In the heart of every Progressive, and not very deep in that heart (assuming, arguendo, that such an organ actually exists), dwells a budding fascist. One only has to look at the godfather of the Progressive movement, Woodrow Wilson, to see how it works. As Jonah Goldberg observed in Liberal Fascism, Wilson and his ilk are not believers in the individual:

Hence Wilson argued that the old “Newtonian” vision – fixed rules enshrined in the Constitution and laws – had to give way to the “Darwinian” view of “living constitutions” and the like.

“Government,” Wilson wrote approvingly in his magnum opus, “The State,” “does now whatever experience permits or the times demand.” “No doubt,” he wrote elsewhere, taking dead aim at the Declaration of Independence, “a lot of nonsense has been talked about the inalienable rights of the individual, and a great deal that was mere vague sentiment and pleasing speculation has been put forward as fundamental principle.”

In his 1890 essay, “Leaders of Men,” Wilson explained that a “true leader” uses the masses like “tools.” He must inflame their passions with little heed for the facts. “Men are as clay in the hands of the consummate leader.”

Last week we reported on the one of the increasingly frequent Two Minute Hates at our colleges and universities where a group of nice little Islamofascists banded together in an attempt to have a campus screening of the movie American Sniper cancelled. Apparently, the thought of an American hero killing Muslim terrorists who primarily preyed on harmless Iraqis was too much for them to stomach. Since that time another angle to that attempt to control what other people may see has come to light. Via Reason

Zeinab Khalil, a recent UM graduate, Muslim, and progressive activist who won numerous distinctions during her time on campus, including an award named for Martin Luther King, Jr., thinks it’s the former. A UM group’s decision to screen the film American Sniper offended the sensibilities of some Muslims, including Khalil, who claimed on Twitter that the campus “is already a hostile place for Arab/Muslim students.

The film, and the support given the film by UM football coach Jim Harbaugh had her all in a state of sand-filled-panty-wadding anger:

Hold that thought.

Back in December, a Muslim student named Omar Mahmood, wrote a satirical column for the campus newspaper on the subject of political correctness called Do The Left Thing. For a sample:

As I walked, I slipped on a patch of wet leaves lining the steps of the Hatcher, and I fell forward headfirst onto the steps of the library. If it hadn’t been for the left hand that I thrust out right before my fall, I would have ended up just another statistic in the war on colored people. As it were, a white cis-gendered hetero upper-class man came down the steps just as I was falling. He looked at me with that white man’s burden face that I see too often on this racialized campus.

“Cold, isn’t it?”

Behind his words I sensed a patronizing sneer, as if he expected me to be a spokespersyn for my whole race. He offered his hand to help me up, and I thought to myself how this might be a manifestation of the patriarchy patronizing me. I doubt he would’ve said those violent words had I been white, but he would take any opportunity to patronize a colored m@n or womyn. People on this campus always box others in based on race.  Triggered, I waved his hand aside and got up of my own accord.

He was taken aback. Suddenly I felt I was taking back some of that lost agency that colonialism had robbed my people of. I felt like Aamir Khan in Lagaan. That’s right, that white man wasn’t about to tax me. I didn’t even want to be that white. I turned on my heels and showed him my back.

He shouted after me, “I was just trying to do the right thing!”

The right thing… The right thing… I became so aware at that moment of the left hand that I had thrust out before falling, and suddenly my humanity was reduced to my handydnyss. The words rang in my eardrums, and my blood throbbed. This was the microaggression that broke the gender-neutral camel’s back. But unlike other microaggressions, this one triggered a shift in my worldview. All this while, I had been obsessed only with the color on this campus. All of a sudden, though, that became a side issue. All those race-based microaggressions now seemed trivial. I had, I realized, forgotten to think intersectionally.

 

Not everyone was amused– and fascists being, well, fascists are famous for their lack of a sense of humor. Now we return to Reason:

At 1:40 a.m. on Friday, December 12, 2014 the three women entered Mahmood’s building. They vandalized the door leading to his apartment unit, pelting it with eggs, gum, and hot dogs, and left hateful messages such as “You scum embarrass us,” “you have no soul,” and “everyone hates you you violent prick.” They also left a picture of Satan and defaced copies of the thing that had drawn their ire: a satirical column he had written for the campus’s conservative alternative newspaper, The Michigan Review.

Unfortunately, for the perpetrators the apartment complex had surveillance cameras. You can watch this conspiracy of super-villains in action in this video:

Who perpetrated this act of intimidation against a Muslim student? It was Khalil herself, according to Mahmood, whose account is supported by the testimony of other students, video footage, and emails obtained by Reason.

Khalil was assisted by two others, according to Mahmood, who are also recent graduates and progressive activists in the UM Muslim community.

Mahmood has known this all along—the amateur criminals were caught in the act on the apartment complex’s surveillance video and are identifiable to those who know them—but he says he didn’t report their names to the media in hopes that they would reconcile with him privately. They never did.

In the wake of the controversy over American Sniper and Khalil’s statements about campus hostility toward Muslims, Mahmood says he couldn’t hold back any longer.

That’s right, the same person who vandalized the apartment of a fellow Muslim student was concerned about being all hurty-pants over the showing of American Sniper. It really isn’t surprising that Khalil’s hostility to an open and pluralistic society would not stop with the banning of movies that violate her predisposition to defend fascism and extend to the free speech rights and freedom of conscience of fellow students. And if one of those students who disagrees with her is one whom she thinks should be part of her personal identity group, there is little wonder that she acted as she did. Mr. Mahmood should consider himself lucky that she wasn’t armed and didn’t bring an orange jumpsuit for him.