Updated at 3:30 p.m.
A violent “mob” attacked controversial author Charles Murray and a Middlebury College professor as they left a campus building Thursday night following a chaotic attempt at a lecture, a college spokesman said.
Professor Allison Stanger was assaulted and her neck was injured when someone pulled her hair as she tried to shield Murray from the 20 or 30 people who attacked the duo outside the McCullough Student Center, said Bill Burger, a vice president for communications at Middlebury College.
Burger said people in the crowd, made up of students and “outside agitators,” wore masks as they screamed at Murray.
Murray wrote the controversial 1994 book, The Bell Curve. A New York Times bestseller, the book sought to link social inequality to genetics. The Southern Poverty Law Center considers Murray a white nationalist.
“The demonstrators were trying to block Mr. Murray and Professor Stanger’s way out of the building and to the car,” Burger said. “It became a pushing and shoving match, with the officers trying to protect those two people from demonstrators — and it became violent.”
“This was an incredibly violent confrontation,” added Burger, who described the crowd as a “mob.”
On Friday afternoon, Middlebury College president Laurie Patton sent a statement to all students, faculty and staff describing how “deeply disappointed” she was by the incident.
“I know that many students, faculty, and staff who were in attendance or waiting outside to participate were upset by the events, and the lost opportunity for those in our community who wanted to listen to and engage with Mr. Murray,” she wrote, later adding: “I extend my sincerest apologies to everyone who came in good faith to participate in a serious discussion, and particularly to Mr. Murray and Prof. Stanger for the way they were treated during the event and, especially, afterward.”
Murray had been invited and scheduled to speak at Wilson Hall Thursday afternoon. But a jeering and booing crowd of students turned their backs on him and shouted down his attempts to speak. After about 25 minutes, administrators resorted to plan B: moving Murray to a private room and streaming the video of his speech online.
Students continued to make a ruckus as Murray spoke from the private room with occasional questions from Stanger, a professor of international politics and economics.
About half an hour after the event ended, Burger said, the two, accompanied by a college administrator and two public safety officers, tried to leave the building via a back entrance and hurry to a car. But protesters had surrounded various entrances and swarmed to the fleeing Murray and Stanger as they exited, he said.
Once Murray and Stanger were inside the car — and after Stanger had been assaulted — the crowd began jumping on the hood and banging on the windows, according to Burger. The driver tried to inch out of the parking space but the angry crowd surrounded the vehicle and tried to keep it from leaving.
Burger said someone threw a stop sign attached to a heavy cement base in front of the car. It finally got free of the crowd and then left campus.
Members of the Middlebury Police Department eventually arrived on scene, said Burger, who did not know of any arrests. He said members of the campus public safety department, who are unarmed, “put themselves in harm’s way to permit this car to leave.”
“It was a very, very dangerous situation,” Burger said.
Senior college administrators held an emergency two-hour conference call Thursday night and another meeting is scheduled for this afternoon, Burger said. The school will look into arrests and other discipline for “what were clearly violations of our policy,” both during the disruption of the lecture and the violent, chaotic aftermath, he said. Administrators plan to review video and pictures to discover who was involved.
“It’s fair to say this is consuming a lot of our time,” he said.
Stanger visited the emergency room for treatment of her injury and is now wearing a neck brace, Burger said. Murray was not injured, according to Burger.
Stanger did not immediately respond to a request for comment, nor did Murray, who alluded to the incident Friday morning on Twitter.
“We were prepared for the disruption of event, which is why we prepared the backup plan for the live stream,” Burger said. “We were caught by surprise by the violent acts as Mr. Murray and Professor Stanger left the building.”
The Middlebury incident comes approximately one month after the University of California, Berkeley, canceled a planned lecture by right-wing provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos amid violence. Some 1,500 people protested peacefully, according to the university, but approximately 150 “masked agitators” who used “paramilitary tactics, including hurling Molotov cocktails, setting fires, throwing fireworks at police, pushing barricades into windows and damaging campus and city property.” The protesters there caused approximately $100,000 in damage to the campus, the university said.
“While we have made clear our belief that the inflaming rhetoric and provocations of Mr. Yiannopoulos were in marked opposition to the basic values of the university, we respected his right to come to campus and speak once he was invited to do so by a legitimate student group,” Chancellor Nicholas Dirks said in a statement. “The violence last night was an attack on the fundamental values of the university, which stands for and helps to maintain and nurture open inquiry and an inclusive civil society, the bedrock of a genuinely democratic nation.”
Patton, the school president, attended Murray’s lecture. Some booed her as she received a large round of applause and took the stage.
Patton said she “profoundly disagree(s) with several of Mr. Murray’s views,” but attended in support of free speech on Middlebury’s campus.
“I know, from our community conversations of the last week, that there are some here who might wish to exercise their right to non-disruptive protest at Middlebury, and I wish to state, if you’d like to do so, please do,” Patton said.
Alex Prolman, who helped organize the protest against Murray’s lecture, said he is not a student but a “concerned community member.” He helped write news releases and described his role as connecting students with members of the press for coverage of the event.
“There was a plan from the students that had emerged to prevent Murray from speaking, and I think they were largely successful in that,” said Prolman, who attended the lecture.
Reached by phone Friday morning, Prolman, a Burlington resident, said he was headed to the Middlebury campus for a student meeting about next steps. He declined to say much about what happened outside the building.
“I’m still a little hesitant to comment on this at this point,” he told Seven Days.
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There are two issues here that need to be kept distinct:
— Is racist blather reprehensible?
Yes, of course.
–Was the behavior of the thugs at Middlebury reprehensible?
Yes, of course.
It is helpful to bear in mind that these are not mutually exclusive statements..
I find the students’ actions deplorable. So their are disagreements over opinion, Everyone is entitled to an opinion. Unfortunately this was also shown evident during the presidential campaign and after. “It is ok to have an opinion as long as it does not disagree with mine, if it does then I can act in all manner of disrespect and even resort to being a thug because they should not disagree with me.” is the mantra of a lot of these people. Then to say they were afraid for their safety, they should be sent home to their parents and disciplined like the spoiled little children they are
Why does Seven Days insist on calling a mob a ‘Mob’ or a “mob”?
According to the interwebs:
mob
mb/Submit
noun
1.
a large crowd of people, especially one that is disorderly and intent on causing trouble or violence.
“a mob of protesters”
synonyms: crowd, horde, multitude, rabble, mass, throng, group, gang, gathering, assemblage
“troops dispersed the mob”
verb
1.
crowd around (someone) in an unruly and excitable way in order to admire or attack them.
“he was mobbed by autograph hunters”
synonyms: surround, swarm, besiege, jostle More
I can’t think of a more appropriate use of a word, without the ambiguity added by the scare quotes, than the current.
Middlebury is a forward thinking institution so my question is: Why would they invite someone who wrote a book over 20 years ago – a book that’s been discredited by scholars and experts based on facts, to an open forum given today’s social and political climate? There was no intended “educational” goal here. It was clearly to push an agenda. The school legitimized him and his cohorts by giving him an open forum. Bad move. Had the school made this into a “town hall” where others participated to counter his position and challenge Mr. Murray (and vice versa by the way), it would have been a much better situation and more productive…a true learning opportunity for both sides. You could have followed it with student rebuttals after the so-called experts had their time in the spot light. A clear communications and marketing strategy would have alerted the audiences of a plan to involve all points of view. Cooler heads would have prevailed. This was very poorly handled. BTW, I recommend Mr. Charles Murray so see Hidden Figureshe will learn something. The only reason why non-whites haven’t been able to show their brilliance like the non-Hispanic whites is because of oppressive practices, lack of opportunities and recognition. Hard Facts. Why don’t ANY of the history books talk about the inventions by black scientist, scholars, etc.? Because it’s not a version of history that’s convenient to non-minorities. Not because they agree with it (some do but not all), but because it just doesn’t affect them, so they have no urgency; it’s not their battle. What we should do as a people is DEMAND history books be corrected. From the start, educate kids on the real history of this country. And stop legitimizing the non-sense that pushes an agenda. Both sides are guilty.
I must confess I am profoundly shaken by the video from Middlebury. There is no defense, no justification, for allowing mob rule and anarchy to shut down free speech- period! And that’s equally true for mobs on the right or the left. While passion may drive some to protest, that protest cannot come at the expense of the constitutional rights of others. Sunshine remains the best disinfectant when speech is tainted. Prior to this I had no idea who Charles Murray was. As a past chair of Vermont’s Human Rights Commission I flatter myself in the belief that I am no racist, but now I’m tempted to go buy this man’s book to make a point about how frustrated and shocked I am by the actions of this mob.
Unfortunately, I need to disagree with almost all of the comments above. I do not condone violence. The students who pushed the speaker and professor should be held accountable. However, The speaker’s opinion is not just a point of interesting debate. Even if the speaker does not call himself a white supremacist, his views are the perfect fodder for their actions. And, it is clear, if you have any contact with people with brown skin at all, that it is not true. The only difference between people with different skin color is skin color and maybe a little body hair differences. There is no such thing as a separate race. I support the students who shouted him down. Middlebury should be ashamed of itself for inviting this speaker. I am Jewish. We have seen where this kind of pseudo-science goes. The current “alt-right” is just a more pallatible word for Neo-Nazi. Steve Bannon and his friends believe that Jews are not really human and should be exterminated or, at least, all move to Israel. They believe that African heritage people and, all those who are not “white” are lazy, of inferior intelligence, and should either be treated as slaves or go back to “where they came from”. Like Hitler, they believe that gay and lesbian people are subhuman and should either be “converted” or killed. They believe that women should do what men tell them to do. That is what Neo-Nazis and the KKK believe. The speaker represents their view points. This is not new academic information. Please, let Middlebury focus on relevant scientific research that can provoke real debate and bring us to improving the lives of everyone.
So where were these protesters when Bernie Sanders embraced violent racist Al Sharpton?
I imagine they all went back to their closets and huddled in a fetal position in their “safe space”.
“.. the crowd began jumping on the hood and banging on the windows .” Animals !
There may or may not have been “outside agitators” there, but your attempt to deflect responsibility away from the thuggish Middlebury students and blame all the aggression on “outside agitators” won’t cut it. In the blog post cited by Abby Lin, anonymous Middlebury students admit that it was students who blocked Murray, Stanger, and Burger from attempting to leave campus. They tried to stop the three from getting into Burger’s car. They surrounded the car on all sides. They banged on the car and pushed and shoved it. They blockaded the car so it couldn’t move. And at least one of them got on the hood of Burger’s car. This much is admitted to by the students who claimed they were there and who wrote the blog post.
So here’s what should happen. These self-righteous students should do what Martin Luther King and his followers did: accept the consequences of their civil disobedience. Which means identifying themselves, acknowledging what they did, and accepting possible suspension or expulsion from Middlebury. They can go home and explain to their parents why what they did was the “right thing to do.”