Today it is reported that Max Price, VC of UCT was assaulted after meeting with some students. A couple of days back students set fire to a building at CPUT with guards locked inside.
There are repeated references to the current student protests as being revolutionary or militant and that earlier generations ought to learn from what they are doing, because they are a new generation, making their own decisions and their own history.
I do believe that the new generation has to find their own paths in the problems they confront, while older generations should not expect their own experience to guide the youth of today. But humility should not preclude us from naming what they are doing as criminality where it entails wanton destruction of buildings and resources that are needed by the poor, assaults or attempted murder of individuals, whether they are VCs, guards or anyone else. There is nothing militant or revolutionary about that. These are criminal acts and it is time that the more mature students and staff who support them should name things for what they are.