The 2016 U.S. presidential election has been one of the most polarizing elections of all-time. People seem to adore or loathe both candidates with little middle ground. The hatred and worship of Donald J. Trump has expanded over walls and borders and into Canada. And the strong feelings over the Republican presidential candidate also followed.
We take you to the Mount Royal University in Calgary where student Matt Linder wore a pro-Trump hat. The Trump supporter was wearing a now iconic red cap that says, “Make America Great Again.” Seems innocuous enough.
WRONG!!!
Stupid me. I forgot it was the year 2016 and everyone is “offended” at anything and everything including words on a hat.
Fellow student Zoe Slusar approached Linder and demanded that he take his Trump cap off.
Her reason for insisting that he remove the hat?
She considered the harmless hat to be “hate speech.”
Hate speech? More like hat speech.
“You’re not allowed to share hate language at a University,” Slusar shouted at Linder. “Make America Great Again means Make America all for white people, no immigrants, no people of different sexual orientations.”
Slusar had no answer when the cameraman pointed out that Trump’s wife, Melania, is an immigrant.
The special snowflake who is “offended” by words continually tells Linder that he “has to take the hat off.”
Eventually, she unleashed her ultimatum.
“Listen dude, like we’re friends and I’ll level with you, but you’ve got to take the hat off or I am going to write the president of the University and he’s going to come and talk to you because I already talked to him about this,” she continues. “It’s not allowed. It’s hate language on campus.”
I like how she tells Linder, “We’re friends,” but then seconds later says she’s going to get him expelled for wearing a hat she didn’t like.
She didn’t care that the gentleman was exercising his freedom of speech in a public place. Her feelings were hurt and that was all that mattered.
The video ends not with civil debate, but rather a white knight charging towards Matt and ripping his Trump hat right off his head. How very tolerant and open-minded of him.
“Mount Royal University respects individuals who exercise their constitutionally-protected right to freedom of expression, as long as it is peaceful and respectful,” Melanie Rogers, a spokeswoman for college said.
I’m sure this girl would have no problem if someone was wearing a Che Guevara t-shirt, a proven racist who was Fidel Castro’s chief executioner.
Being offended by things that aren’t actually offensive is a very slippery slope. I could say that the social justice warrior‘s white shirt is offensive because maybe it was manufactured in Bangladesh and it is a symbol of unfair working conditions for citizens of third world countries that are taken advantage of by clothing companies who want cheap labor to produce shirts by young children who work 15 hour days in cramped and broiling conditions at a sweatshop.
The SJW’s friend who is wearing a New York Yankees hat could trigger someone. Maybe someone could be insulted that the Yankees were the fourth to the last MLB team to have a black player on their team with Elston Howard in 1955, eight years after Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in 1947. Or maybe someone could be “offended” that the Yankees have an exclusionary policy of not allowing players to have facial hair, which can be discriminatory.
Are these examples crazy? Of course. Are they much crazier than someone demanding that a person to take off the hat of the Republican presidential candidate? Not really.