Viewpoint Diversity at Princeton

Hope Perry ’24
Princeton Alumni Weekly

Excerpt: Princeton faculty present at a closed meeting Oct. 21 voted 166-156-7 to postpone votes on three controversial proposals related to faculty advocacy until the last scheduled faculty meeting of the academic year, on April 28, 2025, according to meeting minutes obtained by PAW.

Faculty meetings are typically held in Nassau Hall and are open to the campus press and other observers specified by the faculty’s rules. Two weeks before the meeting, the Faculty Advisory Committee on Policy (FACP), composed of six tenure track faculty members, unanimously voted to close the meeting to observers.

Hope Perry ’24
Princeton Alumni Weekly

Excerpt: Princeton students and community members engaged in heated arguments with Francesca Albanese, an Italian human rights expert, during an event hosted by the School of Public and International Affairs on Tuesday.

Albanese was appointed to her position, United Nations Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territories, in 2022. She has been criticized for attending a conference hosted by Hamas’ Council on International Relations in 2022 and was condemned by the United States, France, and Germany for a 2014 comment that resurfaced in 2022 in which she characterized the U.S. as “subjugated by the Jewish lobby,” playing into an antisemitic trope.

Ted Balaker
The Coddling of the American Mind, Substack

Excerpt: Every time I think the Ivies are completely doomed, a ray of sunshine pierces the darkness. There’s Steven Pinker at Harvard. Randy Wayne
at Cornell, and at Princeton, there’s Princetonians for Free Speech (PFS).

Each has done so much to advance free speech, open inquiry, and viewpoint diversity, and each has been instrumental in bringing The Coddling movie to campus. Pinker, as well as Harvard Undergraduates for Academic Freedom, made our first Ivy League special screening possible. Wayne, along with the Cornell chapter of Heterodox Academy, made our second Ivy League special screening possible. And, along with along with Whig Clio, we have PFS to thank for our third Ivy League special screening.

Stuart Taylor Jr. & Edward Yingling
National Review

Excerpt: Princeton University is tiptoeing toward canceling its greatest president and a founder of our nation in a process that its trustees and president Christopher Eisgruber accelerated on October 2 by announcing that they would leave the statue of John Witherspoon in its prominent place on Firestone Plaza — but probably only for now. The issue has been punted to the “Campus Art Steering Committee” to decide whether the statue should be moved, or removed.

Sena Chang
Daily Princetonian

Excerpt: On Oct. 2, the Princeton University Board of Trustees announced in a letter that John Witherspoon’s statue would remain on campus. The decision came after an extensive review process that began in November 2022 by the Council of the Princeton University Community (CPUC) Committee on Naming.

Keith E. Whittington
Reason Magazine

Excerpt: A health sports instructor at the University of Kansas is out of a job after a video clip of his in-class behavior went viral. The university's statements do not inspire confidence, even though the professor might well have been out of bounds.