By Michael Todd
The left has chosen to act like the Chinese Communist Party rather than the representatives of a free society that cherishes free speech. While proclaiming themselves the purveyors of morality, they continually expand what is considered hate speech to silence their opposition. With attacks on people’s families and the threat of losing scholarships, jobs, etc., the left has found that absolutism within a two-tiered judicial system they’ve created, can prevent opposing voices from derailing their agenda. This doesn’t only pertain to words, but actions and symbols they consider threatening to their ideology. In a sense, radical leftism has become a cult bent on preventing free thought.
‘By the skillful and sustained use of propaganda, one can make a people see even heaven as hell or an extremely wretched life as paradise.’
Adolf Hitler
‘If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.’
George Orwell
‘What is needed is the right to print what one believes to be true, without having to fear bullying or blackmail from any side.’
George Orwell
An example of this is the case of Austin Tong, who attends Fordham University. Unfortunately, while incidents like this have become all too common, this case represents individual thinking outside the established leftist thought. Being a Chinese immigrant, Austin and his family immigrated from China to the United States when he was six years old, seeking freedom from the Chinese Communist Party.
The issues for Austin started when he chose to mark the Tiananmen Square Massacre anniversary in China by posing an Instagram photo with a legal firearm to symbolize his support for the resistance against the Chinese Communist Party. Tong also posted a picture of former police captain David Dorn, who was gunned down by rioters in St Louis, with the caption, “Y’all a bunch of hypocrites,” because of his frustration with the situation and the subdued reaction to Dorn’s murder. As a consequence of his actions, Fordham University suspended, barred him from campus, and demanded he attends bias training. Additionally, the dean of students, Keith Eldredge, contacted Tong and stated that he was being investigated because of his posts. The irony of this story is that Fordham University is acting more like the Chinese government than an American institution entrusted with our youth’s education. Sadly, actions like these illustrate the increased restrictions of conservative speech on university campuses.
Actions like those by Fordham University demonstrate the absolute depravity engulfing the left in this country. They have taken to labeling their opposition as monsters not worthy of expressing different opinions. Calling people on the right murders, Fascists, and a slew of other derogatory terms, they have given their followers free rein to attack people, burn cities and intimidate those not in line with the left’s ideological goals.
By suppressing the speech of others’, those who want to harm our country can never be held accountable to an ignorant populace. If opposing voices are not allowed to voice their ideological differences, then the side that still has free speech will eventually inherit unchecked authority to impose their will on society. This is the danger we face with the growing audacity of the left to suppress and intimidate differing political thought. If we don’t stop this, our country’s future will forever be changed into an unrecognizable totalitarian state where no one but the state has rights.