Opinion

"Academic freedom" means freedom

Watsky denounced Murray, compared his speech to the recent Open Air Outreach protest at Princeton, and concluded that neither should be protected in a university. But he left out critical details about Murray’s visit and reached a conclusion with grave repercussions. President Eisgruber was right to make this allusion because the Middlebury protest showed how academic freedom is under siege.

We should be the change

This sort of universal student activism is something quite powerful to absorb. Through such a massive move of participation, change is possible, and progress is reachable. We must come together more as a student body for the causes that afflict, touch, and inspire us to show our strength, make our voices heard, and take a direct and undeniable stand. To be students in “the service of humanity,” we must act more boldly, more passionately, and more powerfully as advocates for the change that we wish to effect. 

Why is school spirit reserved for alumni?

Three quarters of the way through my first year at Princeton, I find myself wondering why this energy doesn’t trickle down into undergraduate life. I don’t want to envy middle-aged men and women trying to recapture the glory years I am living. Instead of waiting until after we graduate to bleed orange and black, Princeton students should try to foster a greater sense of school spirit now.

Today's news

"Ooh na na, what's my name?": The importance of getting it right

My name is something my parents gave me to pass on their hopes, their aspirations, a little piece of them that they bestowed upon me. The meaning of my name, “Siyang,” or “思扬,” is multifaceted. The first character can mean “thinking of” and the second is a shortened version of the Chinese city, “Yangzhou.” This is because Yangzhou is where my parents first met, and therefore those two characters always draw back to that time and place where the paths of their lives first crossed. My name is a tribute to the tenacity and beauty of their love. In addition, “yang” means to rise, to fly — a kind of lightness and happiness they hope for me. There is too much meaning carried in those two syllables of my very Chinese name for me to ever let it go. I am my name.

Mood

Paintball in COS 126

This man that claimed to be affiliated with the University (but didn’t offer proof to show it) was still able to market to the entire COS 126 lecture. The result was that students were directly taken advantage of.

Princeton Plays responds to the Sexpert

We advocate for all kink and BDSM that is risk-aware and consensual. To maintain agency and empowerment in BDSM dynamics—regardless of the degree to which they permeate day-to-day life—we suggest that participants prioritize open communication.

"Hands up, don't shoot" appropriated?

So, why were the protestors in Los Angeles, who were predominantly white students and parents, using this slogan? Especially when the concepts implicit in this slogan, of police brutality and antipathy for young black lives, are not a pressing concern for the people I saw co-opting this cry?

What Students Should Know About Calendar Reform

The new calendar would move fall final exams to December and create a two-week, non-credit bearing “Wintersession” in January before the spring term.

Colleggtion

S.S. Internships

Dear Princeton University

Believe it or not, there are people who have to clean up after us. A real-life human person wakes up at 5 a.m. on Monday morning, takes public transportation from Trenton, arrives on campus, walks into a bathroom and is welcomed by a toilet full of of two-day-old vomit. Then, that person has to clean it up.

Why don’t you look or act ‘Latino’?

Under this umbrella, just because we come from the same continent and many may be disadvantaged, does not mean we all vote Democrat. There is an immense socioeconomic diversity in Latin America, and despite popular assumptions, Latinos hold different views and ideologies in politics.

Fisticuffs and the future of the Left

The tit-for-tat nature of the Biden-Trump brawl would be indicative of the left-right culture war coming to blows if not for the fact that it’s more worthy of a Monty Python skit than of New York Times headlines. While these audacious quotes garner laughs for their ridiculousness, they also bring to the fore the ethical dilemmas and rifts within left-leaning politics.

On honesty

I can’t say that honesty is always the best policy because it worked for me in a particular scenario, but I can say that honesty is the best policy because the alternative — dishonesty — cannot possibly be.

On the never-ending routine

Do you ever feel like you’re on an episode of the Truman Show? Following a rigid, agonizingly repetitive script that you aren’t sure you wrote? Like, Eisgruber is secretly some major Hollywood producer and there's an entire audience at home, sick sociopaths filled with joy while watching the pain of your struggling to hand in your paper on time? 

The importance of preserving Utah's national monuments

In December of 2017, President Donald Trump, alongside U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke, announced plans to reduce the land of two protected national monuments in Utah. I am calling for students to continue to pressure the government to maintain the natural spaces that are formative to our national identity.

How a hate group spurred Princetonians to action

I have always hesitated to do anything political. But students just like me took action that day against the Open Air Outreach protest. They did not have to respond at all. After all, the protest occurred while classes were in session, when many of us would be studying Locke or cleaning chemical glassware.

What do you mean by “academic freedom?”

My point here is not that everything that occurred on the Middlebury campus was justified, but that discussing Murray’s inability to lecture as an affront to academic freedom is irresponsible. The debate surrounding academic freedom is an important one, but not all ideas deserve to be protected in our academic spaces, and Murray’s certainly don’t.