If you need further proof that one of the internet’s main purposes is to unnecessarily make ugly situations even worse, look no further than Sunday’s spat between Megyn Kelly and The Daily Wire’s Candace Owens. If you haven’t read the back-and-forth and care to do so, Twitchy has the play-by-play here.
If you prefer a condensed version, Kelly took Vivek Ramaswamy to task for stating that Harvard students who support Hamas should not be blacklisted. Owens caught wind of it and chimed in on Ramaswamy’s side. The basic premise of Owens’ argument was that college kids are inherently dumb, so they had no idea that babies had been murdered. They believed they were championing a righteous cause. She cited the fact that Thomas Sowell was originally a socialist and her own history as a former leftist as reasons why the students should not be subjected to a blacklist. Hostilities commenced, and the rhetoric quickly degenerated.
Both Kelly and Owens took to their podcasts to air their opinions, with Owens calling hers “My Viral Feud with Megyn Kelly EXPLAINED.” The thrust of her podcast was that it is easy to get hoodwinked by the internet, free speech should not be stifled, and cooler heads should have prevailed by now.
I understand Owens’ point. I was a leftist in my younger days. I once subscribed to “The Nation” and backed abortion. I even had a calendar depicting famous lefties in history. I’ve never been shy about my progressive past on the pages of PJ Media. And yes, I leaned left into my 40s.
But during my entire time on the Left, the majority of my comrades never took to the streets to support those who had committed the wholesale slaughter of innocent people, including babies. Sure, there were some on the fringe who were fans of violence, but as for myself and the lefties I knew, no one would have ever condoned or ignored what happened in Israel on October 7. And if you listened to some of the chants of the protestors, you should have been chilled to the bone. When someone calls wholesale murder “decolonization,” that person has entered dangerous territory.
Can these students’ minds be changed? Sure. In time, some of them may come around. Age and experience have a way of doing that to a person. And everyone says or does dumb things from time to time. But these students are not just intellectually but emotionally indoctrinated.
Would I have a problem hiring someone who differs from me politically? No. Would I be comfortable hiring someone who took advantage of the vile acts in Israel to protest and call for violence? Would I hire someone who torched a Jewish student’s dorm door? Would I hire any of the people who chased Riley Gaines down a college hallway and threatened her? No. Because a person like that will be led by their emotions.
At the moment, these protestors are not interested in discussion or debate. Can they be educated? Can someone inform them? Can they grow up? Possibly. It isn’t going to happen overnight, and it isn’t going to be easy, mainly because when that attitude is so ingrained in someone, it takes a serious moment of personal epiphany for that person to change. They have to reach a point at which they realize that they have been propagating evil under the guise of righteousness. And to be honest, I am not entirely sure if the generation in question is capable of such a thing, at least not on a larger scale.
We have members of Congress who can’t even do that. Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) all but broke into a sprint when asked about whether or not she would condemn the execution of children and has clung bitterly to the idea that the IDF destroyed a hospital in Gaza. One exception is Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.).
Fetterman? Yep. Fox News notes that he took to X (formerly Twitter) on Wednesday to blast his Capitol Hill colleagues who blamed Israel for the rocket strike:
It’s truly disturbing that Members of Congress rushed to blame Israel for the hospital tragedy in Gaza.
Who would take the word of a group that just massacred innocent Israeli civilians over our key ally?
— Senator John Fetterman (@SenFettermanPA) October 18, 2023
I grieve for every innocent person and brave Israeli soldier killed since Hamas started this war.
If not for the horrific attacks by Hamas terrorists, thousands of innocent Israelis and Palestinians would still be alive today.
— Senator John Fetterman (@SenFettermanPA) October 18, 2023
He added:
Now is not the time to talk about a ceasefire. We must support Israel in efforts to eliminate the Hamas terrorists who slaughtered innocent men, women, and children. Hamas does not want peace, they want to destroy Israel. We can talk about a ceasefire after Hamas is neutralized. In the meantime, I look forward to working with my colleagues in the Senate to quickly deliver the aid our ally Israel needs.
If Fetterman can figure it out, what is Tlaib’s issue? Or is she too busy planning “protests” in the Cannon Office Building, the White House, and a Senate hearing? January 6, anyone?
Does Owens have a point? Yes, she does, but this is a whole new generation of leftists. And these people are either so indoctrinated that they cannot see the evil in their midst or, they embrace it. Maybe these people will change one day, but that day will only arrive when they look in the mirror and are horrified at what they have become.
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