On some campuses, it doesn’t take long for a conversation to be destroyed by mob rule. And it can take a lot of courage to say that babies are people too. 

A recent visit by Students for Life of America (SFLA) staff to Denver, Colorado, with a student group from the University of Colorado Denver proved this point. 

SFLA field team staff Joseph Rouse, Braiden Gonzalez, and Christian Alan arrived to help students defend life at Auraria Campus’s Tivoli Quad in the heart of Denver, Colorado, as part of SFLA’s new fall tour, “Abortion Victims: Every Abortion Has a Human Cost.” They set up at their reserved space and started a normal day of activism. 

That didn’t last, however, after a group of students standing nearby angrily approached the display. Soon, there were a crowd of dozens surrounding the SFLA activists, shouting expletives and threats. One student grabbed the top portion of the tour display and ran away with it.  

Rouse pursued the student and called on a passerby to contact campus security. Several in the crowd challenged the SFLA staff to prove that the display belonged to them, with some demanding documentation establishing ownership. 

During the pursuit, another student who was not affiliated with the pro-life activists intervened and grabbed the display. The student who initially stole the sign fell to the ground as the crowd falsely accused everyone from the pursuing student to SFLA staff of assaulting the thief. 

Rouse had to escort the student who recovered SFLA’s sign to class because the student was afraid of being targeted by the angry crowd. 

People began throwing pro-abortion topic cards at the SFLA activists as Alan called police. As the SFLA team tried to leave, pro-abortion students began closing in on them, screaming obscenities. Some chants and slogans invoked “fighting,” and multiple students shouted at the activists to kill themselves. 

The hostility also became personal. Multiple students approached Rouse to tell him that he resembled Charlie Kirk and to wish him a “happy Kirkiversary,” as seen in the now viral video. 

What began as an ordinary afternoon of campus outreach had transformed into a large and hostile confrontation. The episode demonstrated why peaceful pro-life outreach on college campuses remains important: conversation about abortion can provoke strong emotions, but an absence of pro-life speech makes it worse, even violent, when opposing voices are finally heard. 

In the face of strong emotions, it is our role to defend our position through civil dialogue and continue bringing the pro-life message into places where it is needed most. 

WATCH THE VIDEO OF THE INCIDENT HERE.