‘Rantings of a Demagogue’: Parents angry at Princeton president’s commencement speech

Written by Abigail Anthony via The College Fix,

A large contingent of parents of graduating seniors who attended Princeton University President Christopher Eisgruber’s recent commencement address described it as hypocrite and a “woke sermon” in interviews with The College Fix.

They scoffed at his claim that the Ivy League institution is a bastion of free speech and bristled at his embrace of all kinds of diversity except intellectual diversity.

“President Eisgruber’s commencement speech was a disgrace,” said a mother of a graduating senior The College Fix in an email.

“The primary assault on free speech is taking place on every campus in this country, including Princeton.”

“It’s about blocking and calling out professors and guest speakers who dare to stray from liberal orthodoxy,” he said.

“…He chose to use his 2023 commencement speech to spout the rants of a demagogue.”

Eisgruber told the audience that “we must stand up and speak together for the values ​​of free expression and full inclusion for people of all identities.”

“There are people who claim, for example, that when colleges and universities espouse the value of diversity and inclusion or teach about racism and sexism, they are ‘indoctrinating students’ or otherwise putting danger to freedom of expression,” he said.

Eisgruber also criticized the Florida legislation without specifying which bills, suggesting Florida students are now living in fear. He denounced other laws recently passed across the country that have curbed illiberalism.

“Some of these bills prohibit discussion of sexual orientation or gender identity. Some prohibit teaching disfavored views about race, racism, and American history. Others seek to undermine the institutional autonomy of colleges. law schools and universities or abolish tenure, thereby allowing politicians to control what professors can teach or publish,” he said.

More than 10 parents who attended the graduation ceremony expressed their disappointment and anger at Eisgruber’s speech in interviews with The College Fix. Most asked to remain anonymous.

“I was surprised by the audacity of [Eisgruber’s speech] and the falsity of it, even dishonesty. As far as I can tell, no one else in the country has done more than him to undermine the protections that tenure gives to independent thought and independent academic activity.” Christopher Nadon, the father of a Princeton graduate student, said The Fixed

Nadon, a professor at Claremont McKenna College, added this Former Princeton professor Joshua Katz was “obviously fired for his political speech.”

Katz, a longtime classics professor, was dismissed last year after publishing an op-ed criticizing professors’ proposals for anti-racism initiatives at the University and criticizing a group of far-left black activists.

Katz had previously faced a fourteen-month investigation into a consensual relationship that occurred more than fifteen years ago with a then-undergraduate student, for which he had already been suspended without pay for one year. Princeton opened a second investigation after Katz published the article.

“It was so hypocritical to say, ‘Oh, tenure is being threatened and books are being censored,’ when voices are being censored and opinions are being censored and they’re fleeing campus,” Nadon said.

Various parents interviewed by The Fixed he also compared Eisgruber’s speech to a religious speech.

“Eisgruber’s wake-up sermon was inappropriate for a college commencement and a captive audience forced to sit through it,” said a father of two Princeton alumni, one of whom graduated in the Class of 2023.

“As a parent, I felt a great cognitive dissonance. On the one hand, Princeton University has been very welcoming and generous to my son.”

“On the other hand, Eisgruber was indirectly condemning the governor [Ron] DeSantis’ Florida law that aims to protect her children from physical and chemical mutilation before they reach the age of 18 and can make a more informed and rational decision. added.

Another parent of a graduating senior said The Fixed that Eisgruber’s speech attributed personal political views to the institution and therefore taught students “what” to think and not “how to think.”

“Eisgruber gave a very biased, sermon-like and condescending commencement speech that was disrespectful to at least half of the audience, both the student population and the parent population,” one parent said via email . “I wouldn’t be surprised if there are consequences on the donor front.”

Robert Gagnon, the father of a graduating senior and professor at Houston Christian University, wrote directly to President Eisgruber to express his disapproval.

“As president, without a doubt, you believed you were exercising your free speech rights.” He wrote

“However, in doing so, you trampled on the rights of others to free speech by using your position to make those under your authority feel that what would happen to racists would happen to them if they expressed a dissenting view on ‘LGBTQ’ orthodoxy”.

Gagnon shared his letter to Eisgruber with The Fixed

“You have a greater obligation at Princeton than anyone else, precisely because you hold the highest office, to assure people who disagree with you that they are respected and valued, not the moral equivalent of racists Gagnon continued. “You expressed no concern that studies have shown that conservative college students already feel like outcasts and are afraid to voice their viewpoints in the classroom for fear of administrative retaliation, even at Princeton.”

A father of a humanities graduate also criticized Eisgruber for advocating an “orthodoxy.”

“Eisgruber’s opening remarks were not only discouraging. He launched a one-sided angry polemic from his bully pulpit leaving no doubt about the preferred orthodoxy at Princeton.” wrote the father.

“He begged [the question of] who was he hiding too and why? It certainly didn’t seem like it [to be] a message intended for students”.

A recent poll of Princeton students found that most self-described “conservatives” and nearly half of “moderate” seniors are either “very uncomfortable” or “somewhat uncomfortable” sharing their views on campus. By contrast, the survey found that less than five percent of students who identified as “very liberal” said they were “very uncomfortable” or “uncomfortable” sharing political views.

Another recent one poll of Princeton students found that 76 percent believe it is acceptable to yell at a loudspeaker.

“President Eisgruber’s speech made good points about equality and free speech, but it was hypocritical.” said a mother whose graduate daughter was the second child to attend Princeton for an undergraduate degree.

“While speaking out against censorship in virtuous tones, Mr. Eisgruber’s administration fosters a campus environment where minority viewpoints (conservative, traditional, religious, etc.) are canceled and those who express those views are bullied,” he said.

“Senior survey results indicate Princeton students feel under gag order. Practice what you preach.”

Another father, who is a teacher in a Christian school, wrote to him The College Fix this “President Eisgruber showed a stunning lack of understanding of his audience by assuming that all students and parents would be on board with such left-wing speech or simply didn’t care to offend his audience.”

“I think the latter is probably the case. He himself is surrounded by a liberal bubble in which everyone is convinced that they have a moral high ground and that anyone who does not support their policies is a fanatical danger to society.” , the father continued.

In addition to parents who attended the ceremonies, undergraduates also criticized Eisgruber’s speech.

“Any reasonable person watching Eisgruber’s sermon would conclude that its content has no place in the president’s commencement address,” wrote Princeton senior Matthew Wilson, a College Fix alumnus. Daily Princetonian. “It was a serious mistake for Eisgruber to offer these ideological and divisive remarks at the outset, supposedly under the moralizing banner of inclusion, but in reality with the express purpose of excluding, marginalizing, and suppressing the voices of those who dispute their particular account of Social Justice.”

Junior Danielle Shapiro he wrote in The Princeton Tory, the conservative undergraduate publication, which “Eisgruber’s exit message was misguided by its substantial focus on political activism and its departure from the central purpose of Princeton and universities like it: the pursuit of truth and the production and dissemination of knowledge.”

Another aspect of the president’s hypocrisy, according to Nadon, played out beyond his keynote address.

Nadon also attended the Princeton ROTC commissioning ceremony, where Eisgruber delivered Observations that contrasted what he had said just hours earlier throughout the promotion and further revealed the president’s hypocrisy, he said.

“As a student of our nation’s Constitution, I am inspired by one singular fact about this ceremony every time I participate: Each of you will make a solemn pledge to defend the Constitution of the United States, not our land, not our land our wealth, not even our people, but our Constitution,” Eisgruber told the newly commissioned officers.

“Shows Eisgruber’s political quiver: he’ll basically say whatever the particular audience requires,” said Nadon The Fixed “For the president of an institution that has a thirty billion dollar endowment to complain about people trying to curb some of the craziness on campus, through a process of democratic representation, is just one more element of hypocrisy.” .