As our nation’s colleges and universities reopen for the new academic year, incoming college students have expressed fears of being bullied and silenced by liberal student mobs like the one that came after me at Sarah Lawrence College in the spring of last year.

They have shared this fear with me and in various online forums. Weekly emails show up in my inbox from scores of students around the country, revealing that our incoming first-years are well aware of how mobs can quickly form and turn on someone for questioning and challenging certain ideas. Students know that they are entering a climate where speakers are shouted down and silenced. Non ultra-liberal ideas surrounding race, identity, and sexuality are protested, and those who support conservative thought and principles are shamed and intimidated.