University of Tennessee law professor Glenn Reynolds had some harsh words for the protestors who blocked a North Carolina highway on Wednesday night: “Run them down.”
After the police shooting of Keith Lamont Scott in Charlotte, protestors took to the streets, blocking traffic and starting fires. In the chaos, one civilian was shot and a police officer was injured, according to reports.
Reynolds, who is also a USA Today columnist and the man behind the popular Twitter account and news aggregation site “Instapundit,” was briefly suspended from Twitter for his three-word response, and the uproar that ensued on social media.
Many took this as another example of Twitter “censoring” conservative speech, after the site permanently suspended conservative writer Milo Yiannopoulos in July.
Reynolds defended the controversial tweet on his blog:
“Sorry, blocking the interstate is dangerous, and trapping people in their cars and surrounding them is a threat,” he said. “Driving on is self-preservation, especially when we’ve had mobs destroying property and injuring and killing people. But if Twitter doesn’t like me, I’m happy to stop providing them with free content.”
Twitter has since reinstated his account.
Twitter has unblocked my account on condition of deleting the offending tweet. I’ve done so, but it’s here:: https://t.co/DDkZd2el6Y
— Instapundit.com (@instapundit) September 22, 2016
The UT law school released a statement that said the university’s leadership supports “peaceful civil disobedience and all forms of free speech, but we do not support violence or language that encourages violence.”
In his blog post, Reynolds said he would have supported peaceful protests, but that he would not support violent riots.
“I’ve always been a supporter of free speech and peaceful protest,” he said. “I fully support people protesting police actions, and I’ve been writing in support of greater accountability for police for years. But riots aren’t peaceful protest. And blocking interstates and trapping people in their cars is not peaceful protest — it’s threatening and dangerous, especially against the background of people rioting, cops being injured, civilian-on-civilian shootings, and so on.”
Nick Gillespie at Reason.com called Reynolds “one of the most-interesting and thoughtful voices on the broadly defined right.”
“Whatever you think of the tastefulness of his suggestion regarding the protesters in Charlotte, the idea that he is seriously inciting any sort of actual or real threat is risible,” he said.
