After weeks of often-violent protests that smeared Columbia’s University with the stain of anti-Semitism, the student editors of the Columbia Law Review say the few hours of police action to clear the occupation of one campus building has left them way too stressed to take their final exams.
“The violence we witnessed last night has irrevocably shaken many of us on the Review. We know this to be the same for a majority of our classmates,” the students wrote, according to their Instagram page.
“Videos have circulated of police clad in riot gear mocking and brutalizing our students,” they wrote. Almost 300 people were arrested; no injuries were reported.
This is just too good! @ColumbiaLaw
1. @Columbia students violate all rules and vandalize the university
2. Police evacuates them
3. They send a letter demanding that the university cancels their exams and gives them passing grades, because they are "irrevocably shaken" 🤡 pic.twitter.com/PkGICfZJVX
— Pasqui (@Pasqui701) May 3, 2024
“The events of last night left us, and many of our peers, unable to focus and highly emotional during this tumultuous time,” the plea for no exams read.
The Washington Free Beacon noted that a statement saying a "white supremacist, neo-fascist hate group" was guilty of "storming" Columbia concerned a pro-Israel rally organized by Christian Zionists that featured hymns and prayer.
Columbia Law School said the exams were taking place.
A message to students from law dean Gillian Lester said the only changes were that exams would be remote instead of in-person and that students who wanted the option of pass/fail could request it, according to Reuters.
I say cancel the students & expel them instead. Besides that we have enough crooked Democrat lawyers as it is. https://t.co/YnVCSZ5liz
— Kazoomike (@MikePIMarine) May 3, 2024
Legal expert Jonathan Turley said if students can’t cope with pressure, they picked the wrong profession.
“This is indeed a learning moment. Law students need to be able to face such moments without shutting down due to the stress. Our profession is filled with stress and trauma. It is the environment in which we operate. In those moments, we do not have the option of being a no-show. We make our appearance and speak for others,” he wrote on his website.
“It is true that law firms are likely to look for students who can handle high-stress situations. This letter suggests the opposite of students at the very top of the Columbia law class,” he wrote.
Little snowflakes will never survive in the real world https://t.co/Hw5hk6zwQJ
— Camohatguy (@camohatguy) May 3, 2024
“More importantly, the question is how such law students are emotionally prepared for the pressures of practice when such protests shut them down and leave them ‘unable to focus.'
"However, they have been educated in systems that have fostered the sense of victimization or trauma from opposing views,” he wrote.
“Outside of the Columbia Law Review offices is a thing called life. It is neither predictable nor comfortable,” Turley wrote.
