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Jun 24, 2017

Casey Rae Friedlander walks in during the Processional to the music "Pomp and Circumstance" during the commencement at the Broadalbin-Perth High School in Broadalbin on Friday. (The Leader-Herald/Bill Trojan)

BROADALBIN Top Broadalbin-Perth High School class of 2017 student Julie Capito, interested in studying environmental science in college, on Friday compared this areas beauty to the path ahead for her classmates.

We have been privileged to grow up in an area surrounded by wilderness, so as we transition to the next phase of our lives, let us not forget the lessons of nature: the wisdom of being impactful, resilient people, Capito told the commencement gathering.

A total of 129 B-PCS graduates dressed in blue and red received diplomas in the gym.

Sometimes you may think your actions dont matter or no one cares what you do, but that is not true, Capito said.

She quoted environmentalist Rachel Carson: In every outthrust headland, in every curving beach, in every grain of sand, is the story of the Earth.

Julie Capito speaks during the commencement at the Broadalbin-Perth High School in Broadalbin on Friday. (The Leader-Herald/Bill Trojan)

Capito said, Your daily choices, whether its the type of shampoo you wash your hair with or the food you eat and the behaviors you portray such as smiling at someone or deciding not to recycle, are significant. Every breath you take, every step you make leaves its mark. As you journey throughout life, what type of impact do you want your life to hold? This is one of the questions I ask of you and myself tonight.

The class second-ranked student Christina Lin thanked parents, administrators and faculty.

She said of the Broadalbin-Perth teachers, Youve all impacted us in ways too many to list out in this speech. You have been shoulders to cry on, fantastic mentors, and some of the most dedicated members of our community. Thank you for giving us your heart and soul, because without it, none of us would be sitting here today.

Lins address went on to chronicle social media today, noting it is an age where its possible for us to have Pepe the Frog and Dat Boy rolling across our Twitter feeds alongside the nations turmoil.

Break the rules, she said. The greatest discoveries in life cant be found if youre restricting yourself. Think for yourself. Never let anyone, no matter how respected or how powerful, tell you how to live or what to believe in. Make educated decisions. Be yourself and care about others.

Jake Cope speaks during the commencement at Broadalbin-Perth High School in Broadalbin on Friday. (The Leader-Herald/Bill Trojan)

Jake Cope, third in his class, told the graduates they would move on to something greater after Friday.

At first, it may seem a bit scary, taking our first steps out of Broadalbin-Perth and into the open world, but we are not the first to do so, he said. Many graduates before us have been in our exact position anxiously wondering if they themselves will succeed in the future. Those people have the answers to our challenges.

Cope said his mentor throughout high school was William Eipp, who teaches many of the upper-level math and technology-related classes.

I am planning on studying computer science this fall, and Mr. Eipp has encouraged me all along the way, he said. From letting me audit an introductory programming class during my junior year to recommending me for an internship this summer in a computer science field, he has played a key role in the early development of my career.

High School Principal Mark Brooks told the students, Were here to celebrate one of the greatest group of students Ive gotten to know the last two years.

Isabella Bianca Magliocca, left, and Ryan Zajaceskowski take a selfie together in the lunch room prior to the commencement at the Broadalbin-Perth High School in Broadalbin on Friday. (The Leader-Herald/Bill Trojan)

He said the class of 2017 was the 30th graduating class of the Broadalbin-Perth merger. He said the class earned 1,367 college credits. He said 77 of the students earned enough credits for an entire semester of college. He talked about the various academic, athletic and extracurricular achievements of the class.

These are the things that make Broadalbin-Perth special, Brooks said. And thats only scratching the surface.

Other speakers included Board of Education President Edward Szumowski. He told the graduates that to be happy, they should be honest and trustworthy, hardworking and persistent.

Superintendent Stephen Tomlinson urged the graduating seniors to be humble and kind after they leave their public school system. He congratulated students and their parents, informing the students: Its time We are letting you go.

Music during commencement was provided by the Broadalbin-Concert Band and High School Choir.

Nicholas M. Eglin receives a handshake and his diploma from Superintendent Stephen Tomlinson, at left, as President of the Board of Education Edward Szumowski, at right looks on during the commencement at the Broadalbin-Perth High School in Broadalbin on Friday. (The Leader-Herald/Bill Trojan)

School Business Administrator Marco Zumbolo recognized the top 10 students.

Class of 2017 Co-Presidents Michelle Shlomovich and Alexandra Wagner presented a class gift a banner to be displayed at the school.

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Grads' journey begins - Gloversville Leader-Herald

Linfield College administrators have forced a Young Americans for Liberty group to cancel a free speech event over a cartoon frog.

Staff at the university labeled participants white supremacists after one of them drew a picture of Pepe the Frog, the popular meme thats been unfairly maligned as a hate symbol by Hillary Clinton and her supporters in the mainstream media.

The libertarian group set up a table on campus to promote their organization, and planned to sponsor a series of free speech events planned at college, which is in Oregon.

According to Reason, Kiefer Smith, vice president of the chapter, brought an inflatable free speech ball for participants to write and draw pictures on.

The majority of the things written on there were uplifting things, not political, not inflammatory at all, he said.

Typical examples were said to include youre awesome and have a nice day.

When one participant drew Pepe, the group came under attack by other students on campus, and involved the administration in their complaints.

Immediately we were deemed alt-right, said Smith, who says that YAL were even accused of being white supremacists over the drawing.

Reason states that the Linfield Advisory Committee on Diversity responded to the drawing by inviting the group to a free speech forum, where they were supposed to hold an hour-long discussion on the freedom of expression, but the event turned into a four-hour condemnation of the group.

Reshmi Dutt-Ballerstadt, a professor of English and gender studies coordinator accused the group of being funded by alt-right dark money.

Following the forum, the school administration canceled the planned free speech events that YAL was sponsoring, including a talk hosted by University of Toronto psychologist Jordan Peterson on ethics and free speech.

Peterson has come under fire from the progressive left for speaking out against the enforcement of gender-neutral preferred pronouns like ze/hir and xe/xir.

The campus faculty, including Dean of Faculty Dawn Nowacki, took aim at YAL in the campus newspaper, where they falsely described the libertarians as alt-right.

These efforts are a lot more subtle, wrote Nowacki. Just as becoming a terrorist is a gradual, step-by-step process, people do not become part of the alt-right overnight. These events represent a kind of soft recruitment into more extremist ideas.

The Young Americans for Liberty went ahead with their free speech event at an off-campus site, where they received a turn-out of over 400 attendeesdouble the number they were expecting.

The banned lecture also received around 90,000 views on YouTube.

This colleges efforts to suppress free speech backfired spectacularly.

Ian Miles Cheong is a journalist and outspoken media critic. You can reach him through social media at@stillgray on Twitterand onFacebook.

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Pepe the Frog Drawing Forces Free Speech Event Cancellation at Linfield College - Heat Street

DerRichter/Wikimedia CommonsFaculty and students at Linfield College have compared the campus chapter of Young Americans for Liberty (YAL) to terrorists and denounced them as white supremacists. Why? Because the libertarian student group attempted to host a series of free speech events at the small liberal arts college in McMinnville, Oregon.

The story begins in April, when YAL members set up a table on campus to promote both their newly formed group and a series of "speak freely" events they were sponsoring. Keifer Smith, vice president of the chapter, brought along an inflatable "free speech ball" and invited students to write whatever they wanted on it.

"The majority of the things written on there were uplifting things, not political, not inflammatory at all," Smith reports: comments like "you're awesome" and "have a nice day." But one person drew Pepea cartoon frog that some alt-right trolls have adopted as a symboland so the YAL chapter quickly became the focal point of campus outrage.

"Immediately we were deemed alt-right," says Smith. They were even called white supremacists.

The Linfield Advisory Committee on Diversity responded to the Pepe doodle by inviting the chapter to a free speech forum. According to Smith, this was supposed to be an hour-long discussion of the general idea of open expressionbut quickly morphed into a four-hour denunciation of him and his group for their supposed intolerance.

Next the school declared that it would be cancelling an upcoming event in the "speak freely" seriesa talk on ethics and free speech by the University of Toronto psychologist Jordan Peterson. The libertarian group was told the paperwork for the event had been turned in a day late; the school also cited tweets from Peterson promoting what was supposed to be a private event for Linfield students and faculty.

Meanwhile, faculty lashed out at the YAL chapter in the campus paper, The Linfield Review.

"The agenda of groups like Alt-Right and campus clubs that are either supported by the Alt-right or providing a platform for the Alt-Right is clear," wrote Reshmi Dutt-Ballerstadt, a professor of English and the co-coordinator of the school's gender studies program. "They want to challenge college campuses for their numerous diversity and inclusion initiatives that provide a legitimate space for ideas and knowledge base that have been historically marginalized and excluded."

At the free speech forum, Dutt-Ballerstadt had accused Smith and his group of being funded by "alt-right dark money."

Similar sentiments were expressed by Linfield's dean of faculty, Dawn Nowacki. Nowacki admitted that she didn't know any times anyone in the YAL chapter had expressed anything racist or misogynist, but she insisted they still posed a threat. "These efforts are a lot more subtle," she wrote. "Just as becoming a terrorist is a gradual, step by step process, people do not become part of the alt right overnight. These events represent a kind of soft recruitment into more extremist ideas."

Undeterred, the chapter moved the Peterson lecture to an off-campus venue. "We were really only planning on having maybe 100 people, maybe 200 people," Smith recalls. Instead over 400 folks turned up, and a YouTube version has so far gotten nearly 90,000 views.

Smith says he hopes to keep providing a forum for students to express otherwise maligned and unpopular viewpoints. As for the professors and students who have denounced him, Smith says their rhetoric is part of an open campus discourse too: "That's the price you pay for free speech."

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Students Hold Free Speech Events, Get Denounced as White Supremacists - Reason (blog)

Pepe The Frog, meme for the ages and white supremacist hate symbol, is dead at age twelve, The Guardian reports.

Matt Furie, a children's book author and the creator of Pepe, symbolically killed off the frog in an effort to put an official end to Pepe's life as a symbol of white supremacy and antisemitism. Furie originally created Pepe as part of his "Boy's Club" series on Myspace way back in 2005. Pepe enjoyed several years online as a regular meme before being co-opted as the hate symbol he is unfortunately known as today.

In the lead up to the 2016 presidential election, Pepe reached the height of his fame when he was adopted by "alt-right," neo-Nazi 4Chan types as a hate symbol adjacent to a swastika or burning cross. The cartoon frog became such a large part of the national conversation that Hillary Clinton publicly categorized Pepe as a racist image last September, and the Anti-Defamation League added him to its database of hate symbols.

Furie, who at one point launched an ill-fated "Save Pepe" campaign to bring back pleasant depictions of his amphibian friend, said having his creation co-opted by the alt-right was a "nightmare." After six months of trying to take his "peaceful frog-dude" back from the neo-Nazis' grip, Furie finally decided to honor-kill him in a one-page strip for independent publisher Fantagraphics' Free Comic Book Day. The strip shows Pepe's lifeless green body being mourned by his fellow Boy's Club characters. Notably, Pepe is shown in an open casket to lay rest to any rumors that he might not really be dead.

Will this actually stop trolls from using Pepe's image to spread hate? It's highly unlikely, but at least Furie was able to separate himself from the dark legacy his innocent cartoon ultimately took on.

"Having your creation appropriated without consent is never something an artist wants to suffer, but having it done in the service of such repellent hatred and thereby dragging your name into the conversation, as well makes it considerably more troubling," Fantagraphics said in a statement on behalf of Furie.

Comic Shaun Manning wrote in Comic Book Resources, "the rehabilitation of Pepe was always going to be a struggle, and it's hard to imagine Furie taking much joy in creating new Pepe strips knowing that, whatever his own intentions, the character would be read through tinted lenses."

He added, "While it's unlikely Pepe's official death will stop extremists from co-opting his image, this was, perhaps, the most effective way for Furie to reclaim his character; Pepe's soul has returned to his creator. Rest in Peace."

[h/t The Guardian]

Images via Matt Furie

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Pepe The Frog Meme Dead Killed By Creator Matt Furie

This past week, Ireceivedan expected fan notefrom the internets neo-Nazis. Now, the alt-right is very familiar with my work.

In fact, during the 2016 election campaign, an Anti-Defamation League study found that I was the second-most abused Jewish journalist on Twitter by its partisans. Yeton Friday,a clip of my appearance on a recent panel at the American Jewish Committees Global Forum was posted and praised by The Daily Stormer, one of white nationalismspremier outlets. Under the headline, Its a Good Thing Most Young Jews Arent Anywhere Near as Self-Aware as Yair Rosenberg, the video received thousands of views.

I raisethis incident not to drive traffic or attention to The Daily Stormer (which is why Imnot linking to them), but because their reaction offers a warning for those who underestimate Americas white nationalists. On the panel they lauded, I explaineda key strategic choice made by the far-right that has enabled them to be more electorally successful than the far-left.Their applause is an admission that should trouble their opponents.

Let me explain.

The AJC exchange in question took place on a panel about the alt-rightfeaturing The Atlantics McKay Coppins, theWashington Posts Jennifer Rubin, and myself. Early on, the moderator asked us to explain how the notoriously anti-Semitic group squares its support for Donald Trump with his pro-Israel posture and Jewish family members. I had actually posed this question to some of my trolls during the election, and relayedthe following response:

In other words, the far-right succeeded in 2016 because it proved far more politically pragmatic than many on the left.The alt-right is not stupid. It didnot think Trump was actually theideal avatar of its preferred policies. It knew he had connections to Jews. But the group recognized that his candidacy offered their bestchance, and so they took itwith relish. Meanwhile, many on the progressive left spent the election campaignand the months after it to this dayfeuding internally over the relative purity of their candidates. A significant number ultimately voted for Jill Stein or not at all.One might mock the alt-rights Pepe the frog memes, but they were far more electorally effective at rallying the faithful than popular progressive hashtags like #BernieorBust or #JillNotHill.

The alt-right knows that their willingness to settle for the real over the ideal gives them an advantage over the left. The Daily Stormer, in its pieceon my remarks, admitted as much: Seriously, we would have a big problem if all young Jewish journalists [read: liberals] were able to reflect like this particular Jew is able to reflect. The alt-right, in other words, is far more self-aware and pragmatic than many give them credit forand than many of their opponents are. Until this changes, they will continue to punch above their weight.

Previous: Who Are Trumps Alt-Right Supporters?

Yair Rosenberg is a senior writer at Tablet and the editor of the English-language blog of the Israeli National Archives. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook.

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Yair Rosenberg - Tablet Magazine