"It's not a surprise, but I'm glad there's confirmation. We can only roll back this evil once it is acknowledged.
On today's college campuses, students are not maturing -- they're managing. Beneath a facade of progressive slogans and institutional virtue-signaling lies a quiet psychological crisis, driven by the demands of ideological conformity.Between 2023 and 2025, we conducted 1,452 confidential interviews with undergraduates at Northwestern University and the University of Michigan. We were not studying politics -- we were studying development. Our question was clinical, not political: "What happens to identity formation when belief is replaced by adherence to orthodoxy?"
We asked: Have you ever pretended to hold more progressive views than you truly endorse to succeed socially or academically? An astounding 88 percent said yes.
These students were not cynical, but adaptive. In a campus environment where grades, leadership, and peer belonging often hinge on fluency in performative morality, young adults quickly learn to rehearse what is safe.
The result is not conviction but compliance. And beneath that compliance, something vital is lost.
Late adolescence and early adulthood represent a narrow and non-replicable developmental window. It is during this stage that individuals begin the lifelong work of integrating personal experience with inherited values, forming the foundations of moral reasoning, internal coherence, and emotional resilience.
"Of course, this is the whole point: You can only mold impressionable minds, not older, more mature minds whose beliefs and political leanings are already set.
"Get 'em while they're young, says the Groomer Cult." . . .
