College campuses have been oppressive, left-wing bullying machines since the 1960s
Christopher Tremoglie
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After congressional hearings last week about antisemitism on college campuses, CNN’s Fareed Zakaria provided commentary on the topic that was simultaneously expected and shocking. Like most commentators, Zakaria slammed the universities and the presidents who testified before Congress. He then said the nation’s colleges and universities, especially the so-called academic elite universities, were “no longer seen as bastions of excellence but as partisan outfits.”
However, this is nothing new. Conservatives have been stating this for years. The truly shocking part is that it took Zakaria and others on the Left until 2023 to admit this publicly.
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“To understand their performance, we have to understand the broad shift that has taken place at elite universities, which has gone from being centers of excellence to institutions pushing political agendas,” Zakaria said.
Broad shift? It’s been a steady left-wing pivot for decades. Has Zakaria not set foot on a college campus since the 1960s? Has he closed his eyes every time there was a story about left-wing totalitarianism happening at universities? Or was he just willfully ignorant because he did not want to believe the truth, as it did not align with his ideologically based narrative?
Consider the origins of the Left’s “long march” with the vast number of agitators, hippies, and anti-war movements that started in the 1960s. Universities mobilized college students to do their dirty work and stage protests to promote radical left-wing ideals, values, and beliefs. One of the first such demonstrations occurred on Sept. 14, 1964, on the University of California, Berkeley, campus and was part of the deceptively named “Free Speech Movement.”
The works of academic socialist C. Wright Mills influenced the organizers of this event. Other inspirations included Karl Marx and Antonio Gramsci. These acolytes were socialists and communists who considered the United States evil, racist, and imperialist, basically the original versions of the Left’s systemic racism and white supremacy. They adamantly opposed the U.S. government.
College campuses were also the welcomed homes of groups such as the Students for a Democratic Society, organizations that were as democratic as the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Under the guise of promoting a “free and democratic society” and “participatory democracy,” they were agitators who bullied, intimidated, and harassed anyone disagreeing with them and used aggressive and sometimes illegal tactics to advance their radical left-wing agendas, such as “Black Power” and anti-war movements. By 1969, the SDS reportedly had over 300 chapters and an estimated 100,000 student supporters.
Furthermore, movements such as these were frequently funded by contemporary international communist governments, such as Cuba, China, North Korea, and the Soviet Union. It is a convenient truth the Left regularly ignores and that academia and the communication elite sweep under the rug.
Another event happened in 1993 at the University of Pennsylvania with the “water buffalo incident.” Then, Eden Jacobowitz, an Israeli-born student attending the school, shouted, “Shut up, you water buffalo! If you’re looking for a party, there’s a zoo a mile from here,” out his window to a loud and disruptive crowd of sorority girls who were primarily black.
The university accused Jacobowitz of violating the university’s racial harassment policy and made his life a living hell. He was eventually exonerated and settled a lawsuit with the school a few years after this happened.
Other examples of left-wing cultural dominance include many schools, including the University of Pennsylvania, essentially holding a period of mourning and open weeping after Donald Trump’s victory in the 2016 presidential election in which classes and tests were canceled and students were permitted to turn in assignments past deadlines because of the “trauma” associated with Trump’s victory. A reciprocal “mourning period” with similar accommodations did not happen when President Joe Biden won in 2020.
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Other examples of the Left’s “long march” to campus totalitarianism include the chaos, bullying, and intimidation by left-wing students when Republican pundits are scheduled to speak at universities. Students nearly rioted because of planned appearances at colleges by Ben Shapiro and Ann Coulter. Cornell University even caved to left-wing demands and canceled Coulter’s appearance in November 2022.
For Zakaria, or anyone on the Left, to express shock or outrage as if this is a recent development is intellectually disingenuous. It has been happening for years, but they all turned a blind eye because these antics were ideologically aligned with their values. They knew what was happening but chose to support the ideological corruption of universities. The shock and disbelief they are feigning now is not legitimate or credible.