Image can be found at: https://www.wsj.com/articles/oberlin-pays-for-smearing-the-town-grocer-11560294176

For centuries, the university has been a place of learning, extensive debate, and an incubator for new ideas that will one day permeate the public sphere. “All schools, all colleges, have two great functions: to confer, and to conceal valuable knowledge,” said Mark Twain. Conservatives have, especially in recent years, focused heavily on the absurd and outlandish behavior in the universities. What attracts such scrutiny is the tyrannical, anti-free speech nature of many of the universities in defending the indefensible.

In 2015, lecturer Erika Christakis decided to compose an email, responding to students complaining about heavy-handed advice on Halloween costumes to avoid, to the Yale community inviting them “to think about the controversy through an intellectual lens that few if any had considered.” Erika and her husband, Professor Nicholas Christakis, were immediately met with hundreds of Yale students attacking them, “some with hateful insults, shouted epithets, and a campaign of public shaming. In doing so, they have shown an illiberal streak that flows from flaws in their well-intentioned ideology.” The result of this incident? Erika Christakis gave up teaching at Yale despite her expertise in early childhood education, where she has “been critical of ways that adults deprive children of learning experiences by over-policing their behavior.”

In response to the Yale incident and similar occurrences, Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt wrote “The Coddling of the American Mind.” The central premise is that over-policing the behaviors of children and infants can have real-world implications, such as the use of “safe spaces” and “trigger warnings.” Additionally, the authors argue that many college students engage in ‘catastrophizing,’ or turning common situations into “nightmarish trials or claiming that easily bearable events are too awful to bear.”

Professor Bret Weinstein became the next target. The self-described “deeply progressive” professor of Biology at Evergreen State College allegedly committed the outrageous crime of challenging “a day of racial segregation.” The “Day of Absence” is an Evergreen tradition, where “students and faculty of color organized a day on which they met off campus.” In that year, the students decided instead that “white students, staff and faculty will be invited to leave campus for the day’s activities.” Professor Weinstein’s response to the school: There is a difference between a group voluntarily leaving a shared space and a group encouraging another group to leave the shared space. In retaliation, these “intuitive prosecutors” protested, intimidated the professor, and even sought out his firing from the university. Additionally, Evergreen State College’s president ordered the college police to stand down.

“The Weinstein saga is just the latest installment in a series of similar instances of illiberalism on American campuses,” writes Bari Weiss at The New York Times. These events ring similar to events at Oberlin College. The incident occurred some years ago when “three African American students attempted a petty crime at Gibson’sthat resulted in a physical altercation.” In fear of protests by the radical students at Oberlin, university administrators cut business ties with Gibson’s Bakery. At trial, Gibson’s attorney questioned the chief of staff for the school administration as to the university’s concerns. The chief of staff affirmed that the university was more worried about preventing angry students from lashing out than protecting the due process rights of the accused, Gibson’s Bakery. Unfortunately for Oberlin College, a judge recently announced a verdict of $25 million to be paid to Gibson’s Bakery.

As F. Scott Fitzgerald said, “the test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.”

These are only a few examples of a much larger issue in the higher education system. Aside from the illiberal nature of silencing dissenting opinion, universities face the dilemma between appeasing students and faculty or appeasing donors and future students. Most students seek to challenge themselves in order to work toward a professional job, while the vocal minority abuses their outsized voice in order to silence dissent. As F. Scott Fitzgerald said, “the test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.” The public at-large would benefit greatly if the vocal minority sought out to understand their fellow students.

Reflection on Higher Education

Unfortunately, as college administrators continue to kowtow to the rules of the mob, there appears to be no end in sight. Surely these events are rare; however, the large-scale consequences of accepting such authoritarian measures to combat uncomfortable ideas are terrifying. Conservatives and libertarians should look to place the blame on campus administrators for allowing such tyrannical instances to run roughshod on our cherished educational institutions. Conservatives should also take time to reflect on their inability to successfully infiltrate higher education before such instances could become the norm rather than the exception.

American higher education, fortunately, has numerous options to choose from. Either these institutions can adopt inclusive, pro-free speech policies or these institutions can continue their transformation toward full-blown niche progressive activist boot camps.

American higher education, fortunately, has numerous options to choose from. Either these institutions can adopt inclusive, pro-free speech policies or these institutions can continue their transformation toward full-blown niche progressive activist boot camps. The market will ultimately play a deciding factor in swaying the tide of history as online education continues to grow. Time will tell, but history will likely look unkindly on the moral ineptitude of campus administrators in the face of illiberal progressivism.

Mitchell Nemeth holds a Master in the Study of Law from the University Of Georgia School Of Law. Mitchell founded the Young Americans for Liberty chapter at the University of Georgia, and he served as the Co-President of Students Supporting Israel at the University of Georgia. His work has been featured at the Foundation for Economic Education, Merion West, and the University of Georgia’s The Arch Conservative.