The Third Red Scare

Riding in on the wave of offense-taking culture is a batallion of politically correct troops who are keen on spreading what they call truth. Not content with residing within their own faction of eccentricity, they seek to proselytize and turn once independent thinkers into just another hue on the rainbow. Which, in a sense, is rather ironic when considering their core tenets. I, for instance, would be incredibly satisfied, and politically content, if I were to possess the unquestionable truths about politics that these people do. Something about holding, in my possession, a pearl of political wisdom would make me incredibly happy. But it does not make these people happy. No. They cannot be happy until everyone else believes it, too. Not until every person who makes a lewd joke, raunchy statement or political daring maneuver is locked up and thrown away in the public-shaming jail. Is this multi-culturalism? Is this how to promote diversity? Absolutely not—in fact it is the exact negation of diversity. It elects an unspoken board who decides where the politically correct line is and when someone has crossed it. They know how you should speak and what kind of speech is worthy of public shame.

Ironically enough, these very same people, who hold a McCarthy-like grip on free-expression, are the first ones to call themselves “open-minded.” Hypocrisy of this kind should be labeled exactly what it is: an escape from logic. A train of progression derailed and left to rust. To these people, who may say, “Ah yes, but the ends justify the means. We are only seeking to make campus more friendly,” I borrow the words of Leon Trotsky: “if the ends justify means, what justifies the ends?” After all, this campus has been anything but supportive to students who hold dissenting opinions. And I am not speaking of the bargain, liberal ones that you find by the bundle here. I am talking about the people who have to wrestle through the teeth of stupefying odds to even get a word in edgewise. Without this incredible strain, non-liberals and their opinions are left like a hanging chad in Florida, uncounted. To this “not-for-oneself” behavior, I scoff and borrow the quip from Christopher Hitchens: “To the incredible question that most victims ask, ‘why me,’ the system cackles ‘Why not?’” Sadly for the system, I intend on answering the system with an adamant because it is not fair.

It is not fair to throw the Harkness table away and reschedule class in an echo-chamber. It is not fair to, at once, support the term “multiculturalism” and diversity, only to then slap big red duct tape over the mouth of dissenters. It is not fair this hasn’t been said until now. And it isn’t fair that this article will probably be left, like most concerns, in the garbage of an adorned J. Smith office.​ ♥