What's happening in tyranny today? Based on the news, here is a list:

Trond Harald Håland is a Norwegian man who was allegedly placed in forced psychiatric treatment for more than a week for criticizing the approved COVID narrative online.

Håland’s lawyer, Barbro Paulsen, says that this is likely the “most direct case” in which the Norwegian government detained someone over Facebook posts, while claiming that the country has a history of forcing people into psychiatric treatment for questioning the government. (Sounds like where Canada and the U.S. are headed.)

Scott Gerber, an Ohio Northern University (ONU) constitutional law professor recently told Michele Tafoya on her podcast that armed town police were present when school security guards led him away from his classroom to the dean’s office on April 14 without providing a reason, though he is convinced they did it because he challenged the school’s DEI dogma. Gerber, in his Wall Street Journal op-ed “DEI Brings Kafka to My Law School,” said his students appeared “shocked and frightened” when he was essentially taken into custody, and added, “I know I was.” He said he was “immediately barred from teaching, banished from campus, and told that if I didn’t sign a separation agreement and release of claims by April 21, ONU would commence dismissal proceedings against me. The grounds: ‘Collegiality.’ The specifics: None.” Wow.

Gerber, who was vice-chair of the university council, objected to the diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) material the university was pushing, telling fellow members they needed to remember “viewpoint diversity.”

“Viewpoint diversity?!” At a college or university? Does Gerber believe in unicorns, too?

Gerber told Tafoya that he said to the president of the university at the time that the school had “drifted over into illegality” in its hiring practices and scholarship offerings to students in its adherence to DEI principles. He further stated, “I was naive enough to think … with a tenure and a record like I have, I could push back a little bit, especially because it’s protected activity. I’m allowed, you’re allowed, and anyone is allowed to object to illegality and not be retaliated against, but they did it anyway.” Naïve, indeed. Didn’t work for Trump, either.

According to a lawsuit filed last April by Richard Bilkszto, Kike Ojo-Thompson, a Toronto-based diversity trainer, told a class of about 200 administrators that Canada is more racist than the United States. This apparently didn’t sit well with Bilkszto, a progressive and principal of Burnhamthorpe Collegiate Institute and Adult Learning Center. According to the lawsuit and audio obtained by The Free Press, Bilkszto challenged Ojo-Thompson’s assumption by citing Canada’s publicly funded education system and socialized health care. (As if that would prove his point.) That apparently didn’t sit well with Ojo-Thompson, who responded by stating: “What I’m finding interesting is that, in the middle of this Covid disaster, where the inequities in this fair and equal healthcare system have been properly shown to all of us. . . you and your whiteness think that you can tell me what’s really going on with Black people—like, is that what you’re doing, ‘cause I think that’s what you’re doing, but I’m not sure, so I’m going to leave you space to tell me what you’re doing right now.” Say what?!

Bilkszto killed himself on July 11.

Charlie Kirk, a conservative activist, was drowned out by protesters chanting “F**k you, fascist!” during a recent appearance at Northern Arizona University. Kirk was at the school for a debate entitled “Prove Me Wrong: The Government is Lying to You.” Instead, a mob of rowdy protesters greeted Kirk, many carrying signs with clever bon mots such as “Facists [sic] fuck off!” “Charlie Kirk has a small face,” “Trans rights = human rights,” and “Charlie K. is a piss baby.”

So much for debate. I mean, when you can’t even spell “fascist” correctly, you probably aren’t going to do well in a regulated discussion of a proposition between two matched sides. (Mediaite noted that Kirk set up a booth to debate students only to be “drowned out by screaming students, bullhorns, and even a brass band.”) The protesters may as well have stuck their index fingers in their ears and chanted “Farmer in the dell, farmer in the dell…” It would have been less vulgar…and no more childish and pathetic.

To his credit, Kirk, unlike Bilkszto, didn’t kill himself. He simply laughed off the ridiculous and repulsive verbal assaults.

Image: Tylzael, via Wikimedia Commons // public domain