admin
Dave Portnoy was filming one of his trademark “One Bite” pizza reviews in Starkville, Mississippi on November 7 when a man in the crowd hurled an antisemitic slur at him and allegedly threw coins, a confrontation that was captured on video and quickly went viral. Starkville police identified the suspect as 20-year-old Mississippi State student Patrick McClintock and issued a warrant over the weekend before charging him with disturbing the peace; he was processed and later released on bond and reportedly withdrew from the university.
Portnoy posted footage of the incident and has said this kind of harassment has become a daily reality for him, prompting him to beef up security and call out the growing brazen antisemitism in public life. Local authorities emphasized that while offensive speech alone can be protected, actions that disrupt public order or risk violence can and should be addressed, and they said the incident is being investigated as potentially bias-motivated.
This ugly episode is not an isolated street-level outburst but part of a broader moral collapse on campuses and in the public square where radicalism, cheap hate, and performative outrage get normalized while accountability dwindles. Earlier this year Barstool itself was rocked by an antisemitic incident at its Philadelphia bar, a mess that should have led institutions and local leaders to take cultural rot seriously instead of shrugging.
Let’s be blunt: when universities produce students who think it’s acceptable to parade hate into town, something in the classroom and in leadership has failed. Schools should be sanctuaries of learning and character, not factories for attention-seeking bigotry; administrators must stop reflexively protecting reputation over discipline and start enforcing standards that reflect basic decency.
Law enforcement did the right thing by treating the conduct as a public-order offense and pursuing charges, because tolerating violent-tinged harassment in the name of free speech is a dangerous half-measure that rewards bullies. If our communities want to remain safe and civil, officials must use the tools on the books — including bias-motivation enhancements when appropriate — to make clear there are consequences for weaponizing hatred.
Americans who work hard, pay taxes, and raise families don’t have time for the spectacle of mob impulses and campus-enabled cruelty; we applaud Portnoy for standing his ground and refusing to let a cowardly heckler bully him off-camera. This should be a wake-up call: defend free expression, yes, but also defend civility and the rule of law — and hold accountable anyone who thinks it’s their right to assault a fellow citizen with hate.
