Speaking to a crowd of a few hundred at Cleveland’s Settler’s Landing Park, just down the road from the Quicken Loans arena, a surprisingly statesmanlike Milo Yiannopoulos exhorted conservatives to find common ground with the gay community in facing down a common enemy: “totalitarian leftism”.
And also Lena Dunham. But mostly totalitarian leftism. They’re sort of the same thing when you think about it.
Milo gave the low-key speech to a group of Trump supporters gathered on the lawn, looking for community in an otherwise confrontational Republican National Convention. His speech was more measured than is typical when Milo is addressing fanatical collegiate social justice warriors, hellbent on silencing any opinion they disagree with, but Milo was also focused on more serious matters.
Part of Milo’s trip to the RNC will center around the theme of aggressively confronting the threat of radical Islam – though still in his trademark style. He called on the crowd to form a “gay-conservative alliance” to oppose the radical Islam’s spread.
“Die on your feet or live on your knees….Well, I do live on my knees. That’s all right,” he told the cheering crowd. “As long as I’m not facing Mecca, I’m all right with you guys.”
He also touched on more familiar territory. Speaking on his experience with campus social justice warriors, he told the crowd that he simply couldn’t believe that “ordinary ideas, regular opinions that everybody here holds, reasonable mainstream views, concerns and anxieties were being branded ‘racist’ and ‘sexist’ and ‘homophobic’ and ‘transphobic.'”
Protesters clearly expected to interrupt Milo’s speech, but only a handful of protesters managed to make their way out of downtown and to the stage set up on the edge of Lake Erie.
They were a vocal bunch, though. Once police amassed to protect and separate the pro-Trump and anti-Trump factions, several anti-Trump protesters, hiding behind the armored cops for protection, began shouting “Fuck the police.” The pro-Trump crowd responded by asking the anti-Trump protesters to vacate their “safe space.”
The anti-Trump protesters, oddly, refused.
As protesters realized they were out-manned and out-maneuvered, they turned to using sign language (mostly middle fingers) to stave off attempts to reason.
For the most part, though, the interaction was short and uneventful. Police were quick to address the situation, quickly called for backup, and just a few minutes later, most of the frustrated protesters had adjourned back to friendlier territory in the center of downtown.
Milo will give at least one more speech at the RNC, at a party on Tuesday night.