Good news! The world isn’t ending today. The absence of an onrushing Niburu has compelled the original false prophet to retract his claim. Go ahead and throw a party tonight, for good or ill. (For some strange reason, my wife has decided to go on a Christmas movie binge. I’m sitting here praying for Niburu to show up after all.)
Then, remember, tomorrow was supposed to be the start of Freedom Week, that nonsensical few days that Milo Yiannopoulos was supposed to bring all of his asshole friends to Berkeley to test the limits of free speech with advocacy of Nazi policies. There were portents and omens of raging incompetence ahead of time, and now they have been fulfilled — the event has been formally cancelled.
In a Saturday letter to the school, an attorney for Berkeley Patriot, Marguerite Melo, wrote, “On their behalf, you are hereby notified the Berkeley Patriot is canceling all Free Speech Week activities it sponsored.” The letter accused administrators of putting up roadblocks and said the group was “contemplating initiating litigation against the responsible parties and the administration for violation of our clients’ civil rights.”
Yeah. It’s the administration’s fault because the students (and Milo) failed to get speakers signed up and to pay for the auditoriums they wanted to reserve. Except that also it was clear that this was just the alt-light wackaloons trolling the university.
But in a separate email chain obtained by this news organization, Lucian Wintrich, one of the supposed speakers, told Mogulof the event had been a set-up from the start. “It was known that they didn’t intend to actually go through with it last week, and completely decided on Wednesday,” Wintrich wrote in an email around 10 a.m. Saturday morning.
“Wait, whoah, hold on a second,” wrote a clearly surprised Mogulof. “What, exactly, are you saying? What were you told by MILO Inc? Was it a set-up from the get-go?” “Yes,” came Wintrich’s one-word response. Wintrich did not immediately respond to a voicemail seeking comment.
So it was officially cancelled, but everyone behind it had known it couldn’t possibly happen, and…some of them are still claiming it will happen, without any institutional backing or security or venue.
But representatives for Yiannopoulos insisted the event would move forward without the student group. “The Berkeley Patriot may have pulled out of the event, but Milo and his other speakers have not. More details will be released at a FaceBook Live press conference that will be streamed shortly,” spokeswoman Mona Salama wrote in an email around 11:15 am Saturday.
I think that means that aimless disorganized thugs will show up anyway, wander around haplessly, try to cause a little trouble, and get rounded up by campus police. Fun! Chaos! Confusion! And afterwards,
the recriminations and finger-pointing!
Except here. I’ll be home grading papers.
Niburu, where are you?
As cop-outs go, I have to say this is one of the stupidest and weakest I have ever come across. He could have at least put a little effort into it.
The absence of an onrushing Niburu has compelled the original false prophet to retract his claim.
Doesn’t the bible have some kind of pretty nasty prescription for false prophets?
Not the end of the world, but coming soon to a hotel near our house. Fortunately, I just bought the perfect t-shirt for the show.
Could we stop using the term “alt-light?” Alt-right is a bad enough euphemism as it is, we don’t need to let them add more.
“Niburu, where are you?” would be an excellent title for a novelty song.
I’m detecting a hint of blackhole sun. The underground dwelling Reptoids lost contact with Niburu last month. It is assumed the planet went rogue and abandoned the sun’s orbit. The Illuminati cheered this development as it may sound the death knell for their scaly ancient adversaries. They may revive Adam Weishaupt from cryonic freeze to celebrate the demise of the lizards. The next Cremation of Care should be jubilant.
@5 “Are you there Niburu, it’s me Milo.”
Have Jerry Coyne and Sam Harris condemned the regressive left for this yet?
The kook hasn’t retracted anything. He’s always been saying yesterday (23-Sept) was the start of some invisible process which will become apparent in October. From the 17-September Washington Post, The world as we know it is about to end — again — if you believe this biblical doomsday claim:
As I read that last , he may very possibly claim he his ranting was correct since something will indeed be different in October. The name of the month (e.g.), albeit he’ll presumably latch onto some, possibly obscure, event.
@Steve:
Don’t worry, Jerry always goes to defend his honorable alt-right buddies, Milo and all other fuckwits in the name of “FREEDOM Of ZPEECH!” while at the same time, banning any sort of dissent in his own blog. I’m not sure if it is very pathetic or very sad, probably both.
I now see Caine@1 made essentially the same point as me@9. Apologies for the duplication.
I see this crap as the modern equivalent of yelling, “Fire!”, in a crowded theater. Entitled asses screaming bald-faced lies and riling up low information idiots to make the lives of vulnerable people even more vulnerable. I don’t see any reason not to deny them any kind of forum. It does real harm to real people.
@lotharloo:
Yeah, that’s the astonishing thing about Coyne. How censorious and extremely thin skinned he is. He seems to be completely unaware about this hypocrisy.
So does Berkeley have a right to sue for it’s losses associated with setting up security for a promised event and venue rental that never happened?
C’mon, you know the world has ended not physically but, you know, spiritually… for the 100th time.
I reckon the ‘prophet’ is looking to profit on the possible nuclear exchange / posturing between USA and N.Korea so if it happens he can shout, “See! I was right all along! I am the Great Prophet.” And then he can use it to make a further great profit for himself.
“The significant number is 33, according to Meade.”
Ok, now we just need to find a month with 33 days…
The mildly dereanged penguin sells a range of alternative calendars, and can produce a customized model. Her most popular is “Century without Mondays”, closely followed by “Eternal Weekends”. She says a one-off 33 day month isn’t difficult, and can offer a discount on even longer months containing many Mondays (there’s a considerable Monday surplus, and she wants to reduce the inventory).
Re @18
Any astrologically synchronized of 13 months each 28 days? There once were 13 signs per year and one got dropped motivated by 12 legato months per year with oscillating numbers of 30,31 days and the single 28 day month that gets extended to account for the fractional Terran rotation vs Solar revolution periods.
.[aside] (you’d think “intelligent” design would synchronize these periods to integer ratios)
EOM rambling again . Exit stage left