Conservative Student Attacked
The Princeton Tory reports that a conservative Princeton student, Francisco Nava, was attacked recently by people who disagree with his politics. He was beaten until he was unconscious. The assault came after he had received several death threats. What’s more, Princeton seems to have a serious problem in this regard, considering that Nava isn’t the first conservative who has received death threats from political opponents.
One of two assailants, identified as a white, college-aged male, stopped Nava and asked him if he would “help someone who’s been hurt.” The assailant then pulled Nava into a dark area where another male joined in holding Nava’s jaw shut. The two assailants thrust Nava’s face against a brick wall causing abrasions, according to an email sent to administrators. Nava was then punched until he lost consciousness. When he awoke the assailants were beating him with a glass bottle. Nava’s two attackers said, “shut the f* up,” apparently echoing words that had appeared in messages received by Nava and four others affiliated with the conservative Anscombe Society. After the assault, Nava was taken to Princeton Medical Center for treatment. He was released late Friday evening.
The attacks came two days after Nava and four others, including prominent politics professor and conservative scholar Robert George and Rhodes Scholar and Tory Editor-in-Chief Sherif Girgis, were sent email death threats. One message said, “SHUT THE F* UP WE WILL DESTROY ALL OF YOU WE ARE WATCHING YOU YOU DONT BELONG HERE WE WILL KILL YOU.”
The emails were traced to computers at Princeton’s Firestone Library that do not require a log-in or password. Campus dormitories can be accessed using the same ID card that undergraduates use to enter the library. All students receiving threats spent the night off-campus at either a hotel or a house in the local area.
To me, it’s a sign of the increasing intolerant behavior displayed by liberal students towards those who dare hold conservative views. As a conservative you’re not only unpopular on most universities, this episode shows your life could even be in danger. This is a very serious problem and it frustrates me to no end that most media ignore hate crimes against conservatives, same goes for universities who seem to think that as long as the victims are conservatives there isn’t much of a problem after all.
More at the Strate-Sphere, Fausta’s Blog (a Princeton resident) and Instapundit. Also more at Kesher Talk where Judith Weiss writes:
I honestly can’t predict where this will go. However, the attack and the muted response from the administration and public safety officials are prompting a hot debate in the blog of the Daily Princetonian, which is all to the good, with references to the response to the noose episode at Columbia University.
Like I said, I’ll be watching this closely. I really hope the university solves this, and fast, and takes a tough line on the perps. Otherwise, my massive annual two-figure contribution to Annual Giving may go the way of mandatory chapel attendance and beanie caps for freshmen.
UPDATE: it seems that it was a hoax. Nava - let me say that I haven’t got words to describe him right now - admitted that he made the story up. Of course, the death threats (others receive) weren’t a hoax, so to a degree the issue remains.
UPDATE II: good. Nava made everything up, including the e-mails. Consider this post to be a huge waste of space and time, basically.
The university needs to take a "hard stance" on the perpetrators kicking their asses out of school. After that the criminal justice system should take charge, how many years can you get for assault? Here’s hoping that some conservative organization gets the victim a really good lawyer that can put them away a long time.
I no longer approve of Hate Crime legislation generally, so I wouldn’t ask they get a harsher sentence for it, but certainly this is as much a hate crime as any of the "traditional" sort. They should be outed and denounced by their peers, they bring shame on the movement they claim to belong to, and silence makes the others complicit.
Wilhelm, Tove, Fredrik?
Okay, this gets me riled up. If a dude can get attacked for being a conservative, that means I can get beat up for being pro-choice… An attack on him is an attack on me, ans an attack on me is an attack on him. This is basic civility; those clowns that attacked him needs some serious time to contemplate this, everybody else should get an example to observe.
It was a hoax: http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/archives/2007/12/14/news/19743.shtml
Hmmm, well, if he made it up then HE should be kicked out of school, and prosecuted according to the level of what he did. Assuming he didn’t accuse anyone personally of the attack, I don’t suppose he’ll get much of a sentence. Nothing so bad as being kicked out of college for being a grade-A ass, in any event.
I thought about blogging about this last night…I even worte up a piece and then deleted it because it all seemed to convienient. The fabrication of such incidents is not terribly uncommon (and evidently Nava did it in high school as well), although it is usually done by those left of center. This is the problem with those, like David Horowitz, who want to try to make consevative into just another minority group that needs "protection"; they tend to adopt the same ethically challenged tactics.
"Of course, the death threats (others receive) weren’t a hoax, so to a degree the issue remains."Not really. According to the Princeton Township police, Nava has admitted that in addition to making up the assault, he was the one who composed and sent the death threats to the other Anscombe members and Professor Robert George. He cruelly used and frightened his friends in order to perpetuate his elaborate hoax.
Thanks for that info: I assume and hope that he won’t be able to continue studying at Princeton?
And people wonder why I stick to the "Drudge Rule" of giving unconfirmed stories a miss until there’s some actual investigation.
Yep, we all make mistakes Tully. This was one of ‘em. Learning from it
Apologize for the inconvenience, etc.
Hm. Stupid ass is going to make the very real opprobrium towards anyone right-of-Clinton seem less credible or at least exaggerated. I’m equally annoyed by this guy - you don’t use made-up assault as a political tool; it lessens the true horror that lives inside cold-blooded violence.
I was going to write on this this morning but something about the story felt…Randi Rhodes-ish. The details of the alleged attack sounded bizarre and the "threats" weirdly generic.
There is lots of discrimination against conservative professors and students on many college campuses. It usually does not need to become violent for the simple reason that the anti-conservatives hold all the institutional high-ground — they have much more subtle tools at the disposal that are much less likely to backfire on them.
The biggest tragedy about this hoax is that it will give anti-conservatives ammunition to ignore and downplay the very real discrimination that they and their allies carry out.
I was going to write on this this morning but something about the story felt…Randi Rhodes-ish. The details of the alleged attack sounded bizarre…
Getting mugged by Ketel One Bloody Mary’s also sounds a little bizarre, but I hear it’s been known to happen.