As a proud American who values the principles of free speech and diversity of thought, it has been incredibly disheartening to witness the rise of antisemitism on college campuses across our country. Institutions created to foster intellectual growth and produce our next generation of leaders have become breeding grounds for hate and discrimination.
My experiences at elite universities including Harvard, Columbia, and Yale have revealed the full extent of this problem. Radical student organizations, tenured professors, and even school administrators have signed public letters in support of the terrorists who killed more than 1,200 Israelis. I have watched them engage in antisemitic chants like “From the river to the sea,” which calls for the destruction of Israel and has roots in the Hamas charter. Having seen this behavior on campus, it did not surprise me last week when I watched three university presidents say under oath that calling for the genocide of Jews would not necessarily violate their campus rules.
Accuracy in Media leads the charge to call out these antisemites on their college campuses. We put the names and faces of these reprehensible individuals on mobile billboards and sent them to their universities to ensure their colleagues, classmates, and neighbors know where they stand. Our billboards have been attacked with bricks, our staff has been assaulted, and my own home has been “swatted” no fewer than eight times. For anyone who isn’t aware of what that means, it’s a term for when fake calls are made to law enforcement reporting hostage situations or other serious crimes taking place, prompting an armed police response that puts my family’s life in grave danger.
I want to be clear: their intimidation tactics will never work. Rather, they motivate me to work even harder to expose every antisemite we uncover. This initiative has already produced powerful results: Many students resigned from radical groups that supported Hamas; multiple investigations have been launched into universities; and the Dean of Columbia Law School resigned just one day after we returned to the campus to expose the antisemitism there.
At Harvard, however, university leaders are standing firm. Despite President Claudine Gay’s abject failure to address rampant antisemitism on her campus, the university still believes she’s the best person for the job. This is a damning indictment not only on Harvard, but on the state of America’s supposedly “elite” university system itself. In response, Accuracy in Media is actively mobilizing another billboard campaign in Cambridge to ensure everyone in the community knows exactly where Harvard leadership stands.
Some in the media have claimed that our initiative has negatively impacted the free speech of the individuals who we highlight on our mobile billboards, but the opposite is true. If anything, we amplified their speech to reach a much larger audience than they would have otherwise. The truth is that many of these hateful individuals attempt to hide behind organizations to spread their vile rhetoric anonymously. We won’t allow that.
I firmly believe in the power of media to shape public opinion and affect positive change. Mobile billboards engage communities directly, forcing them to confront uncomfortable truths. These bullies don’t understand appeasement — they only understand when they are held accountable. That is why our campaign is so important.
As America faces a national reckoning over the rise of antisemitism on college campuses, it can be easy to fall into a state of complacency without seeing the problem with your own eyes. Hopefully, everyday Americans are waking up to the problem after actually seeing leaders of elite universities so profoundly embarrass themselves last week.
This isn’t an abstract challenge we face as a country – there are extremely dangerous individuals indoctrinating students with a hateful ideology. We must remain vigilant in exposing the antisemitism that has taken over countless universities, or risk losing an entire generation to its deadly grasp.
Adam Guillette is the President of Accuracy In Media (AIM), a media watchdog organization dedicated to promoting accuracy, fairness, and balance in news reporting.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller.