A new era for conservative students at Harvard

In the desolate campus days, considering conservative ideas — even if you didn’t agree with them — was not considered an educational exercise. A progressive orthodoxy held that the conservative platform was a tacit endorsement of hatred.

But things have changed.

“Political violence is real, it’s on the rise, and it’s a problem unique to the left,” podcaster Michael Knowles told a crowd of about 200 people Oct. 2 at Harvard Law School, just weeks after the assassination of his friend Charlie Kirk, a conservative activist. “If mainstream liberals danced on the grave of the gracious and moderate Charlie Kirk, what might they do to the rest of us? Knowles asked the audience.

The event, promoted on Knowles’ podcast and social media, was part of the decidedly not-so-secret Young America’s Foundation speaking tour, this stop organized by the Harvard Law Republicans. Kirk’s recent death at another conservative event on campus did not deter the students, who waited in a line that snaked around Austin Hall.

Young America’s Foundation told me they had to turn away about 100 people. Spencer Brown, YAF’s communications director, said that after Kirk’s death, students said “they wanted to do more on their campuses to create a free and open exchange of ideas,” such as bringing in speakers like Knowles.

If just wanting to hear Conway made you a bigot by 2019 campus standards, then cheering for Knowles would have been an act of nuclear war. A political commentator affiliated with the conservative Daily Wire, Knowles is a controversial voice even outside the progressive Harvard bubble. The conservative Catholic wants to “drastically reduce all immigration,” supports traditional marriage and has been criticized for saying “transgenderism must be eradicated from public life.”

Knowles, in other words, is not the kind of vanilla conservative that administrators invite onto campus to appease the few frustrated college Republicans.

The podcaster’s presence at Harvard not only marks a significant shift in the school’s tolerance of right-wing ideas, it’s also a sign that the right is more emboldened than ever to share them. Conway, for example, was invited back to campus in 2024, but moved from a small lecture hall to a public event at the John F. Kennedy Forum.

Knowles’ well-attended speech also signals a transformation within the student body. Students weren’t just willing to be seen at a Knowles event: they were happy to be there.

In the aftermath, Thomas, a 19-year-old Harvard visiting student enrolled at Babson College who declined to give his last name, told me he was “really excited when I heard that [Knowles] was going to be here. …He will take a modern problem as a [jumping-off] point of entering into more philosophical and historical points. So I also learned a lot from his show.

Frank Fusco, a member of the Harvard Law Republicans, told me that President Trump’s election marked the beginning of a cultural shift on campus. “Many conservative students are regaining the confidence to boldly express their beliefs again,” he said.

When Knowles concluded his remarks, most of the young men gathered around to ask him questions during the question-and-answer portion. Some were curious about political issues, like the fate of higher education or the Israeli-Palestinian debate. But most of them wanted personal advice: How can I deepen my faith in college? How can I represent my conservative values ​​and truly live my faith on campus? What are your dating tips?

During the event, I continued to look around, waiting for the routine walkout, or at least the omnipresent cry of “Free Palestine.” But there was nothing, only applause. And a few laughs too. Especially when Knowles read the titles of some of Harvard’s new courses — “Queer Ethnography” and “RuPaulitics: Drag, Race, and Power” — taught by Kareem Khubchandani, a drag queen turned professor who goes by the name LaWhore Vagistan. “A reminder that Harvard College costs $90,000,” Knowles noted.

I caught up with Knowles after his speech, wondering what it was like to be on one of the most progressive campuses in the country after Kirk’s murder. “It’s very important that conservatives don’t back down and give in to servile fear,” he told me. Knowles said he “made the decision to have a public life,” and so he is most impressed by the students who showed up: “There is an implicit threat to any student who attends these events. »

We disagreed on quite a few points. I told him, for example, that I worried that Trump’s excesses at Harvard would set a precedent for Democrats to use federal funds to pressure universities to adopt progressive policies. The Obama administration already did this, to a lesser extent, with the “Dear Colleague” letter, which supported policies watering down due process for students accused of sexual assault.

Knowles has taken a tit-for-tat approach that conveniently ignores the First Amendment implications of the administration’s demands on Harvard. “Are we going to abandon this exclusively one-sided political method, which does very bad things? He believed that by exercising this same power, conservatives can “make our adversaries, for the first time, think twice before using them the next time they are in power.”

Count me skeptical. But also relieved: One of the few times I was in a Harvard lecture hall, I was in disagreement with someone to my right.

Carine Hajjar is a columnist at Globe Opinion. She can be contacted at carine.hajjar@globe.com.