Are Religious Jews Welcome at Princeton?

One month after President Eisgruber promised a campus of inclusivity and open discourse, antizionist mobs have been scene accosing religious Jews.

Dear President Eisgruber, 

I am shocked and appalled by what I saw happening at Princeton over last Friday.

(Antizionist rally held outside of Firestone Library, the speaker shouts from a bullhorn at one unlucky Jew in the middle, surrounded on all sides)

I saw a video of Princeton students gathering outside of Firestone  Library, surround a Jewish man, and proceed to harass him and call for the murder of Jewish people all around the world.

In addition to the disgust I felt to see Princeton students engage in a mob attack, I also felt betrayed. I felt betrayed by you. 

I felt betrayed by you because, just one month ago, you stood before Princeton alumni and asked us to make a case for Princeton University.

You told me, and everybody else gathered there, that Princeton should be a place that is inclusive of everyone, where anyone and everyone should feel welcome to come and learn together in peace.

What I saw this weekend was the opposite of that. 

What I saw this weekend was not an inclusive community that opened and welcomed healthy discourse – what I saw this weekend looked more like a scene straight out of the first act of a Holocaust film.

What I saw this weekend was a Jewish man, standing all alone, surrounded by a mob of agitators as they expressed their two-minutes of hate. 

What I saw this weekend was the antithesis of the kind of community you promised us.

This was not intellectual discourse. This was not free speech. This was violent demagoguery intended to terrorize Jews into silence.

Based on what I saw this weekend, I would say it is working. 

Is this what the state of discourse is at Princeton University? Is this what is being taught to our students? To surround an individual and shout in his ear with a bullhorn? 

(“1984” Two-Minutes of Hate)

I am a high school teacher. I teach in an Orthodox Yeshiva High School in Pico Robertson. I have the pleasure of teaching some of the brightest and most curious young minds I have ever worked with.  

At the Venture Forward event, you requested that people like me make a case to our students that they should go to Princeton and should pursue higher education in America.

But is Princeton making a case to my students that they are actually wanted there? 

I have heard, time and again, you and all of the presidents of the Ivy League universities talk about free speech and the importance of the First Amendment when it comes to letting antisemites lambast and insult the people of Israel, but I have never heard you advocate for the Jewish right to respond.

Why is it that the university, which allegedly champions and cherishes discourse, gives so much air time to known antisemites and provocateurs, but it never seems to invite in Zionist speakers? 

How strong can your commitment to free speech be if you seem to let things like this happen all the time? And how serious can it be if you only sponsor one side of the discourse?

I teach a speech in the debate in class, and I teach my students about the art of rhetoric and the rules of argumentation.

One of the things that I teach them is about good faith argumentation and how to have respectful debate and discourse.

This was not that.

In fact, it was one of the most embarrassing things I have ever seen come out of Princeton University.

I showed it to my speech and debate class, and they asked me, very simply: 

“Mr. Goldstein, how can you debate against someone with a ball horn and a mob?”

I closed my eyes, and I wondered what Jewish Princetonians would have said to their peers when they nominated Hitler as the “Greatest Living Person” in 1939. 

I thought about Sophie Scholl and the brave men and women of the White Rose who lost their lives to spread truth in the once revered halls of University of Munich.  

(“How can we expect righteousness to prevail when there is hardly anyone willing to give himself up individually to a righteous cause? Such a fine, sunny day, and I have to go, but what does my death matter, if through us, thousands of people are awakened and stirred to action?”Sophie Scholl’s Last Words, February 22, 1943”

I told them the truth: “I don’t know how to debate against someone with a bullhorn and a mob. In fact, I would recommend against it, since that is what got Paul Kessler killed.” 

“But,” I told them, “I will ask the president of the university. He is an expert in free speech and campus discourse, and he told me a month ago that Princeton was the kind of place where things like this did not happen.” 

So, I am asking you two questions on behalf of my students: 

Number one: “President Eisgruber, how can someone have an open and honest debate with someone armed with a bullhorn and a mob?

In this isolated incident, there was one Jewish man, one hundred screaming protesters, and a bullhorn.  

But this isolated incident is also a metaphor and a microcosm for what's going on all around the world.

With 13 million Jewish people in the world, we make up just 0.2 % of the global population. 

In a world of mob-think, there is no chance that the Jewish voice, the Jewish argument, or the Jewish right to live would be able to be heard above the shouting of the mob.  

So tell me, President Eisgruber, how does one argue with a bullhorn and a mob?

Number two: What is Princeton doing to promote free speech for its Jewish students, who do not have the luxury of having a mob and a bullhorn everywhere they walk?

From what I could tell, the only thing that separated this man for beratement was the fact that he was wearing a Kippa.

My students wear Kippot every day. They put on hats three times a day when they pray. They have tzitzit poking out of their belt loops. 

Is that grounds for them to get attacked and verbally accosted whenever they walk around on campus? 

Or will you tell them to quietly hide their Judaism to protect the university’s image like Harvard did? 

After watching this video, I cannot, in good faith, recommend that any high achieving high schooler, Jewish or otherwise, apply to Princeton.

A truly good student has a voracious curiosity, one that cannot be satisfied without being challenged. But Princeton does not seem like a place where students are encouraged to challenge and be challenged by one another. 

I cannot imagine a worse environment for learning than the one I witnessed last week. 

I cannot imagine a worse environment for free expression and public discourse than our once beautiful campus.

I cannot imagine a worse environment for high-achieving intellectual students than Princeton University.   

I promised my students that I would ask you their questions, and I intend to keep the promises I make to my students. 

Our third and final question: 

Is Princeton a community that is inclusive of Orthodox Jews? Or does Princeton's promise of inclusivity not extend to anyone who wears a Kippah and Tzitzit.

My students and I eagerly await your response. 

Spread love, spread light, 

Theodore Goldstein