Donald Trump was not always the ultra-conservative loudmouth that everyone perceives him to be today. He is a true New Yorker, and, according to The Washington Post, he is also a former generous financial benefactor of the Democratic Party. In the past, he has endorsed the campaigns of both President Barack Obama and Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton.

I’ve always believed that Trump is simply seeking attention with his presidential campaign, which is governed by a “belief system” that is actually just a series of hate crimes waiting to happen. He is a brilliant businessman who is using the same admittedly brilliant strategies to successfully run a sensationalist campaign; he feeds on the subconscious racist, sexist, xenophobic, and homophobic fears of seemingly normal, logical people, and encourages this fear to elicit their support. Rather than rationally dismissing fear, he strategically uses it as a tactic to manipulate people into a frenzy of racial paranoia.

Similar to Trump, Milo Yiannopoulos is not providing the world with any constructive debate or what he would call “progressive progress”; rather, he is spreading hateful ideologies. As proven by his Twitter page, Yiannopoulos is entirely unprofessional in the same manner as Trump, with reprehensible comments like “feminism is cancer” and “I think I should do a talk on cultural appropriation in full Native American costume. #DangerousFaggot.”

Yiannopoulos knows how controversial he is, and even uses his sexual orientation as a justification of his statements by claiming that leftists don’t know how to respond to him because they can’t deem him a homophobe. On Feb. 25 during his visit to the University, he claimed that “if [he] were straight, [he] wouldn’t have been able to say half these things on stage.”

It couldn’t be more obvious that Yiannopoulos is a politically-right wannabe who is manipulating his sexual orientation as a popularity point in gaining attention on the political spectrum. Formally, he defends free speech as an innate right, boldly stating that he should be able to “enjoy” offensive jokes at the expense of the dignity and humility of the oppressed groups that have been subjected to these derogatory slurs.

But what is the use of free speech if the concept is abused to the point where insulting one another on the basis of race, sex, and sexual orientation is promoted? Yiannopoulos claims that there is utterly no danger in hearing another person’s opinion and it is ridiculous to think otherwise. Like Trump, he simply doesn’t realize (or refuses to recognize) the true repercussions of his actions.

For example, Yiannopoulos claims that the rape epidemic on college campuses simply doesn’t exist, and said that “every single rape report [he has] ever heard has been false. Every one.” Disregarding the fact that this comment is, in nature, factually absurd, Yiannopoulos’ marginalization of the rape crisis is sending women in the opposite direction of progression in terms of tackling the issue of sexual assault, which is grossly under-prosecuted and trivialized. If spreading ideas that rape simply doesn’t happen isn’t dangerous to women, I don’t know what is. Just like Trump, Yiannopoulos is using the oppression of minorities to incite hate and fear, and it’s becoming more dangerous than ever.