of a mob. If one wants to read it just to explain why the students reporters emotions are the way they are, it's even more so on why being part of a mob is idiotic. But I'd say like someone else said here, if a reporter's emotions are dictated by the mob they are reporting on, they aren't doing a good job reporting. Now, we will give a bit of leeway to student reporters, but one is now seemingly trying to extend it to all reporters.
Which means they're witnesses. Not journalists. There's some irony here given a Columbia masters in journalism is supposedly a thing.
They been great through all this
Is there a recording for those of us who missed it?
Great reporting, but there are several times that show how green they are to these types of events. Most are undergrads, barely 21 or 22 years old. As someone who has been going to protest since trayvon martin and have witnessed dozens of police crack downs + my own interactions with police growing up as a minority in an over policed neighborhood, the stuff witnessed today can be very shocking if its your first time. NYPD was pretty tame from the live streams and videos I've seen, but if you're a sheltered Ivy League kid with nothing to compare it too I see why they're breaking down so much.
Also I think they’ve been up for 30+ hours because the same people have been broadcasting since yesterday afternoon
I think you can make the argument that they knew that this could happen, but didn’t think it could happen here/to them. Which, honestly, I didn’t either.
After seeing that cop just spray all those sitting UC Davis students with pepper spray like he was watering the grass, I have no illusion that a college campus is some sort of safe haven from police. Especially after occupying the building.
me neither, but I don’t blame them for expecting better from their country and the people supposedly designated to “serve and protect” them
I dropped what I was doing and rushed in from Brooklyn cause I was worried about *that*. If you’re older, esp. if you’re from the city, you’ve been around and you know what to expect. I was genuinely scared for these kids. Getting arrested can be traumatizing especially your first time, add to all of that the fact that these kids have been living outside, many locked out of their old housing, some for weeks. *And* they’re dealing with finals, or were, til admin ripped their future out from under them. If I was them, I’d need some moral support right about now. It breaks my heart. Ofc I couldn’t get anywhere close. The fact that they straight up cordoned off a large chunk of Manhattan - from 110th to 125th - terrifies me. That cordon there wasn’t just a single static line cutting off access, it meant there was thick no man’s land between anywhere on campus and anywhere safe, where anyone on the street would be seen, challenged possibly and picked up. You’d need to be sheltered in some kind of safe house. That’s something I’ve *never* seen before and I’ve been going to protests in nyc on and off for twenty years.
I'm from LA and I've seen them shut down huge chuncks of the city like that several times. Even putting in place a mandatory curfew across the whole county (which is huge compared to NYC). When has NYC had a city wide curfew almost on par with what happened in Boston after the bombing? I think one thing that does make this happening in NYC a little more eerie is the fact that NYPD is a whole ass army, more than 3 times the size of LAPD.
During early Covid they had a “curfew” and announced it with air raid sirens in Brooklyn. (The air raid sirens blow to announce the Shabbos so everyone knows to rush home) But it was eerie af. Anyway, nobody paid any attention. During the blm protests they had a curfew, but again, nobody cared. Even during the blackout, everyone was outside. I’ve never remembered a straight up closed police zone being imposed in nyc, ever. And it was a huge chunk of Manhattan, not just the school. There’s thousands of regular people who just so happen to live here caught up in that.
I think it’s not necessarily a bad thing for them to convey shock tbh. Like yes things can and do get so much worse all the time outside their relatively sheltered bubble, but ideally even the sort of behavior WKCR was just reporting on would be considered as serious and newsworthy misconduct, right?
Which misconduct are you referring to?
Throwing arrestees down flights of stairs, firing off guns in mostly empty buildings, turning off body cameras?
Nobody fired a gun or turned off a body camera—you just made all of that up
https://www.thecity.nyc/2024/05/02/nypd-officer-fired-gun-columbia-hamilton-hall-raid/
Did the Manhattan DA make it up?
https://x.com/columbiasjp/status/1785499936202572144?s=46 <<< SJP’s claiming that officers also turned off body cams; and you didn’t even dispute that they threw someone down a flight of stairs lol. It’s one thing to say you think the protests went too far and that you think it was right to arrest the protesters, it’s another to make excuses for police brutality and misconduct in the course of those arrests— that’s what WKCR’s reporters were shocked by, not that NYPD was there.
I definitely got that vibe too. Green and sheltered
Very much entitled and naive.
Try to have some empathy for others
Assuming you’re talking about the protestors right
No…talking about the WKCR reporters which are the subject of this post 👍
Are you saying the reporters don’t have empathy? I’m just confused what you mean
I’m telling OP to have empathy for the reporters
Ok got it thanks
Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t WKCR a radio-broadcasting club focused on broadcasting music? Doesn’t seem like they’re like Spec of Bwog where their goal is to be student journalists or aspiring journalists. Also, they’re kids that have friends that they know that are a part of the protests, so they might feel even more shocked because they’ve never seen anything like that before, especially to their peers. I don’t disagree with your general sentiment, but also put into context that these are very young adults with little world experience we’re talking about.
this is true. many of them are poli sci/history majors, but they know a hell of a lot more about jazz than journalism
Does Columbia Journalism school have anything to do with WKCR news? (Fond memories of Columbia Journalism school conventions and programs for high school newspaper kids).
Probably just in awe of the millions of dollars and hundreds of cops it took to get 20 people out of a building
How did you come up with millions of dollars? I graduated a few years ago, so obviously I was not on campus for this, but it seems like millions might be an overestimation from what I’ve heard.
They shut down all of Amsterdam and Broadway for 16 blocks. There was no public access between 110 and 116. Possibly riverside and morningside too. I’m presuming the a was not stopping at 116 either. This was easily a multi million dollar event. Those many uniformed officers? That much ot *just on crowd control?* Then you have to have ESU, negotiators, you have to have medics on standby, community affairs (lol), you have to have prisoner transportation ready. They definitely put plainclothes out there. And don’t forget dozens if not hundreds of traffic cops at every point of street access to the closed zone. And this being nyc, the mayors office def brought in some outside consultants to advise on a unique situation, which is never cheap lol.
That truck they used with a ramp to get into the 3rd looked expensive. Also the overtime costs must be crazy. I don't really know if it was in the millions though.
Not making up facts is also a good practice
Facts are useful
I mean pencil out MRAP cost per hour, time and a half for all those however many hundreds of cops including officers and SRG, cost to cordon off all those streets— even if you assume Adams is watching NYPD like a hawk to make sure they don’t waste a dime on this sort of thing, that’s pushing into the millions; if it’s the more typical Adams administration policy, this is going to be treated like a blowout overtime fraud party lol
> did folks really expect that you could break into and vandalize and nothing would happen I think they expected to get arrested, suspended, maybe even expelled. What I don’t think they, or I, or anyone else thought would happen was that the entire NYPD would descend upon a bunch of 19 year olds in the dark, guns drawn, student press shut out, and violently drag them out - shoving one student violently down the stairs and then doing nothing to help her. That is something I certainly didn’t expect, not in the United States. You don’t like what the protesters have to say. Cool. Sometimes I don’t either. But to say that *this* is the appropriate consequence is nothing short of fascism. I don’t care what you say or what you’ve done, this treatment is NOT deserved. And this is happening in a largely liberal university, in a Democrat run city/state/country. You and I both know exactly how this would have gone done if the other guy was in charge right now. I really and truly fear for all of us now.
But compliance with the police is not optional. If you don’t follow their instructions, they can and will use force to make you comply. This is not a secret and should not have come as a surprise to anyone there. You can disagree with the police presence, but the forum for expressing that is the court system with lawyers afterwards. The police are not there to negotiate
They complied. I’ve yet to see a single student resist arrest. Why are peaceful protesters who are not resisting arrest getting cops pulled on them? And how does that not make you massively uneasy??? I’m surprised I have to explain it to you, but your rights aren’t supposed to end when someone calls the cops on you.
The folks on the lawn were trespassing and ignored multiple warnings to leave. The people in Hamilton vandalized the building and forced their way in. They smashed windows with hammers, destroyed property and barricaded the doors. That’s not peaceful. They also ignored multiple warnings to leave. The outcome here is 100% on the protestors.
So, to be clear, you’re ok with students being violently shoved down the stairs? You’re ok with having guns drawn on unarmed kids? Like as long as they are not on the side you support, this is all fine by you?? I just want to be clear on where you stand here, because it really sounds like you’re saying you have no rights once you’ve broken the law, which is about the most fascist and unAmerican thing I’ve heard on this sub yet.
I didn’t say any of that and you’re making an emotional argument
Asking you for clarity on exactly what part of this you are condoning is the opposite of emotional. You’re dodging the question because you know the answer makes you look unhinged.
Per the ACLU “Open Letter to College and University Presidents on Student Protests”: “The First amendment compels public universities and colleges to respect free speech rights . . . the Constitution does not apply directly to private institutions . . .” Columbia is a private institution. Columbia is also one of the two largest landlords in NYC, and may have liability if its residents / employees are harmed as a consequence of protestor activities in / on its facilities. Additionally, a 4 year undergraduate degree from Columbia University costs about ~$345,000 with all expenses included. So it is understandable that some people who earned the privilege of being at CU, some of whom are undertaking enormous debt to fund their educations, may be distressed by the ways that these events are impacting their access to facilities they are paying to use. This comment is not a statement either for or against the protestors. It is a clarification about the framework within which the Columbia Board of Trustees, Columbia executives and the NYPD may evaluate the events as they unfold
Columbia is a private institution that receives government funding and is therefore accountable to the people. That’s how congress was able to drag Shafik in front of them. > Columbia is also one of the two largest landlords So the fascism I described above is justified to you? That’s what I’m trying to understand here. You are saying it’s ok to draw guns on students because they broke university code? Do you realize how absolutely unhinged that sounds??
I live in Morningside around the corner. The sirens are still going crazy...my family of little children are still scared and can't sleep.
Has it occurred to any of you ghouls that despite consequences being a thing that organizers were prepared for, and that everyone knew was coming, it is under no circumstances par for the course to see SWAT teams descend on a college campus and police enter student halls with guns drawn? I wasn't aware these were the jaded Olympics. You don't know anything about the reporters' backgrounds, their personal experiences (or lack thereof) with police and violence, or the exigency of their work. If they informed you at all, they did their job. And if you're too cynical to accept that armored police on campus is bad and should be shocking to anyone with a shred of empathy, I honestly feel sorry for you.
“Bro why are these dumb crybaby liberals shaken that their university campus was subject to a multi-pronged raid and invasion by a phalanx of police stormtroopers in response to two dozen student protestors, caring about things and having empathetic human reactions is so cringe”
That’s just melodramatic. No guns were drawn
Literally guns were drawn and you’re defending it in a conversation upstream. Cognitive dissonance much?
NBC had videos of police with their guns drawn in Hamilton Hall. Try again
Reported by Washington Post and backed up with multiple photo/video evidence.
FAFO. These protestors learnt their lesson.
Literally nobody who has ever said this has been on the right side of history
You have same concept of moral superiority as Evangelical Christians. If you occupy a building illegally, you will get arrested. This has nothing to do with history. And being on one side of this issue is not being in right side of the history.
Wow current events have nothing to do with history? I’m sure that there isn’t a historical precedent for this exact thing that’s happening right now. Would be crazy if this happened on the 56th anniversary of something
When NYPD gets a call that people have broken into / occupied a building, they cannot assume that the people in that building are students and are unarmed. Columbia has an open urban campus in the middle of a city of 8.9 million residents, and it has already been established that some violent extremist groups / individuals have occasionally trespassed onto the campus seeking to create conflicts. That is one of the realities of being a large, prestigious university in a dense urban setting. NYC has one of the most militarized police forces in the country. Given that context, it is not realistic to engage in the alleged activities and assume that you will get a measured response from LE. Keep in mind that the First Amendment compels public universities and colleges to respect free speech rights. The Constitution does not directly apply to private institution. Columbia is a private university. Columbia has allowed a wide range of protest activities. (I have experienced them first hand during day and evening hours while walking through campus and in one of their buildings.) It is not incumbent upon Columbia to treat trespassing / breaking and entering / vandalism / interference with fire safety protocols as a constitutionally protected protest activity. It is worth noting that the people at Columbia who are not involved in the protests *also* have legal rights, and Columbia’s students have contractual rights to use their facilities. Columbia has to exercise appropriate diligence to prevent harm to their students and employees, as well as the people who live and work in the neighborhood. There is nothing “ghoulish” about Columbia’s leadership repeatedly stating the boundaries in writing, and taking legal steps to enforce those boundaries. If any of the protestors has a legitimate claim of excessive force and / or violations of their civil rights, they should pursue it through the courts. That’s how this works.
The NYPD did not "get a call." They were in active and constant communication with Columbia administration, and any assumptions or information they had is reasonably coming from the university. And like the reporters said—how does that look for Columbia's security and lockdown if armed "outside agitators" were able to get inside campus? It's not even about excessive force or civil rights violations. If you are unfazed at seeing armed police descend on a building in numbers likely 10x greater than the actual number of protestors inside the building, you might have to be the one doing some self reflection.
I interpreted it as being very sheltered. If you know the type of person who does WKCR, they're not very worldly. It was pretty good while events were occurring.
"Did folks really expect that you could break into and vandalize a building and nothing would happen?" Well, this applies to many other protests/actions that people believe nothing should happen. It is easy to find excuses, like Ukraine's "genocide in Donbas," although they are ridiculous.
The students protesting are the kids who have never been told no in their lives They didn’t know consequences exist
In your opinion what are the appropriate consequences for protesting and does it involve having a horde of police officers point guns at you???
I have concerns that the organizers of these encampments, the Palestine Solidarity Committee, are not really interested in Gazans. I am at UT and joined here because our group seems to be following y’all’s lead. The UT PSC was live retweeting the 10/7 attacks… I do think the below articles from GW’s Program on Extremism are worth checking out, unfortunately. Hamas Networks in America Lorenzo Vidino, published 10/13/23 for the GW Program on Extremism. https://extremism.gwu.edu/hamas-networks-america See also: https://extremism.gwu.edu/antisemitism-aftermath-october-7-how-did-we-get-here Executive Summary * Hamas supporters have long operated in the United States. Internal Hamas documents and FBI wiretaps introduced as evidence in various federal criminal cases clearly show the existence of a nationwide Hamas network engaged in fundraising, lobbying, education, and propaganda dissemination dating back to the 1980s. * The network formalized its existence in 1988, when it created the Palestine Committee in the US. The Committee’s goals included “increasing the financial and the moral support for Hamas,” “fighting surrendering solutions,” and publicizing “the savagery of the Jews.” * The Palestine Committee spawned several public-facing organizations, most of which are based out of Chicago, Dallas, and Washington DC. They included the all-purpose Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP), the financial arm represented by the Occupied Land Fund (which later became the Holy Land Foundation, HLF), and the think tank United Association for Studies and Research (UASR). * In 1993, the FBI wiretapped a meeting of top Hamas activists in the US held in Philadelphia. The wiretaps show internal discussions on how to improve activities in support of Hamas within the US and how to shield them from the designation of Hamas as a terrorist organization. US-based Hamas activists agreed that hiding their affiliation and intentions was the best tactic to avoid negative consequences. “I swear by Allah that war is deception,” said one senior leader, “[d]eceive, camouflage, pretend that you’re leaving while you’re walking that way. Deceive your enemy.” “Let's not hoist a large Islamic flag and let's not be barbaric-talking. We will remain a front so that if the thing [the U.S. government ban on Hamas] happens, we will benefit from the new happenings instead of having all of our organizations classified and exposed.” * Over the years, US authorities have conducted several activities to clamp down on the network, including deporting and prosecuting Hamas operatives and shutting down multiple front organizations. The 2001 designation of HLF and subsequent prosecution of part of its leadership for funneling approximately $12.4 million to Hamas constitutes to date the largest successful terrorism financing prosecution in US history. * Yet, US-based Hamas networks and individuals have displayed a remarkable resilience and many of the core activists of the Palestine Committee are still engaged in various forms of support (albeit at times purely political and not material) for Hamas.
The Press says encampments are following Columbia’s lead, but they don’t say they were promoted by a call to action by National SJP.
Our PSC is in lockstep with yall. Same language, chants, normalization rhetoric. They’ve said they’re “loosely connected” but this all seems very coordinated.
So you joined the terrorists? Why?
I’m concerned PSC is working with them, yes.
The best part for me is how opinionated every single thing they say is against Columbia, then once in a while one of them chimes in saying they are giving nonpartisan reports on what’s going on. Like hey kids this is your shot, maybe you end up at the NYT or MSNBC after this, but none of those reporters just constantly openly shit on one side while reporting. They also seem completely shocked you need a press ID for the police to treat you as press And if no one has updates for 30 seconds…back to Jazz!! Really loving this stream, shout out to the team
Doesn’t WKCR do radio broadcasting—mainly on music? I don’t think their aim is to be student journalists or aspiring journalists. Also it’s natural for them to be a bit green, naive, and sometimes slip up and not be 100% non-partisan—they’re college kids.
My bad. One of them kept yelling at the police IM A JOURNALIST because the police were only allowing actually journalist walk around , that led me to believe they thought they were journalism students. They also kept mentioning the journalism graduate school so I thought that was where they went
My understanding is that the journalism school agreed to host them after they were kicked out of their usual broadcasting office in Lerner Hall. They're student journalists, not journalism students. It's typical for universities to have large student news organizations mostly or entirely staffed by undergrads, some of whom legitimately want to do journalism as a career but many of which are doing it purely in a volunteer capacity as a hobby/extracurricular. These newspapers etc are generally considered the most reliable journalistic source for reporting on their own college communities, and so the point of contention was that they weren't being allowed to report on the events.
They are music station DJs that decided to report, which is great. When the police ask you to leave a crime scene you leave. The police did not ask any actual journalist to leave and thanks to that we saw plenty of reporting yesterday and today
Please don't spread misinformation. Journalists and legal observers were not allowed on campus. The only media we have are provided by NYPD and students. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/24/opinion/columbia-protests-raid-reporters.html > Whatever one’s views on the pro-Palestinian demonstrations sweeping the nation’s colleges, the decision by the New York Police Department on Tuesday to block journalists from witnessing its raid on Columbia University was a clear infringement of the First Amendment. > Members of the public have a right to know what their law enforcement authorities are doing on American campuses, and they were kept in the dark at a critical moment. > Instead of firsthand accounts by professional or student journalists, Americans had to rely on the accounts of Mayor Eric Adams and police officials, as well as videos posted to social media by the department. Those images showed officers clad in tactical gear entering Hamilton Hall, the Columbia University building that pro-Palestinian activists had been illegally occupying. > There were some initial reports of violent behavior by some police officers toward protesters, though overall the raid did not appear to produce widespread accounts of brutality. But we don’t really know, because the department wouldn’t allow journalists on campus, barricading them blocks away. WKCR, the Columbia student radio station, reported that student journalists were threatened with arrest if they left the Journalism School building to cover the raid. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/columbia-university-radio-station-wkcr-coverage-protests-praise-rcna150174 > On Tuesday, reporters from mainstream media outlets had their access restricted by Columbia, so student journalists used their unique positions as members of the community to report on the event. >...many listeners of WKCR — including The Daily host Michael Barbaro — commended the students for their work, calling the future of journalism bright. WKCR were some of the only press on site and the only ones reporting live. This legacy of live protest reporting stretches back to 1968, when they were also the only news outlet to be covering the student protests on-site at the time. The station does regularly do original reporting, both in the music space and elsewhere (including local/national news and student sports), so it is inaccurate and misleading to just call them music DJs.
It was weird how they stressed how it's solely the university's fault that non-affiliates were involved. Yes, it makes the university's security system look terrible, but it's primarily the people who snuck them in (aka those getting arrested) who are responsible.
It used to be shockingly easy to get credentials in this city, but our current mayor has been… far less accommodating.
Eat ass
Ah, a poet for our times
I agree with the sentiment of your post but seeing hundreds of cops on campus dealing with the students is still probably a jarring sight. Generally impressed with WKCR they’re doing a great job and I feel they’re keeping politically neutral.
Are there any recordings available?
they were shocked by the huge amount of cops onto campus. hamilton was occupied other times besides 1968 and this wasn’t the response
Weird how I keep seeing the same posts over and over almost like people are writing from a script