Our daughter Izzy, a freshman at a large urban university, has kept us updated since the election on the rapidly developing situation at her school. For a number of reasons she chose not to participate in protests and movements which the majority of her classmates are swept up in. As such, she has been able to provide us with a more objective, real time narrative.

It is worse than you might imagine.

On election night, Izzy was working to fulfill community service hours at the campus election polling station. By 9pm she texted us that the mood had become chaotic and there were suddenly many police officers on the scene, some threatening to use pepper spray if the students didn’t disperse.

Her text read: "People are not happy. Students are getting rough so we are vacating."

Later she continued: "The police are EVERYWHERE, like 4-5 on every block. Everyone is threatening violence saying everyone supporting Trump will go down as the worst mistake in human history. People are threatening to beat up anyone who supported Trump. A common thing is “support your gay friends, women friends bc America just said we don’t matter”"

On her way to class the morning after the election, Izzy was shouted at by other students. She texted, “Damn, I’ve walked literally to one class and got called privileged 5 times.”

This (called privileged) is a disturbing trend Izzy informed us of earlier in the semester. It seems one of her classes, at the direction of her minority gay professor, frequently discussed how white Americans cannot be discriminated against since their white ancestry caused the minority oppression that exists in society today, a common theme in many universities these days. There is zero personal responsibility involved in this line of thinking and it has now set the stage to for students to target other students whenever convenient.

Wednesday, the night after the election, the riots began. Definition - Riot: a violent disturbance of the peace by a crowd.

Izzy texted that her dorm was eerily silent because no one was there. Outside, the noise from the crowd was growing. That night, like in many other US cities and on major campuses, thousands of students marched, shutting down the city streets and even spilling onto the interstate highways. Ambulances and rescue vehicles could not reach the downtown hospitals. Monuments were defaced and city and public buildings were vandalized.

It wasn’t until the following day we realized the signs being carried on the city streets of Izzy’s campus were the same as the signs carried in Portland, Oakland and New York City. The words being chanted by the crowds were exactly the same everywhere. This was a coordinated effort and it told us several things.

First, there was money behind this, which meant funded agitators. This protest was not a spontaneous outpouring of objection to the results of an election. It was a “movement”, hijacked before it ever began and designed to disrupt. Second, this would not end quickly if some entity was in the business of making this ongoing protest their business. Third, it was conceivable that events would escalate in intensity as time moved forward and people became less outraged and desensitized to the riots. It would be days before we discovered protestors were actually being bused into urban centers to organize and ramp up the rhetoric.

Five days of rioting later, we asked Izzy if her classmates showed signs of tiring. Surely after almost a week of little to no sleep, these kids would need to hit the books and get some studying done? No, not only are they still motivated for this nightly ritual, they have vowed to march every night for the next four years if need be.

The saddest part of Izzy’s story is not the swarms of college kids who have been convinced Trump is their enemy and the cause of all their problems yet to come. No, the really heartbreaking chapter came today when the homeless people disappeared from the city park.

Like many urban universities, there is a park in the middle of campus. Izzy’s dorm is on one side of the park and most of her classes are on the opposite side. When we first toured the campus last summer, we noticed quite a few homeless people there. I was a bit apprehensive for her safety, especially when considering that she would be walking to her dorm after evening classes in the dark.

When we went to visit Izzy after the semester began, we walked through that park with her. Much to my surprise, quite a number of the older black homeless residents of the park smiled when they saw Izzy and some said hello. I have little doubt that is because Izzy made eye contact with them and smiled, recognizing they were real people rather than looking through them as so many do with elderly and homeless people. It appeared they developed an appreciation for her.

I had asked Izzy where the homeless go when the weather is bad or it becomes cold. She explained the local churches open their doors and are very helpful to them. I found myself appreciating that kind, local people, even though homeless, were keeping an eye out for my kid in the big city.

So obviously I was floored this morning when Izzy texted and said they were closing the park. Since that is the place the demonstrators organize and meet each night for their pre-riot staging, the city has completely closed down the park until further notice. All the homeless people are gone. It does not appear to Izzy they were physically relocated, but simply evicted from the park. Tonight she texted to say many were huddled under awnings while it rained. She attempted to buy one homeless person food using her school meal card, but was informed it was not permitted. It is the saddest chapter of the post-election mayhem I have heard yet.

While the college campuses continue to function with some normalcy, Izzy has had to make quite a few modifications to her own behavior since the snowflake riots began. Thus far she has been most appreciative of our input.

New Rules:

1. Do not leave a building or walk down a street when the police are using teargas. Do not approach areas where protestors are spray painting or climbing on the police cars.
2. Avoid late night trips out of the dorm and try not to walk alone after dark.
3. Make sure errands and tasks such as laundry are done in daylight hours to avoid surprises.
4. Keep the emergency (bug out/get home/first aid) backpack from your car in your dorm room.
5. Have alternative plans to leave the campus for safety (if need be) without retrieving your vehicle from the parking garage.
6. Keep bottles of water and several days of food in your dorm room. (My cases of homemade canned chicken soup sent with her have been a godsend on nights when the rioters are between the dorm and the gluten free dining hall.)
7. Always carry your self-defense items (pepper spray and a knife are permitted per campus rules.)
8. Stay on high alert for changing circumstances and potential dangers. Be ready to re-assess your alternatives at any time. If there is any question of your safety, attempt to reach a more secure location.

While the snowflakes have university sponsored “Election Healing Spaces” so students can feel better before venturing out for their nightly rioting activities, Izzy tries to do homework, study for tests, and write papers while getting very little sleep. The inside of her dorm may be quiet as a tomb, but the roar of the crowd from outside is very loud.  The volume of the ruckus out on the street can be heard when she calls home from her dorm room on her cell phone. This level of noise goes on for most of the night, every night now.

The disruptive protests and destructive behavior appear to be intensifying rather than fading away. The student support system(s) of the universities affirm and often validate the actions of a distraught student population. Many professors initially cancelled classes because they were too upset about the election results to teach. Assignments and deadlines were extended. Tests have been cancelled. The R.A.s (resident assistants) on each dorm hall text their student residents to remind them there is support available and not to do anything rash.

Now that we have confirmation these events are being organized and implemented by very well paid groups, I predict events will escalate. Izzy says she is seeing more #BlackLivesMatter and other anti-establishment groups mixed in with the #NotMyPresident protestors. I give an even 50-50 odds that we see troops in the streets before all is said and done.

Whether a person is Pro-Clinton or Pro-Trump or one who advocates going about their own business without engaging in outspoken political opinions, I suspect nobody, not even the homeless, will get by unaffected. In the end, it doesn’t matter which camp you’re in because so long as people are battling each other, no one is storming the castle gates with pitchforks and torches. At this rate, I will be glad if Izzy limps through to final exams.

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