This weekend, I had the opportunity to fly out to Los Angeles to take part in the second annual PragerU Summit. I heard discussions on free speech, America's second civil war, and the effectiveness of the free market. I got to rub elbows with some of the biggest faces in conservatism including Dave Rubin and Dennis Prager. This weekend, I also had a chance to talk to the people behind the scenes. The men and women who make PragerU videos possible with their donations and support. And they all had the same question for me:
What's it like on campus? What's it like being a conservative on campus?
I told them about how sometimes it's tough. I told them about the successes and how much I appreciate PragerU and what it stands for. I told them about how conservatives fight back. But, in retrospect, I forgot to say maybe the most important thing I could have said.
I love being a conservative on campus.
It can sound naive to say it. At campuses across the United States, right-wingers face persecution and violence for their opinions. Their chapters of Turning Point USA or College Republicans shut down, their speakers blocked from campus, their ideas constantly attacked in class. It's rough some days. My own parents feared for my safety when I started school as an openly conservative student and, frankly, there's always a risk when "Republican" is equated to "Nazi" without a second thought.
But then there are the good days. There's a rush in being a part of a counter-culture on campus. Debating ideas and promoting free speech -although this may just be my natural combativeness talking. The feeling of finding other conservatives in class can only be described as happy relief and one that wouldn't exist if millennial right-wingers were as ubiquitous as air. We're part of a rebellion.
I don't pretend that colleges are going to turn into the GOP's new headquarters. I don't imagine that academia will ever sway any farther right than the 9 on a clock. And that's fine by me. It doesn't change my values or my opinions. But it convinces me that, more than ever, we need conservative students on campus and we need them to love being conservative. American college students need to be exposed to, not only diverse skin tones, religions and backgrounds, but diverse thoughts. As I said this weekend, we're fighting the good fight adding some red to this painting. In closing,
Good Luck America.
A post shared by PragerU (@prageru) on
