The whole point of college used to be expanding the mind. Academia gave you the opportunity to think about things in brand new ways. And yet today, walk onto many of America’s most prestigious university campuses, and you’ll find a culture that is the complete antitheses of open-minded intellectual inquiry.
Identity politics and political correctness have taken over. Leftist mobs are enforcing a strict code that defines acceptable speech and thought, and rules anything else out of bounds. “Trigger warnings” and “safe spaces” shield students from any concepts the might upset this delicate construct. Dissenters from the new orthodoxy are ostracized, vilified, threatened, and even physically attacked. Opposing viewpoints are shut down; visiting speakers are shut out. Faculty and administrators, whose job it is to help enlighten younger minds, act as hapless enablers, giving free rein to student activists whose passion outreaches their emotional maturity.
The values that supposedly define academia—the pursuit of knowledge and the open exchange of ideas—have become sad casualties. Free thought is not allowed if it broaches concepts deemed “problematic.” When you enroll at a college or university today, you can expect four years of being told what to think—and precious few opportunities for critical thinking.
No Safe Spaces, edited by Dennis Prager and Mark Joseph, pg.6-7
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