KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The Folly Theater has decided to cancel an appearance from Milo Yiannopoulos, a controversial writer, over concerns about the "safety and security of employees and patrons."
Yiannopoulos, a former editor for Brietbart, was booked to speak at the Folly on Nov. 5 as part of his "Troll Academy Tour."
The event was announced Friday afternoon and then canceled Friday evening.
Yiannopoulos is used to this kind of controversy. An announcement that he would be speaking at the University of California at Berkley sparked violent protests last month and eventually the event was canceled.
Read the Folly Theater's full statement below:
The Folly Theater has cancelled the November 5 show. We were concerned about the safety and security of our employees and patrons.
Over the years, we have rented our theater to a wide variety of organizations, hosting everything from church services to drag queen shows. In this case, and the vast majority of these instances, we don’t handle ticket sales, event production or promotion, we simply rent The Folly Theater as a venue. The views represented by artists aren’t necessarily reflective of the views of our staff, volunteers, board or donors.
Unfortunately, when we booked this appearance we were unfamiliar with the personality involved. We did not conduct the appropriate due diligence and for that we are sorry. We remain committed to bringing in diversity, but the safety and security of our staff, patrons and volunteers is always our highest priority.
