A Berkeley Visit That Mainstream Media Haven’t Covered

Star Parker, founder and president of the Center for Urban Renewal and Education, recently spoke at the University of California at Berkeley, a flash point for the free speech battle.

Berkeley’s college Republicans group invited conservative columnist Ann Coulter to speak on April 27. Administrators rescheduled the event to May 2 for “safety” reasons.

But the defiant Coulter said she would show up on April 27. The student group said it will sue the university if Coulter isn’t allowed to speak on the original date.

The college Republicans had to cancel an appearance by conservative writer David Horowitz because of violent threats, and earlier this year, liberals who don’t want their worldview challenged rioted and shut down a speech by Milo Yiannopoulos, former Breitbart editor.

In contrast, Star arrived at Berkeley and spoke on April 12 without incident. Political science lecturer Alan Ross invited Star to speak to his class. From The Daily Californian:

In her speech, Parker expressed concern for the social and economic challenges communities across the country are facing, which she said she believes result from the country’s “collapse of ethics and collapse of marriage.” Parker offered five policy proposals, including ending abortion subsidies, welfare entitlement reform and corporate tax relief.

“I thought the event was fabulous. People were attentive,” Parker said. “The students were genuine, thoughtful, had their own their opinions and allowed me to share mine.”

One student who disagrees with “99 percent” of Star’s views said he nonetheless recognizes “the importance of someone like her coming to our class because she represents the ideology of people” in the Trump administration.

Star wrote about the visit to Berkeley in her recent column:

“To my very pleasant surprise, I discovered that professor Ross has developed a sane, civil and educational model for presenting a broad spectrum of viewpoints to students, which he has now been doing for 32 years.

“I spoke to about 600 attentive students in a large hall about my proposals for conservative reforms to fight ingrained poverty, including ending the use of taxpayers funds for abortion providers, housing and school vouchers, business tax-free zones, retirement savings accounts for low-income earners and tax credits for charitable contributions in targeted ZIP codes.”