The Swarthmore College newspaper recently published an editorial titled “The Phoenix has a Diversity Problem,” where the editorial board called themselves privileged racists who have neglected minority voices for years, while unveiling an absurd plan to increase racial diversity within their own office. The editorial board describes how the paper is now more diverse than when it was first published in 1881. Yet, the staff claims that they are not diverse enough. They say they are committed not only to racial or ethnic diversity, but diversity of “gender, ability, sexuality, religion, socioeconomic status, and more.” How Swarthmore’s The Phoenix thinks they are going to be able to proportionately represent each of these groups on their editorial board is baffling. In their attempt to be considered “woke,” the staff wrote this statement: “Our policy is that anyone can submit an op-ed to The Phoenix, but we recognize there are several obstacles to submitting a piece. Having the time to write an op-ed is a privilege in itself since that time could otherwise be spent on jobs or schoolwork.” They openly state that any student can submit a piece for publication, but somehow even that policy is founded in privilege because some students have more time to write than others. This ridiculous situation is unsurprising, given that Swarthmore’s long history of radical leftist antics. In 2013, Robert Zoellick (Swarthmore alumnus and 11th President of the World Bank) was scheduled to speak at the college’s commencement ceremony. He backed out after students criticized his involvement in the Bush administration. Also in 2013, students who opposed the fossil fuel industry and other issues disrupted an open board meeting in an attempt to bring attention to their causes. Nowhere in this editorial do they talk about publishing more intellectually diverse opinion pieces in the school paper. Swarthmore is one of many colleges that are interested in one kind of diversity and not another. They want diversity of race, gender, sexuality, and a whole slew of other things. But, when it comes to diversity of opinion, that is notably absent. The Phoenix‘s editorial offers a glimpse of the perplexingly impossible “utopia” that the Left desires to create, something conservatives should be sure to push back against. The Phoenix did not return multiple requests for comment on their editorial.
