Westport college students are on both sides of the protests roiling campuses nationwide.
One made it into the Washington Post.
Reporting from the University of Texas, where Governor Greg Abbott is sending in troops, the paper quoted students who called his actions politically opportunistic.
However, the Post said: “Not every student found the response unsettling.
“Lily Caplan, 19, a sophomore journalism major from Westport, Conn., joined fellow members of Longhorn Students for Israel at a counter-protest next to the pro-Palestinian gathering Thursday, waving Israeli flags and chanting ‘Bring them home now’ — a reference to Jewish hostages in Gaza.
“‘Yesterday we saw a totally different response than other universities around the country and me, as a Jewish student, I was so grateful for that. Don’t mess with Texas,’ she said, echoing a state slogan as she stood in a circle with other counter-protesters.
“Caplan said she was reassured by support from Abbott and university president Jay Hartzell.
Click here for the full Washington Post story. (Hat tip: Douglass Davidoff)
================================================
Husbands and kids’ alert: Mother’s Day is May 12.
Westport Marketplace has the holiday covered. Brunch spots, spas, chocolates, other gifts and more are all in a handy list. Click here to see — then act!
The mom in your life will thank you.
==================================================
Officer Joe Saponare of Westport Animal Control wants Westporters to know: “All wildlife animals — especially coyotes — will be out more now, both day and night, searching for food because of their newborn babies.”
He suggests taking dogs out on leashes. Owners of little dogs should be especially vigilant.
Compo Beach coyote. (Photo/Richard Gabor)
==================================================
Soccer fans around the US know Robbie Mustoe as a keen-eyed commentator on NBC Sports’ Premier League coverage. Soccer fans around the world know that he’s a former English professional player.
Westporters know him as our neighbor — and a golfer.
He may not have scored the winning goal at Wembley. But on Monday he did the next best thing: He got a hole-in-one.
Don’t take our word for it. Here’s what he posted on X:
It happened. It finally fcking happened.
After roughly 40 years of playing golf, I got a HOLE IN ONE. Joy. Deep joy.
Whiskey and champagne followed.
Longshore Golf Club Westport CT, Hole number 2. Witnessed by my wife Caroline and my son Elliot. April 22nd 2024. A great day. pic.twitter.com/922iAdbngB— Robbie Mustoe (@robbiemustoe) April 23, 2024
(Hat tip: David Groner)
==================================================
Tonight is A Better Chance of Westport’s annual Dream Event (Saturday, 6:30 p.m., Westport Library).
If you’re going, you know it will be an inspirational evening. But those not there can still take part in a great online auction.
Broadway and Yankees tickets, golf, Arabian horse lessons and more are up for bid. Just click here, then click “Not attending” and follow the prompts.
=================================================
ABC’s Dream Event is just one of many galas this spring. All are important, for excellent causes.
But the Westport Weston Family YMCA is hosting an “Extra Special Spring Bash” on May 4 (6 to 8:30 p.m.).
The evening is tailored to students ages 12-18 with disabilities.
The Y promises fun and excitement, with food, a photo booth, gift bags and a DJ.
Students will be partnered with a student volunteer buddies who spend the evening with them. Parents can stay in a separate room where they can mingle, and enjoy refreshments.
Click here to register, and for more information.
==================================================
Jesse Terry and Sam Robbins share the bill next Saturday (May 4, 8 p.m.), at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation in Westport’s Voices Café.
Terry — a full-time touring artist for well over a decade, and Wilton native — has been called “a gentle soul with a formidable songwriting talent and a clear artistic vision.”
Sam Robbins is based in Nashville. He brings a modern, upbeat edge as a storytelling troubadour.
The concert supports local social justice programs. Click here for tickets, and more information.
==================================================
That’s not Sam Robbins’ only upcoming Westport appearance.
Carolyn Miller runs Westport-based Meals for Music. The non-profit provides free meals to touring musicians.
Their first fundraiser is May 8 (7:45 p.m.) at Fairfield Theatre Company. Damn Tall Building — and Robbins — provide the entertainment. (And presumably will eat well.)
Click here for tickets, and more information.
==================================================
Speaking of entertainment: Nearly 300 musicians have signed a letter, urging US senators to help fix the broken concert ticketing system.
Three of the them — more than 1% of all of signees — have Westport connections. Nile Rodgers lives here. And Billie Eilish and Finneas’ father, Patrick O’Connell, is a 1975 Staples High School graduate.
They’re in good company. Other signers include Duran Duran, Fall Out Boy, Graham Nash, Green Day, Cyndi Lauper, Indigo Girls, Jason Mraz, Siaand Lorde. (Hat tip: Mark Mathias)
Finneas has some Westport roots.
=================================================
Johanna Keyser Rossi loves Burying Hill Beach.
The other day, she noticed that artificial flowers placed along the fence at the top of the hill had been removed.
She thought they were a tribute or memorial to someone, and was sad to see them gone.
Yesterday, to her delight, someone — the same person perhaps, or someone else — had replaced them.
Beautifully.
(Photo/Johanna Keyser Rossi)
=================================================
Sometimes the Fresh Market osprey leaves its nest to fish.
Sometimes it just wants a change of pace, from its platform in a busy parking lot.
Hilary Ellis spotted today’s “Westport … Naturally” scene on Spicer Road.
(Photo/Hilary Ellis)
==================================================
And finally … Mike Pinder, founding keyboardist of the Moody Blues, died this week in California. He was 82. Click here for a full obituary.
(Go now! But before you do, please click here to support “06880” — your hyper-local blog. Thank you!)
Animal Controller Officer Joe Saponare is a very experienced person. Take his good advice.
regarding college protests. I would encourage all activists that are pro Palestinian to go to Gaza. I would suggest that the gay and lesbian supporters get up close to Hamas and express their freedom of speech.
Great point Richard.. Hamas may hate the gay community more than they hate the Jewish people.. Hamas is pure evil . That these students or worse these Universities dont see this should be cause for alarm
we agree
.That’s probably the male osprey. Females are identified by their “necklace of brown pearls”. Also, the female usually stays on the nest, incubating the eggs, then protecting and otherwise caring for the young. The male will go fishing and return with his catch to a spot not too far away where he’ll eat some of the fish before bringing the rest to the female for her and the chicks. Osprey are very good parents.
Very proud of Lily Caplan and thousands of others for standing up to the recent wave of hatred and antisemitism. Keep it up Lily we support you!
130 hostages still being held over 200 days later.
Hamas is using their own people as pawns.
Israel has every right to retaliate.
Ironically, the same people calling Israel out for “occupying” Gaza (which is a free state controlled by a terrorist cell) is occupying college campus grounds and even taking force into buildings such as Cal Poly.
The virtue signaling going on at schools while chasing, following and blocking Jewish students, especially the “top” schools is abhorrent, disturbing, disgraceful and disgusting.
🇮🇱
thank you
Andrew, you seem to be saying that opposing the policies of the administration of Benjamin Netanyahu makes one antisemitic.
Nope! Not what he is saying nor what the pro Hamas colllege protestors are saying!!!!
Eventually the government will have another Kent State on its hands. The US is complicit in this genocide.
It must be intolerable living in a country that’s so supportive of “genocide.” Perhaps a move to South Africa, Cuba or Venezuela is in store? Seems like those would be a better fit for your ideology, especially those latter two.
I hope the police here in Westport would protrct us Jews from terrorists who want us all dead! That would be the genocide, not the war started by Hamas and their terrorist attack on Israel.
Dermot, you are my impetus for teaching and attending school board meetings to make sure extremism and brainwashing does not seep into our schools!
Hamas is charted to destroy Israel and since their barbaric 10/7 attack has vowed to attack Israel again and again until Israel is destroyed. Tell us all again who is practicing “genocide”.
By the way, it was the Republican governor who ordered ARMED NATIONAL GUARDS onto a college campus and who FIRED 67 ROUNDS at the UNARMED students.
“Genocide, complicit, divest”. Now, where can I charge my phone?
Both sides? One side is for terrorism! The side marching for Hamas and for the killing of Jews worldwide! How can anyone who is educated be FOR that? Those protestors are all anti semiites. They are all brainwashed and braindead. Extremists just like people in the Trump cult.
The worst of the protestors is Suasan Sarandon!
Meanwhile, did you know there are collge seniors who had their high school graduations canceld bc of Covid and now their college graduations are canceled bc of these angi semitic terrorist agitators! NOT OK!!! Arrest them all! We do not pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for our children to be treated this way!
Stephanie, who is the ‘we’ that you’re referencing? UCONN, far from an ‘elite’ university is where the majority of Staples grads go?
I have no clue what you are talking about.
Majority go to UConn? I don’t think so.
https://06880danwoog.com/2023/11/19/staples-class-of-23-by-the-numbers/
Plus, what is her point? I never said the word “we” nor “elitist” in any of my comments.
Sorry, my reply ended up as a comment.
“Arrest them all?” Stephanie, I guess that the right to free speech doesn’t count for people who have different views than your own.
People capable of thinking critically can easily acknowledge that attacks of October 6 were an absolute atrocity.
People capable of thinking critically should also be able to acknowledge that the killing of more than 30,000 civilians, the killing of journalists, and the killing of aid workers is its own kind of atrocity.
If opposing the policies of Benjamin Netanyahu equates to antisemitism, half of the voters in the nation of Israel are antisemitic.
I’d suggest that you heed the words of Friedrich Nietzsche, “Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you,” but it may be too late for you.
That 30,000 civilians killed number reminds me that about 30,000 Americans are killed in America, EVERY YEAR, from firearms. We can thank congress for that by continuing to allow the nation to be flooded with 400 million firearms.
Where are the demonstrations, outrage and pop up tents protesting those deaths, or don’t they count?
Thank you for the Whataboutism.
I see. The lives of those lost in Gaza matter but those lost every year from gun violence in the USA, not so much. I’m sure the families of Americans slaughtered with guns don’t consider it “whataboutism”.
Russell – nobody is saying victims of gun violence don’t matter. It is that it has nothing to do with the subject of the post or the comments.
Stephanie – I don’t think “gaslighting” means what you think it means. You are having one of your typical social media tantrums.
Chris, stop gaslighting! Go to Gaza and see how they treat women and Palestineans! Go!
It’s not anti-semitic to oppose the policies of Benjamin Netanyahu, but let’s be real: the vast majority of protestors aren’t protesting Benjamin Netanyahu – they’re protesting the mere existence of Israel as a Jewish state. I’d even argue this isn’t necessarily anti-semitic, but there seems to be an implication that these college protestors are simply protesting Benjamin Netanyahu’s policies. I wish this was the case and would love to be proven wrong – but I think it’s much bigger than that.
Re: people capable of thinking critically – that would rule out the vast majority of protestors, many of whom likely would NOT acknowledge that the attacks of October 6 were an atrocity. Again, they have their right to believe and say this, but not when they’re disrupting the normal functioning of a private university. Kudos to Columbia for threatening to suspend any students who haven’t cleared out of the encampment by now.
Oh and if you want some really good both sides-ism (similar to whataboutism): see this interview with UC regent John Perez: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2024/04/14/a-california-regent-confronts-the-limits-of-free-speech-00152103
“We have gotten to a point of both sides-ism in this question, which is completely not constructive…The campus told me that if you meet with Jewish students, you have to meet with the Muslim students. I said, ‘I’m meeting with students at Hillel because Hillel was targeted.’ There’s no balancing that needs to happen.”
First, Dan has a real name policy, so don’t hide behind cowardly anonymity.
Second, “the vast majority of protestors aren’t protesting Benjamin Netanyahu – they’re protesting the mere existence of Israel as a Jewish state” is complete and utter bullshit. It is designed to deflect genuine criticism of policy rather than addressing it.
NOBODY that I know of in the US did not condemn the actions on October 6. I’m sure you’ll fish someone out as an example (like Trump claiming people celebrating the 9/11 attacks on rooftops), but the actions were horrific and people of every political stripe recognized that.
And, as I stated above, it is preposterous to claim that Netanyahu opponents are simply antisemitic, when Netanyahu doesn’t have the support of half of Israeli voters.
What Netanyahu is attempting to is take advantage of an unspeakable tragedy to install an apartheid state. If you want to defend that, go ahead – but have the courage to acknowledge that is what you are doing.
Otherwise, yeah, when you can’t make a point that you can defend, just broad brush those with whom you disagree as being anti-Semitic and demand that their First Amendment rights are taken away. It’s more expedient that way.
Chris, I have to respectfully disagree. Your comment, “‘the vast majority of protestors aren’t protesting Benjamin Netanyahu – they’re protesting the mere existence of Israel as a Jewish state’ is complete and utter bullshit” IS COMPLETE AND UTTER BULLSHIT”.
Anyone chanting “From the river to the sea, Palestine must be free” is not protesting Netanyahu’s policies but is, in accordance with Hamas’ stated policy, advocating for the complete elimination of Israel. That does seem to be a common chant at these protests. It certainly was at the Boston protest march from Copley to MIT that I witnessed in Boston last November. And, of course, some of what the protesters are saying is much more overt.
To be fair, there is a decent chance that there are dilettantes/low information protestors who have no idea what they are chanting actually means. College students are often woefully ill-informed and certainly DEI has conditioned them to side with the “oppressed” vs the “oppressors” and that the Palestinians are the “oppressed” while Israel and Jews are their “oppressors”. So, I suppose, there is a knee jerk response to jump on the bandwagon even though they all might not fully appreciate they are advocating Jewish genocide. Of course, for those that don’t know, when “death to America” and “death to Jews” is tossed in, one would hope they’d start to question but that is probably asking too much.
On the other hand, it is probably a fair conclusion that most Palestinians (and their co-religionists) that are protesting know exactly what they mean.
Bill (and mpincus01) – most Palestinians want a functioning government and want to live normal lives.
While nobody with a functioning brain would in any way support the actions of 10/6, Netanyahu’s approach to the West Bank and Gaza of “the beatings will continue until morale improves” was never sustainable. He doesn’t want a two-state solution, which means he doesn’t want a truly democratic Israel and wants to have an apartheid state. That’s not an approach that leads to anything resembling peace.
That you want to conflate the rhetoric from terrorist organizations with that of Palestinians speaks to your own bias on the matter. (And before you say something stupid about them voting for Hamas, if Hamas keeps the power on and the water flowing, Palestinians are going to vote for Hamas over Fatah/PNA every time.)
While nobody would deny that there are individual racists, anti-Semites, sexists, or whatever in the US, the idea that a preponderance of non-Jews are anti-Semites is preposterous. What YOU are trying to do define anti-Semitism as anything that opposes the Netanyahu government. Fair to say that most US Jews oppose what Netanyahu is doing. Would you call them anti-Semitic or say that they oppose Israeli nationhood? You are trying to introduce scare tactics so that people support the behavior of the Netanyahu administration lest they be labeled as anti-Semites.
Do you really think that the slaughter of civilians in Gaza is acceptable?
Pew Research polling results on American’s views of Israel:
https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2022/07/11/american-views-of-israel/
Wow, some serious ignorance on display here.
– Real name added (that would be pretty dumb to use my real last name in an anonymity, but my guess this type of logic is foreign to you)
– You clearly have not been following what came out of many Harvard student groups, for example, following October 6. https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2023/10/10/psc-statement-backlash/
– You obviously didn’t read my comment, or chose not to acknowledge it. I agree that it’s not anti-semitic to oppose the policies of Benjamin Netanyahu. I am contending that the protestors on college campuses don’t just oppose the policies of Netanyahu, they oppose the existence of Israel as any kind of Jewish state, period.
– I am defending the right of a sovereign nation to defend itself by rooting out the terrorists that attacked it. Yes, this means that unfortunately many civilians will be killed, particularly when the perpetrators hide underground and leave their people to perish, and actually seem to support this rather than agreeing to release hostages in exchange for prisoners. However, once Israeli elections are held, I do hope Netanyahu is defeated and a more moderate government is put in place.
– Once again, if you actually read my post, you’d realize that I don’t believe protesting the war is necessarily anti-semitic. But it is disruptive to the normal functioning of the campus and if you understood the law (which you clearly don’t), you’d understand there is no “first amendment right” to engage in disruptive protests at Columbia as a private institution.
Free speech?! Lmfao!!!!!!!!!!!!
They are terrorists taking over campuses harrassing Jews and preventing them from entering!!!!! They are desacrating buildings and taking peoe hostage!!!! They are desecrating flags! They are threating people! They are physically harming people! They are shutting down classes and graduations attempting to make people negotiate with Hamas!
You are on the WRONG side of Democracy and history Chris!!!!!
Imagine if these were students linking arms not to allow black people in and out shouting, “ go back to Africa”!!!!
You have been gaslit and brainwashed just like the extremists on the right chanting, “ the Jews will not replace us”!
Class action lawsuits coong to pro Hamas pro Oct 7th campuses!!!!
Isrsel is going nowhere Chris! Neither are us Jews!!!
Has needs to go! Chant that! Bring our hostages HOME! Chant that! Chant against Hamas controlling Gaza and the narrative of the extermination of Jews and Israel!!!!
Oct 7th started this all!!!!! Not the Jews!
The end.
Well, to be fair, you did comment “We do not pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for our children to be treated this way!”
As for “elite”, just speculating, but the schools that (at least initially) were in the news over anti-semitism on campus were historically “elite” schools (e.g. Ivies and friends) that nominally cost “hundreds of thousands of dollars” to attend so perhaps she extrapolated that those were the schools you were referring to.
Obviously, the majority of Staples graduates do not go to schools so defined. In that context, she might be implying is that the majority of Westporters are not directly impacted nor pay “hundreds of thousands of dollars” to send their kids to college so if you were using “we” in the collective sense of “us Westporters”, that is probably a bad usage of “we”, hence her request for clarification. As in the now politically incorrect punch line “What do you mean “we” kemosabe?”
Or, something completely different.
Chris Grimm,
Does DEI peotect Jewish students on campuses?