If those who rioted at Berkley were extreme leftist or anarchist are they on par with the Alt Right?

No. The Berkeley students were protesting an invitation by the school to a member of the extreme right wing. Such an invitation can be viewed as a way of honoring someone, and the students did not feel such an honoring by their school was appropriate. That is a far cry from the white supremacist agenda of the far right. Protesting extremism does not make you an extremist. There is no basis for comparison.

IAnd, there is some question as to whether they were actual Berkley students.

It is much more likely they were plants, provocateurs of the Neo-Nazi movement intent upon fomenting violence and property damage in order to justify further police crackdowns on protests in the future.

Former Sec of Labor Robert Reich was actually there and states in an interview with CNN “I saw these people. They all looked very– almost paramilitary. They were not from the campus. I don’t want to say factually, but I’ve heard there was some relationship here between these people and the right-wing movement that is affiliated with Breitbart News.”

This is much more likely than violent left wing student protesters and should be investigated more thoroughly.

You shouldn’t lump all people all in one category. There were some extremists from both groups involved, obviously.

The right-wing Black Bloc team was involved. The true protestors were warned in advance not to let the Black Bloc provoke them. I suspect by the end it was a mix of Black Bloc (nasty (&(&(*^&‘s) and amateur protestors behaving badly.

Steve Bannon, a self-described leader of the alt-right is in the White House writing policy.

There is no comparison.

@LostInParadise That is a far cry from the white supremacist agenda of the far right.
I have no interest in knowing the agenda of either group what I am viewing, at least from the rhetoric I see, is that Alt Right = conservatives but, Alt Left = mere anarchists with no liberal leanings. Which makes me wonder if the though the Alt Right share conservative values they are not conservatives but right leaning anarchist as the left leaning ones were at Berkeley.

@rojo “I saw these people. They all looked very– almost paramilitary. They were not from the campus. I don’t want to say factually, but I’ve heard there was some relationship here between these people and the right-wing movement that is affiliated with Breitbart News.”
Which tells me Robert Reich, or any others, have a smoking gun or bloody knife. When native Americans occupied a place, I want to think Alcatraz, but it might have been someplace else, they looked like gangsters or such by their bandanas, so appearances are not all there is. To assume they were plants or operatives of Yiannopoulos or some affiliate movement would be like the Devil trying to drive out demons, furthermore that the law was in cahoots with them as they stood by and allowed much of the damage to take place. If these protestors were part of supporters of Yiannopoulos would it not serve their purpose if they got busted had the cops gone in and handled things in usual fashion, would that not have exposed them for who they are?

Alt Left = mere anarchists with no liberal leanings.
What is the basis for your statement? The protest was about the white supremacist chosen to speak at the college. It got out of hand, but the evidence indicates that the trouble was caused by a small percentage of non-students. The alt right are definitely not anarchists. Neo-Nazi white supremacists would be more accurate description.

First of all it is “Berkeley” not “Berkley”. Second of all it wasn’t the students who were rioting but people who came from Oakland who make a career out of disruption and chaos.

Wow—eleven answers thus far, and no one has gotten it right.

In case no one has noticed, anti-Trump and anti-conservative and anti-Israel riots have been going on since inauguration day. Why would any of these three groups riot at their own cause?

I know that many have been brainwashed, but for cripes sake, think CRITICALLY for once. Why would alt-right protesters and paramilitants riot to censor what you say is one of their own?

Didn’t many of you say TRUMP supporters would do this if TRUMP lost the election?

Please be so kind as to enlighten us as to what is really happening.

Ummm… a pro-Israel speaker has to show up in riot gear to give a speech or be killed by his own audience.

anti-Israel riots have been going on since inauguration day

That isn’t true.

Also, don’t say “pro-Israel” when you mean pro-settlements and pro-Likud/Home/far-right. Lots of Israelis don’t support either.

Lets shift this around a bit to clarify the issue. I don’t mean to sound patronizing, but it seems that a lot of people really are brainwashed here.

Let’s say its September of 2016, and that Hillary Clinton is giving a speech at Vanderbilt.

Suddenly, rioters show up and, in the name of tolerance, desecrate the campus with fire bombs and broken glass. Hillary is escorted away by the secret service.

Who were the terrorists? People protesting Hillary or people there to support her?

Yeah, Rojo—I know. Those anti-police demos where cops are shot and killed last summer were really the police trying to create a national mindset of support for the police.

@Yellowdog Sometimes we are wise to take our own advice, particularly when it comes to thinking critically. _“Why would alt-right protesters and paramilitants riot to censor what you say is one of their own?”. Think! Dog, think! They would not protest their own cause or to censor but they would certainly cause riot and destruction in order to make those who are protesting look like extremists and to help justify whatever actions taken by the police or to give cause for any future “laws” are put into place to keep those protesters from exercising their rights.

Look up provocateur.

Never mind, I did it for you: “a person who provokes trouble, causes dissension, or the like; agitator. ”

And a little further information for your education From Merriam Webster: In “provocateur,” a word borrowed directly from French, one sees the English verb “provoke.” Both “provoke” and “provocateur” derive from Latin provocare, meaning “to call forth.” Why do we say “provocateur” for one who incites another to action, instead of simply “provoker”? Perhaps it’s because of “agent provocateur,” a term of French origin that literally means “provoking agent.” Both “agent provocateur” and the shortened “provocateur” can refer to someone (such as an undercover police officer or a political operative) whose job is to incite people to break the law so that they can be arrested, but only “provocateur” is used in English with the more general sense of “one who provokes.” Bold mine.

@rojo , Very nice explanation. I have heard stories of undercover Israeli police joining a peaceful Palestinian protest and act as agents provocateurs by throwing rocks at the Israeli army. I don’t know how accurate the stories are, but they seem plausible.

I guess people will believe just about anything.

@Yellowdog Those anti-police demos where cops are shot and killed last summer

One need not be a provocateur to railroad an event for one’s own agenda.

Going off that, one can say those radical fembots feminist in that whatever march were really plants of the conservative right to make women look so paranoid and unstable that when anything came up to oppose them, it would seem like the better option, and as a need to mitigate them.

@Hypocrisy_Central I was referring to the instance where a gunman with a personal agenda used an otherwise peaceful protest to further said agenda.

@Yellowdog and some people will not consider anything that does not fit into the world view that has been drilled into them by refusing to view anything but Fox but where does that get us? Basically nowhere.
@Hypocrisy_Central Are you referring to the protest march the day after Trump was elected? The one that had more than twice as many attendees? The one that had no violent acts associated with it? Pull your head out.

radical feminist

Eyeroll.

“Radical” meaning anyone who doesn’t cheer for “grab her by the pussy!!”

@rojo Are you referring to the protest march the day after Trump was elected?
Yes, but if the ideology that is trying to be floated here, those radical feminist are not in opposition of Trump to that extreme but plants to make the radical feminist look so silly as to turn support off of them. I know to those who do not want to think that those students at Berkeley, who surely were not involved as they were standing there with open arms for Milo Yiannopoulos to exercise his free speech rights as the student say they are about when they want to spout off something, could ever be part of a violent protest, just like Madonna would never advocate blowing up the White House.

A couple of things @Hypocrisy_Central then I am going to call it a night.

1. It is not an ideology. There were not violent acts that prompted a response from the police so I think we can assume that, since there was no violence, there was no one agitating for violence or that those who were there to protest were wise to their tricks and did not bite.
2. You cannot say that because the right wing planted agitators and agent provocateurs to disrupt one rally against a right wing speaker then that precludes the fact that there can be people opposed to Trump and his policies. And, no one, never, said that there were not students protesting Yiannopoulos and his hate speech; that is just you reading what you want to believe into what was actually written, And no one denied they that they may not have been caught up in the heat of the moment. What was said was that the instigators were sent their to foment violence and damage in the first place and had they not been there to do that in all likelihood it would have been a peaceful demonstration like the previous one WTF! Seriously, use some common sense.