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By Marisa Hirschfield ‘27
Last year, for a comedy show on campus, I wrote a sketch about the fictional Society to Lessen Unamerican Teaching (note the acronym), a group that wants to rewrite history textbooks in Florida. In the skit, the characters pitch ridiculous falsehoods about American history (e.g., Hillary Clinton wrote the Communist Manifesto and also brought smallpox to the New World). My intention was to satirize classroom censorship of historical injustice and expose the absurdity of legislation like the “Don’t Say Gay” bill, which shapes curricula in a politically-pointed way.
Olivia Sanchez and Annie Rupertus
Daily Princetonian
Excerpt: In interviews with the ‘Prince,’ six students subject to University disciplinary proceedings described a tangled process that appeared fixated on searching for protest leaders to blame and employed tactics they described as invasive. The students were all investigated for supposed participation in pro-Palestine disruptions last spring.
Their accounts, corroborated by dozens of documents reviewed by the ‘Prince,’ including emails and investigation records, provide a rare glance behind the scenes of the University’s investigative apparatus.
James (Jimmy) Lane ’92
Princetonians for Free Speech Original Content
I am a HUGE fan of the “I” in DEI. I will leave the “D” and “E” for others to opine. This essay is mostly a story of how multiple-perspectives critical thinking training by a compassionate classmate at Princeton University helped a first-generation college student become included in middle class America and why a university culture of free speech and open inquiry is so vital to upward mobility.
Gideon Steinbach
February 13, 2024
The excellent discussion by Christie Davis serves as strong evidence for why universities must adopt political and ideological neutrality. The scholarly discussion resorts to inflammatory politics to either support or counter scholarly statements. For instance it provides the “DeSantis” response to DEI, rather than the scientific response, rigorously presented by groups of scientists, such as: Abbot et al, https://journalofcontroversialideas.org/article/3/1/236. Academic neutrality on political issues, protects students, faculty, and the public from indoctrination, which is the intrusion of political ideologies into scholarly discourse. As referred in the discussion, we in the Northeast are not intimidated by DeSantis, and we in the South are not intimidated by Biden. Neutrality keeps us focused on scientific rather than ideological methods for pursuing knowledge. As an aside. let’s also glimpse at the historical perspective. During the anti-Vietnam-war demonstrations, we were starved for information and listened to the speakers to find out the facts. The demonstration leaders were few and publicly accountable. Today, students have the responsibility to perform the rigorous research prior to the demonstration, and the responsibility to critically appraise what they hear. The days of blindly cheering the leader are gone.
Gideon Steinbach, MD PhD