The right of free assembly is central to a free society. Not everyone understands this.
Last week, conservative/“cultural libertarian” provocateur Milo Yiannopoulis went into the Churchill Tavern in New York to dine with fellow gay journalist Chadwick Moore.
Also in the establishment? The New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America. When the socialists noticed Milo they stood up, faced him, and shouted at him, chanting “Nazi scum, get out!”
Milo is not a Nazi, but his past gentle treatment of the alt-right counts as “Nazi” on the left.*
The left has been pushing for an inclusivist** reading of the right of free assembly for decades. You see, state laws in the South, prior to 1964’s Civil Rights Act, allowed and enforced white business discrimination against African-Americans, such as refusing service and accommodations. Leftists argue that there is no right to refuse service or exclude customers; they strenuously criticize those libertarians and conservatives who argue that a right to associate implies a right not to associate … giving them no credit for long opposing laws requiring discrimination.
Yet now we see many on the left banding together to deny others their free association rights by exclusionary tactics.
This was a group of customers, of course, so this is more similar to antifa violence than business discrimination. But Brooklyn politicians echo the logic, now proudly denying free assembly rights to NRA members — on ideological grounds.
Mob action for exclusion? Politicians siding with the mob?
There’s a word for this — fascismo.
Or, in the vulgar tongue, “Nazi scum.”
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
* Cenk Uygur of The Young Turks articulates this point — Milo’s insistence that he is not alt-right carrying no weight, apparently.
** Rather than rule-of-law liberal, or libertarian.
1 reply on “Include/Exclude”
Unfortunately, the onus is on the business. They have to decide what they want. In a previous life, those calling out Milo would have been charged with disturbing the peace. In addition, the Tavern would probably have asked them to leave. Today the heckler’s veto is celebrated on the left. The establishment will have to decide whose business they want to preserve. If they go with the hecklers, let them. People who have freedom not to associate will avoid the Churchill Tavern. If the Tavern owners go with the troublemakers they had better hope they have enough hecklers willing to patronize their establishment.