Lifted from the comments, a small but telling thing:

“I’ve not done anything wrong.” Why has this become so normal? pic.twitter.com/GKHzIozlRj

— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) May 7, 2023

Regarding which, sH2 replied,

Well, indeed. We do seem to be witnessing an upsurge in such sly provocations, and almost always from the same kinds of people with the same kinds of views – an eerie uniformity. And so, Narcissistic Glitter Bint can invade someone’s personal space and shower them, and their children, with some substance – in this case, glitter – and do it repeatedly, against their wishes, while saying, rather triumphantly, “I’m not touching him.”

The dynamic is basically, “You, unlike me, have some self-restraint, which gives me an advantage, therefore I shall test it and see how far I can go.” It’s the psychology of a child unaccustomed to consequences.

Left uncorrected, it’s a psychology that can quickly become quite vile. As seen, for instance, here.

Update, some variations on a theme:

In the comments, we mentioned the videos of Chris Elston (“Billboard Chris”), filmed at Portland State University, in which students who disagree with him – our supposed intellectuals of tomorrow – feel entitled to harass and threaten, and to throw water on him, and to steal his phone and other belongings.

This related video, embedded below, is ostensibly less dramatic, but in some ways more instructive. The charming songbird seen early in the video, and in those above, is Chrissa Mae Kalal, a student, adjunct employee, and self-styled “trans refugee from West Virginia.” Schooled in the role of persecuted saint, Mr Kalal – formerly Chris Burney – spends an awful lot of his time disrupting and physically blocking other people’s conversations – say, around three minutes in, by repeatedly shoving his bike at the legs of the participants while looking enormously self-satisfied – and generally harassing them in a gratuitous and fairly creepy way.

As one does when one is a Higher Being and stipulator of pronouns.

Note too the equally divine creature in the pink mask, who, around six minutes in, also seems unhappy about strangers having a polite conversation.

This brave woman at Portland State University ended up in tears, afraid of the backlash she’ll get for agreeing with us.

She doesn’t know what’s going to happen to her, and says sharing these views in university will get her a bad grade.

She has to fear for her future for… pic.twitter.com/aC58mIoW4X

— Billboard Chris 🇨🇦🇺🇸 (@BillboardChris) May 9, 2023

It’s worth noting that the man with the bicycle, the lovely Chrissa, and his masked accomplice – the one circling the conversation and ‘accidentally’ barging into its participants, repeatedly – are trying to intimidate the young woman in the video. And judging by her nervousness, and the need for continual looks over the shoulder, they’re doing a fairly good job of it.

Needless to say, what you’re seeing is pathological – one might say malevolent – and yet, for some, it’s a marker of woke status, a progressive ideal. And the behaviour above isn’t the result of some fit of temper or a one-off aberration. It isn’t done reluctantly or under duress. It’s practised and calculated. It reveals a sadistic ingenuity.

Hence the grinning and the self-satisfaction.

Christopher Rufo on self-flattering fantasies:

Andy Ngo shares a bedlamite horror story:

Frankly, I’m still processing the words trans therapist. On Twitter, Mr Ngo adds, “As I dig into more disturbing criminal cases involving extreme violence or child sex abuse, I’m finding many of the suspects are trans but are never reported as such by press, sheriff’s offices, or prosecutors.”

And Amy Wax on ‘equity’ versus competence:

In other we’re-letting-the-mentally-ill-teach-your-children news:

The teacher in question, a dysmorphic man named Ashlee Renczkowski, is apparently prone to “phases of depression,” and was, in his words, “having bad thoughts.” And hence of course the comments about shooting the children in his care, grades six through eight, presumably with the three firearms in his possession. The ostensible cause of this rather severe mood swing was a social media post in which unnamed people were “talking negatively” about Mr Renczkowski’s sexuality and professed womanhood.

And any reservations about Mr Renczkowski are, clearly, unfounded.

When not “feeling cute and beautiful” and exploring the possibilities of a “zero-depth vaginoplasty,” Mr Renczkowski boasts of “giving students a safe place.”

Some ironies are just a little too on-the-nose.

Mr Renczkowski has since been removed from the school and his weapons confiscated.

And in other, entirely unrelated news – when a sociology researcher discovers the wrong kind of things:

Readers are invited to guess the area of research before clicking the link.

Little things. For instance,

Below the fold, you’ll find a short film by Rob Montz about Amy Wax, quoted above, a professor of law at the University of Pennsylvania.

Professor Wax has been mentioned here once or twice before. Generally regarding her observations of everyday phenomena that are seemingly unmentionable, at least on campus, and the performative indignation and outright hysteria that reliably ensues. As when students, supposedly adult intellectuals, claimed that the professor’s mere presence on campus was “physically and emotionally harming all of us,” with the law school’s Dean, Theodore Ruger, another supposed adult, invoking the “lasting trauma” of hearing her speak.

Notable moments in the film include Professor Glenn Loury summarising the inevitable consequences of “affirmative action” and wildly varying standards of admission – which, it seems, mustn’t be acknowledged realistically – and Professor Wax’s comment about the race-grifting “equity” establishment, and its opposite – gratitude.

An educator, obviously:

According to the educator in question, Steven Shaviro, “It is far more admirable to kill a racist, homophobic or transphobic speaker than it is to shout them down.” What unfailing criteria might be used to determine such things, and how those gorged on indignation might avoid error, prior to any murder attempt, isn’t made clear.

The professor goes on to blame “right wing” student groups for inviting speakers who “provoke” leftist students – who mustn’t be expected to have any kind of self-possession – making them behave in ways that are threatening and delinquent, even sociopathic. Behaviour illustrated here many, many times – as, for instance, at Middlebury College, where the 74-year-old scholar Charles Murray, a contender for the title of World’s Most Polite Man, was physically chased off campus.

Says our educator,

Or put another way, “How dare you try to discredit leftist Mao-lings by even briefly existing in their proximity and thus making them want to murder you.” I paraphrase, of course, but not enormously.

Update, via the comments:

Given sufficient squinting, readers may have noticed the professor’s tiny rhetorical fig leaf. We’re told that he doesn’t advocate breaking the law – by murdering someone for shits and giggles – he merely admires it, a lot. And so, if, for example, a woman says that she doesn’t think a mentally ill man should be using the women’s changing rooms and toilets – and is then murdered for her “transphobia” – this would be a good thing and “far more admirable” than merely ganging up on her and preventing her from speaking.

He’s an intellectual, you know. A terribly caring intellectual.

Update 2:

In the comments, Pete R adds,

No, not really. This, remember, is a man for whom demurral on a wide range of contentious topics is by definition “reprehensible” and, in his mind, could only exist in order to “provoke” the righteous and good-hearted, i.e., people much like himself, who fantasise about menacing and killing those who disagree with them. Note the implication at the end of his post – that after murdering someone – say, someone who doesn’t think that dysmorphic men and autogynephile perverts are actually women – one should be acquitted, as one’s actions would have been “justified.”

These sentiments don’t suggest a detached thought experiment or some devil’s advocacy. More a sociopathic urge. Maybe inside our professor’s head, there’s a loud, relentless buzzing noise.

This shaper of young minds, a self-styled “Kitsch Marxist,” has been suspended with pay.

Previously in the world of totally balanced educators.

Via Tom Joyce.