To start off, I’d like to thank Declan Leary for having the guts to write a column like he does. Man, is this refreshing! For the last 3+ years, I’ve read the opinion columns in the paper periodically, mainly because I have friends writing the op-eds but also because I love seeing unfiltered views on certain issues, even if not my own. The page mirrored general life here at Carroll: the liberals were loud, unabashed and forceful, while the conservatives, if you could even identify them as such, were timid, quiet and intellectually apologetic. This attitude transferred over into classes, where conservative students were afraid to speak up and say what they truly believed. Backlash came from both liberal students and professors combined, and quite frankly, it was disgusting. As if we didn’t get the blatantly obvious liberal tendencies of the school based off actual school actions (“ripping up hateful phrases,” mock border walls, self-love mirrors and university condemnation of the ending of DACA, to name a few), we had to put up with this crap from our peers daily, knowing that no one from our side would have the courage to back us up.

The incredible response to Declan’s column is pathetically predictable. In just two weeks, no less than 5 letters to the editor were written opposed to his views. Students have called for his censorship. The Dean of Students has been contacted because of his column. One letter even accused him of hate speech, calling his opinion “hateful, factually inaccurate slop.” As an astute scholar of the liberal lexicon, I loosely translated that statement for you: the author is infected with the cancer of identity politics to a point where any opinion contrary to his lifestyle is considered an immediate, existential threat. Once this is understood, one can see why there have been so many calls for censorship of Declan: his opinion literally threatens their existence. Never mind that the obvious reason for the article was to expose the attack by the Left on masculinity – because it conveyed a conservative message, it was automatically hateful, and needed to be silenced. That’s why identity politics and political correctness is such a disease; ideas can’t be expressed for fear of what the Left might say (“Hate speech!”) or even do (“Censor him!”).

Declan has finally broken free of this death trap here at JCU, and that is why the Left is so outraged. Here’s the truth: just because you don’t like his opinion, that doesn’t mean it’s hate speech. Grow up already. It’s a big world out there, with lots of big, scary ideas. Better learn to deal with it. It’s called life. And you’re in college to prepare for it, not to be coddled like a three-year old, running to a “safe space” or demanding repercussions whenever someone has the audacity (AUDACITY!) to disagree with you. Because I’ll tell you what, it’s a lot harder to put up with speech you disagree with than it is to demand censorship. Try doing something the intellectually hard way, for a change.

So Declan, thank you for having the courage to defy the norm. Don’t let the holier-than-thou faux outrage silence you. This is why, in America, free speech is our #1 constitutional protection. Use it!