Adults of America, you need to wake up. Allowing your political biases to create a future where children are treated with hostility while pursuing higher education is dangerous, no matter what political party you belong to. This is not just about Harvard. Or about me. It’s about the country we are building — one where young people are punished for thinking, dreaming and believing differently than the generation before them.
We are not your culture war – we are your kids. We are the future.
I really feel the emotion of this article, to an extent. My son is a Harvard alum, and his grandparents, on both sides, are Trump Republicans. My wife and our two sons are definitely the liberal wing of the family. So, we understand the feeling that arises when Republican family members ask about Harvard, although we’ve never been asked something as direct as “Harvard? Isn’t that a liberal school?”.
I’m proud of my family, though, because, unlike the author’s family, they have never abandoned what they understand about Harvard – it’s reputation for academic excellence. Every member of our family, including the Trumpers, has been outwardly proud of my son for his Harvard education. Many of them even travelled to Cambridge to attend his graduation last year (battling a torrential downpour in the process!).
I hope that pride continues to hold as the university battles Trump’s attacks on higher education. My dream is that their pride in my son actually grows into an understanding of academia and the importance of its continued independence. He’s in graduate school at M.I.T. now and has committed to a career in academia, so it doesn’t seem like an unreasonable ask. We’ll see.
tags: academia harvard politics
posted by matt in Monday, April 28, 2025
