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Michelle DeutchmanHigher education, and education in general, is caught in the crosshairs of culture wars that appear not to have much to do with education, scholars are noting. The latest battle has emerged over the issue of free speech on campus, specifically the freedom to teach about systemic racism and the vestiges of white privilege. Such teaching has come under attack with calls to ban critical race theory, which is playing out in legislators attempts to review and restrict tenure for any faculty member who is thought to be teaching divisive content.

One of the greatest threats [in the current fight] is academic freedom and state legislators trying to impose viewpoint-based laws around what can be taught at the university, says Dr. Michelle Deutchman, executive director of the National Center for Free Speech and Civic Engagement at the University of California.

Using legislation to try to impact the autonomy of universities is really dangerous, she continues.

Deutchman points out that there is already a system for reviewing the work of academics and making sure no one is off track. She says peer review, while not perfect, is a much better form of faculty accountability than allowing people who are not experts in these things, trying to make decisions about the things that underpin the academic enterprise.

A trojan horse?

Among the latest major legislative pushes for free speech on campus came after the 2014 killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., which sparked the Black Lives Matter movement. Then, arguments of free speech revolved around allowing speakers, like Milo Yiannopoulos and Charles Murray, to speak on campus to deliver messages many students opposed as incendiary, hate speech. The most recent reactions, involving faculty censorship and K-12 book bans, followed the 2020 killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis that spurred a resurgence in the movement.

As we see movement towards certain issues, we see unfortunately a backlash, Deutchman says. Free speech is a lot about power dynamics. As power dynamics begin to shift, people may be uncomfortable with that. The problem, she says, is that some people have bigger bullhorns than others.

Aubre Conner, an attorney and lecturer on issues of academic freedom, free speech, and other education law issues at the University of California at Davis, says it is important to interrogate who is controlling the narrative around free speech.

Individuals who felt like [the First Amendment] is supposed to be for them are trying to autocorrect the free speech conversation to again center them and center the white supremacist perspective to free speech, as opposed to taking an equity approach to free speech, says Conner. She says an equity approach would mean that, to shift the conversation, there would need to be an action to allow for that conversation to take place. She says freedom of speech is most important for those whose lives have been marginalized, more than those who are used to having power.

If were really going to center the people who need to be empowered to use free speech, these are the kinds of conversations, these are the free speech cases that should be front and center, not those who are trying their hardest to make sure historically excluded communities will continue to not have a voice about decisions that have been made over the last several centuries, says Conner.

Deutchman is an advocate for freedom of all speech including speech that may be deemed hateful because I think the whole idea is we dont want the government to be deciding what is hateful, adds Deutchman.

Theyre holding the mantle of the free speech flag, but ultimately the things theyre doing [are] chilling speech, she says. Tenure provides protection for people to be more free to create knowledge and share new ideas. Theres this opus to say issues of equity, diversity and inclusion are competing at odds [with unrestricted free speech], says Deutchman.

Is there a push-pull between those two? Absolutely, continues Deutchman. Are they mutually exclusive? No. Thats where universities have to really lean in on their institutional values and help students contextualize speech that might be uncomfortable for them.

Conner says individuals, and especially faculty members, must be careful when taking an absolutist approach to free speech and the U.S. Constitution in general. An absolutist approach may perpetuate a perspective that is harmful to those who were excluded in the thinking, she says.

Just looking at the Constitution just from a historical perspective, the First Amendment and the [Bill of Rights as a whole] were put in place without really any kind of recognition or acknowledgement that Black folks, or any folks from excluded communities, would ever be able to experience those rights, says Conner.

We continue to try to figure out what equal protection under the law even means, she says. When it comes to thinking about the speech that we feel like we need to defend, depending on who the party is, theres typically always a choice Theres not necessarily that same run to protect free speech when historically excluded communities are asking to have their speech protected and empowered.

Conner says that even the courts have placed parameters around what types of speech should be protected; speech that is lewd, vulgar, or inciting violence is not protected under the First Amendment, for example. The key, she says, is to critically examine the values that are being communicated, and whether they advance the universitys overall goal of education.

Leaning into university values

Alain-Philippe DuranDr. Alain-Philippe Durand, dean of the college of humanities at the University of Arizona, is hoping to lead the conversation about the role of the humanities in helping institutions do just that.

We have this vision that the humanities should be a bit more of everything, and the skills that we teach in the humanities, things like critical thinking, empathy, adaptability, communication essential skills, soft skills are really important to the free speech debate and helping students process what theyre hearing, says Durand, who laments that humanities are often not a part of the conversation around freedom of expression.

Durand says the humanities helps people receive information and different perspectives with the intent to understand. What if all of these perspectives were presented and people learn that there can be different perspectives, but it can be done in a polite, respectful way, he asks.

The university is really the place where there can be this formative approach with the safety of the educators being there a safe educational setting, where you can have those things being discussed and settled, he says. If you leave it up to social media for people to get educated on these things, thats where I believe there is the problem.

One of the things the humanities teaches, for example, is the ability to discern when language is being used for manipulation. Even nonfiction prose uses tone, perspective, and cherry picking of facts to present a picture that is beneficial to the storyteller, explains Durand.

Its not just about the ideas that you present, but also the people who are in the room who are going to be receiving these ideas, and you have to pay attention to them as well, he says. And he points back to the mission of the university as well What are we trying to do here? Durand asks. Our objective is to educate. And at the end of the day, we want people to feel like they have learned something. If we try to go with the inflammatory approach, people are just going to close off.

This educational approach is largely about learning how to talk to each other, according to Deutchman. Part of those skill sets is were going to learn how to engage with people we dont agree with, he says. Its a skillset, just like anything else, like calculus or learning how to write an essay.

Aligning university priorities

Many colleges and universities have diversity, equity, and inclusion statements, and some have even revised their mission statements to include these as priorities. But faculty, staff, and students of color across higher ed may affirm there is still work to do around making these priorities a reality on many campuses.

College and K-12 campuses may rush to address the speech itself rather than the issues of inclusion and belonging, Conner says. Its one of those things where our campuses tend to feel like we can talk about campus inclusivity with somewhat of a cognitive dissonance of if were allowing everyone to come onto campus, then the environment must be welcoming of them. But Conner says, you cant create an inclusive environment if students are constantly being bombarded with messages that are harmful and impact how they are made to feel about themselves as individuals.

While it is important for faculty members to help students tackle tough conversations on campus within the safety of a university context, Conner points out that it is equally important to recognize that campus doesnt always feel safe for all students.

Its hard especially for students who come from communities where theyre constantly having to see messages about not belonging in multiple facets of this country that when they come to a space to learn, to learn about how they want to maneuver in the world, theyre not even welcome there, she continues. Just because free speech is allowed and can be helpful to the exchange of ideas, [doesnt mean] the impact of those words, signs, messages that youre not human. Youre still going to feel that.

Conner says its important for universities to make sure there are enough student counselors to handle any additional stress students might be facing because of speakers brought onto campus. If there arent designated free speech zones to house messages students may find harmful, there needs to be an intentional effort to make sure there are alternate paths for students to take to get to class, and trauma-informed resources and staff students can access and that they know where and how to access those things.

If your campus police budget is higher than the budget for student counselors and making sure all of your staff have trauma-informed training then what as a campus are you demonstrating to students who come from communities where police dont often represent situations of safety, she asks. She says the question is especially applicable as campus police are often deployed when there are issues that come up on campus around free speech.

Conner says institutions should also understand that these issues can negatively impact enrollment, especially the diversity of the student population. If schools want to really focus on diversity, this is something that needs to be taken into consideration to retain and to keep students who are from historically excluded [communities] on your campus, says Conner.

At the core of everything is still a need for increased education and not just for students, but for everybody about how the First Amendment works, says Deutchman. We have rights, and we have responsibilities, and theres a whole conversation to be had about how you use those rights responsibly.

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Culture Wars - Diverse: Issues in Higher Education

At a time when many employers are finding themselves caught between their increasingly diverse and often progressive workforces on one side and increasingly combative right-wing pundits and lawmakers on the other, Netflix has plunged into Americas corporate culture wars.

This round, the right is celebrating.

It started last October, when Netflix employees protested the companys defense of a highly popular special by comedian Dave Chappelle, who made remarks some viewed as offensive to the transgender community. Co-Chief Executive Ted Sarandos said he screwed up in his efforts to communicate with upset employees but defended the show.

Last week, Netflix released updated culture guidelines that attempted to limit expectations for how responsive the company would be to employees views on societal and political issues going forward. Depending on your role, you may need to work on titles you perceive to be harmful, the memo stated. If you find it hard to support our content breadth, Netflix may not be the best place for you.

Fox News host Jesse Watters promptly praised the company for not sinking into the woke muck just to make a handful of people happy. Billionaire and culture critic Elon Musk, who had earlier blamed Netflixs business struggles on the woke mind virusand who recently declared he was voting Republicanalso Tweeted his approval.

A Netflix spokesperson said the company had been discussing the issues related to the memo for over 18 months and added that the company invited all employees to give feedback and received over 1,000 comments that helped improve the draft.

Days after the memos release, Netflix said it was cutting about 150 employees, or about 2% of its workforce, as it grappled with slower growth and a shrinking subscriber base. It wasnt long before social-media reports circulated that the company also cut dozens of contract writers, many of whom were part of its diversity communications initiatives, including Black community-focused Strong Black Lead, Latinx-focused Con Todo, Asian American-focused Golden, and LBTQ-focused Most.

The cuts were the latest in a wave of layoffs that began about three weeks ago, when Netflix let go several employees of Tudum, a new fan-focused website; many of the staff were women of color. Fox also asserted that Netflix axed the series Anti-Racist Baby and the documentary Stamped: Racism, Antiracism and You.

Netflix noted that Stamped was a companion piece to Stamped From the Beginning, which is still proceeding. A person familiar with the company said the companys overall diversity numbers remain the same post-layoff and that all social channels are being affected (not just those that impact underrepresented groups). The person added that the agency contractors were cut because the company is changing how it supports its publishing efforts, including bringing some of the work in house.

Netflix is closely watched. Its guidelines are highly influential; they have been called Silicon Valleys most important document ever. So the companys moves, and the reaction they engender, bear watching. How this will all ultimately play out remains to be seen, but there are already lessons to unpack from the forces swirling around the company.

Theres new evidence that workers will vote with their feet.

Leaders should pay attention to those surveys that assert that workers are willing to leave their jobs if they dont believe a companys leadership is speaking out sufficiently on societal and political issues. In the four months after the Chappelle controversy erupted, its attrition rates reached all-time highs since the data began in 2009, according to Ben Zweig, chief executive of Revelio Labs whose research was featured in an MIT study on factors driving The Great Resignation.

Those deciding layoffs, like all forms of corporate decision-making, must be mindful of their impact on all forms of diversity.

Companies can be sure that others will be paying attention. Within hours of the news, reports were circulating on social media alleging that Netflixs layoffs had disproportionately affected departments and workers of color.

The culture wars have reached corporate America.

That one companys memo has already been featured on Fox News says it all: What employers say and do is now red meat for the culture-war news cycle.

David Hopkins, a political science professor at Boston College who is working on a book on the political and social consequences of the diploma divide, noted that Netflix was in a tough spot, as it was stuck between its employees and its content creators.

And while the popularity of certain positions may wax and wane, Hopkins believes one thing will not change: particularly those in creative or technology sectors, any company in those areas is going to be hiring a workforce thats overwhelmingly left of center and politicized on these issues, and theyre going to have demands not only about the internal politics of a company but where the company comes down publicly on issues that are important to young cultural progressives.

Netflix is the latest illustration that leaders have to be more transparent, and more intentional, than ever before. They can be sure when they make a move, many others will watching.

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Netflix's Layoffs and Worker Ultimatum Lead It into the Culture Wars - TIME

Jamie Oliver is outraged that supermarkets can continue to promote buy one, get one free deals on food. In fact, the governments about-turn on its anti-obesity strategy has so angered the podgy chef that last week he marched on Downing Street in protest. In what must surely have been the most middle-class demonstration ever, people carried placards stating Slow down fast food and Give peas a chance. Oliver led the crowd, holding aloft a big bowl of Eton Mess dessert. Because Boris Johnson and a couple of other cabinet ministers went to posh schools and theyve messed up, geddit?

At first glance, the Eton Mess gag made it look as if the celebrity chef was having a pop at out-of-touch Tories. But dont be fooled. As Olivers Guardian article begging us to think of the fat-but-poor children reveals, the mockney millionaires real target is not posh people at all, but those of us who start our weekly shop by looking to see whats on special offer, not whats currently in season. Oliver expresses pity for the deluded masses, too foolish to realise that multi-buys are carefully designed to make people spend more money not less. But pity is only ever one small step away from contempt. As weve long since known, its the Turkey Twizzler-eating hordes that truly disgust Oliver. He is cross with the government for not forcing ordinary people to change their ways.

A quick flick through one of his cookbooks is enough to make clear that it is the people who consume cheap food, rather than the cheap food itself, that gets Oliver riled up. Chicken giblets and scrawny turkey neck bones are absolutely fine when lightly roasted and mashed into wine and shallots to make gravy, but they are appalling when covered in breadcrumbs and shaped into nuggets. Its the exact same food, with the exact same nutritional content. So whats the difference? Chicken nuggets are cheap to buy, quick to cook and easy to eat. Theyre immediately satisfying in a way that a plate of raw veg can never be. But thanks to Oliver and other culture warriors, whether you opt for a red wine jus with your free-range, organic roast chicken, or nine of McDonalds finest, is not simply a matter of personal preference but a major political statement.

Food has long been a focal point in the culture wars. These disputes over competing lifestyles may seem petty a distraction from real politics but they have become a key feature of political debate. For several decades now, commentators have interpreted class tensions and social inequalities through the lens of culture. With identity increasingly to the fore in public life, cultural differences rapidly become personal. Decisions about what to eat, read, watch, wear and buy are judged not as personal choices, or decisions taken in a particular context, but as political statements that reveal a persons moral character.

The solidly middle-class Oliver is ideally positioned to tilt at both the posh public-school culture of Boris and his chums and at the tastes and dispositions of the working class. In appearing to criticise the Tories, while expressing pity for the poor, he perfectly taps into the vibe of todays cultural elite. This is a shtick Oliver has long been practising. Almost as soon as he burst on to the scene in 1999 with his TV series, The Naked Chef, he became an activist, hectoring parents about school dinners while berating government ministers about obesity. Olivers combination of campaigning and cooking takes personal decisions about what we eat and puts them squarely in the realm of politics. He has helped make food a key part of the culture war.

Now, with spiralling inflation leading to an escalating cost-of-living crisis, there are some on the left who think the time has come to shake off the culture wars and get back to real politics. They argue that a focus on values, identity and lifestyle is a right-wing ploy to distract people from proper economic issues. The more we talk about flags and statues, the argument goes, the less likely we are to notice the huge profits made by energy companies, or the chancellor of the exchequers fabulous personal wealth.

But these activists only tend to notice the distraction of the culture wars when it is their side that is being called into question. Indeed, they are the ones who made statues and flags contentious issues in the first place. Wishing the culture wars away ignores the fact that such disputes are how class politics plays out nowadays. And whether they realise it or not, many left-wing activists are on the opposite side to ordinary people in this new fight. Those who have spent decades waging a culture war against working-class people, expressing horror at what they say, think and eat, are in no position to empower working-class people.

There is no way of simply bypassing the culture wars now. This is the terrain on which todays political and class battles are being fought. So the culture wars must be fought and they must be won.

Joanna Williams is a spiked columnist and author of the upcoming book, How Woke Won, which you can pre-order here.

To enquire about republishing spikeds content, a right to reply or to request a correction, please contact the managing editor, Viv Regan.

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Jamie Oliver and the culture war against the working class - Spiked

Heres something you often hear people say as they get older: I remember the last time that was popular. Fashions once considered outdated come back in style. Movements arise and subside, and then surge again. A benefit of age is the wisdom and perspective you bring to the current moment. History doesnt always repeat itself or move in predictable cyclical patterns, but the more you study it and the longer you live, the more you see how the present and the past rhyme.

I must be getting older, because ever since I turned 40 last year, Ive said several times, I remember the last time that was popular. Most recently, Ive been saying that about online debates over the proper posture for Christians seeking to engage the culture in this era. I see the resurgence of a neoReligious Righta return of the culture war mentality among many younger evangelicals who believe the need of the hour is for the church to jump into the fray of hardball politics and be bolder and louder in opposing leftward trends that are harmful for society.

I say neoReligious Right because its not exactly the return of the Jerry Falwell era, and there are some crucial differences that set todays thirst for culture warring apart from my parents and grandparents generation. Well get to some of those distinctions soon.

But this resurgence has piqued my interest because I came of age in the 1990s. My parents were part of the religious right. They followed state and national politics closely and got involved in local elections, with my father serving two terms on the city council. I remember the night of the 1994 midterms and the Gingrich-led Contract with America. In those crucial years of adolescence, Rush was on the radio, Jerry Falwell was sending out videos replete with right-wing talking points and conspiracy theories, Southern Baptists were boycotting Disney because of the companys leftist agenda, men were gathering in Washington, DC, for Promise Keepers, and the character flaws of Bill Clinton were on full display (and worthy of our disgust).

Fighting for the soul of the countrythe culture war mentalitywas the demonstration of faithfulness. Churches were asleep, and Christians apathetic. It was time to wake up. The moment was urgent. As Carman sang in 1992, The only way this nation can even hope to last this decade is to put God in America again!

Historians debate the zenith of the religious right. Was it in the 1980s with the election of Ronald Reagan and the defeat of the Equal Rights Amendment? The 1990s when Bill Clinton was impeached? Or the re-election of George W. Bush in 2004, when voters made clear their disapproval of same-sex marriage? Whatever the case, the moral majority exerted considerable influence on politics and culture during these decades.

At the same time as many pastors and church leaders sought to bring their convictions into the public square, a countermovement was taking place, most notably in the rise of megachurches and the church growth movement. Evangelism was front and center for these congregations. Emphasizing politics made it harder to reach people with varying philosophical and political commitments. Political posturing was divisive and counterproductive; even worse, it distracted from the churchs main mission of winning people to Jesus.

Another countermovement also existedthe religious left, though it was never as large or influential as the religious right. Leaders in this group often chastised white evangelicals for their political idolatry, but too often the religious left was just a mirror image of the kind of engagement they so despisedthe only difference being the political priorities and positions aligned with the left rather than the right. As the Emerging Church movement got going in the late 1990s and early 2000s, some of the leaders who distanced themselves from the political postures of the right wound up walking in lockstep with partisans on the left.

By the time the Emerging Church conversation was at its height and evangelicals were cheering the Iraq War, I was a student at an evangelical university in Eastern Europe. My perspective on American politics had shifted considerablynot away from an underlying conservative political philosophy (which I continue to espouse), but due to my encounters with global Christianity, a wider range of reading, familiarity with different churches seeking to be faithful in various contexts, and seeing the American culture wars from the outside. Much of the attention the American church devoted to politics seemed wildly misplaced and misguided, out of step with churches in many other parts of the world.

So, I gravitated toward stronger distinctions that would help the church maintain its priority on discipleship and evangelism: (1) distinguishing between the church as an institution and Christians as individual believers and (2) prioritizing the mission of the church over the implications of Christians living out their faith. I tried to understand the cultural and historical reasons why many black Christians and white Christians who share confessional unity could be so divided on political priorities. I lamented the intrusion of political debates into every sphere of life.

The gospel-centered movement that arose in the late 2000s and into the 2010s was, in part, an answer to the Emerging Church movement, whose aversion to institutions and authority prevented it from building structures that could sustain its growth. Look at the foundational documents for The Gospel Coalition (written in 2006) and you get a glimpse of the challenges facing the church during that era, including postmodernisms effects on how we interpret Scripture.

The gospel-centered movement was also an answer to the prevalence of church growth philosophy. Leaders decried overly pragmatic approaches in the church, shared concerns about the decline of serious doctrinal instruction, and sought to reestablish the priority of the gospel itself as the unifying force for evangelicalism and the renewal of the church.

Gospel centrality, by nature of its spotlight on the fundamental message of Christianity, cut against the focus of many religious rightinfluenced churches. Political disagreements remained, but they were demoted. The excesses of the moral majoritys approach to politics were on display, and younger pastors turned away from that combative posture (although sometimes replacing cultural combat with intramural theological combativenesscommonly regarded as cage-stage Calvinism).

Synergy showed up in the gospel-centered movement and the missional conversations at the time because both rejected the politicizing of the church so often seen in the religious right as well as the leftward theological drift of the Emerging Church and religious left. This alliance made sense because the gospel and mission naturally go together, as the good news we spread is about the missionary heart of a God who seeks and saves the lost.

During this time, the old guard of the religious right appeared as more of a caricature of its former glory, with increasingly bizarre viewpoints put forth by gray heads with unmerited cultural confidence. For many younger pastors, the whole idea of taking back the country from godless forces felt like a lost cause. If older evangelicals thought of America as a type of Israela country chosen by God for special purposes in the world, younger evangelicals saw the country as a type of Babylona place where the true church will, for the foreseeable future, be a moral minority, prophetic from the margins.

The Israel/Babylon motif has shaped recent generational approaches to political involvement. The old religious right, in thinking of America as a type of Israel, reacted to current events as a betrayal of Christian heritage and prioritized politics as the mechanism for effecting change in society. Younger evangelicals, in thinking of America as Babylon, reacted to current events with a sense of resignation and prioritized pastoral help and counsel in a rapidly secularizing society.

But then, in the span of less than a decade, a series of convulsions reshaped the landscape. The Supreme Court decision redefining marriage for all 50 states in 2015, the rapid loss of political will to enact conscience protections and ensure religious liberty, and then the surprising victory of Donald Trump in 2016 (brought about by a resurgent religious right and widespread white evangelical support) changed the environment. The push for acceptance of gender theories that require a certain suspension of disbelief (not to mention the suppression of speech defining reality) only exacerbated the tensions.

The Israel/Babylon motif doesnt capture the concerns of this current moment. The neoReligious Right agrees with younger evangelicals that were in Babylon. The debate is about how the church should respond to this environment. What does faithfulness in Babylon look like?

The earlier sense of resignation, of being passive in the face of rapid political change, has come under fire from many younger pastors and leaders who believe this cultural moment calls for a rejection of the excesses of old religious right and the apolitical above the fray response so often on display among the leaders of the church growth and gospel-centered movements. You cannot focus on discipleship, they say, without dealing with politics because faithfulness in the public square is a part of discipleship. Overreacting to the religious rights problems has led to a widespread failure in addressing political questions in discipleship, creating a void that leaves the church vulnerable to all kinds of false ideologies.

History is rhyming again, and so were witnessing the rise of a neoReligious Right that seeks to recapture something of that movements focus on political priorities while connecting political thought to Christian discipleship. In forthcoming columns, I want to give some attention to this new development and then offer suggestions for how these resurgent culture-warring sensibilities can be properly channeled so as to result in a stronger church, without the collateral damage often associated with these kinds of battles. More to come.

This is the first column in a series. If you would like my future articles sent to your email, as well as a curated list of books, podcasts, and helpful links I find online,enter your address.

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The Return of the Culture War - The Gospel Coalition

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The University of North Texas has more than 42,000 students, but few are as infamous as senior Kelly Neidert.

Since she arrived at the Denton campus in 2019, the 22-year-old marketing major has revived its Young Conservatives of Texas chapter which had been dormant for years and developed a reputation among students and administrators as the campus biggest provocateur.

Shes easily recognizable in her red Make America Great Again hat and a megaphone sometimes slung over her shoulder she uses it to troll her liberal classmates. On Twitter, she branded herself the most hated conservative college student in the state of Texas.

When students held a protest in January to push for more online classes during the peak of the omicron variant, Neidert went to the top of a nearby parking garage and shouted through her megaphone for more in-person classes. On social media, she tweets statements like, trans women are men, actually, and One of my greatest accomplishments is giving Covid to someone who was vaxxed.

On TikTok, she posted a video in which she approached a group of students holding an event for Coming Out Day and said she was coming out as conservative.

Last month, her reputation grew even more after she invited anti-trans political candidate Jeff Younger to campus to speak at a YCT meeting, a move that sparked a massive protest of students who drowned out Younger with expletive-laden screams Younger responded by calling them communists and telling them to shout louder until university police ended the event because of safety concerns.

Police hid Neidert in a janitors closet to avoid protesters who were roaming the halls, allegedly searching for her.

Neidert repeated the story as a guest on various right-wing media outlets throughout March. She and other YCT members routinely record students reactions to her groups events on campus which have included protests, students cursing at her and death threats on social media then share the videos during her media appearances on Fox News, Newsmax and other outlets.

Thank you libs for the endless amount of content you are giving me, she posted on Twitter last fall after students protested an anti-abortion candlelight vigil that her group hosted.

In just a few years, Neidert has single-handedly elevated the happenings at UNT into the national political debate about free speech on college campuses.

To her allies on the right, shes a crusader against the woke left that is censoring conservatives in American higher education. In December, she was named one of the rising stars in Texas conservative politics by the far-right, Texas-based Current Revolt site.

To her opponents on the left, shes using YCT and social media to spew hate speech about transgender students and to harass them, all to further her own image within the conservative movement.

Shes a grade A troll, UNT political science major Maya Isola said. In a way, I have to commend her, because she knows what shes doing.

UNT President Neal Smatresk told a group of students protesting the universitys handling of the Younger event last month that Neidert and YCT members have taken over the dialogue [on campus], according to a video of the conversation provided to The Texas Tribune by a student.

I dont know if we can ever stop the one individual who is in that group because shes become a media sweetheart, Smatresk added. And I think that shes going to keep going.

Neidert told the Tribune that her motivation to post her experiences at UNT online is to show what its like to be a conservative on campus today.

I think that conservatives, especially older ones who havent been on a campus in a while, theyre shocked by it, Neidert said. And so the goal of my TikTok has been to show people this is happening at college, and its also happening in Texas. (Her TikTok account, which at one point had 64,000 followers, has been suspended for weeks. She says the platform considered a video from the Younger protest to be violent.)

Since late 2020, events organized by Neidert and her group have sparked at least one confrontation per semester between UNT students and YCT members. Each time, Neidert or another member has documented the incident with photos or video, and then Neidert shares the images with conservative TV outlets which often put them on screen as Neidert tells the host about the experience.

When YCT members planted hundreds of flags on campus for an anti-abortion memorial in the fall of 2020, students began removing them and Neidert grabbed her phone and started recording. The video later played on an online broadcast of Real Americas Voice, a self-described alternative to mainstream networks where traditional values continue to get trampled on.

In that segment, Neidert said the backlash she received on social media over the event included suggestions that she should kill herself.

Kelly, youre a brave young lady. Continue your fight because you can be stronger than all those folks, the host said as she wrapped up the segment. It has to be hard to be on that campus, though.

The following semester, Neidert appeared on Fox News after her group hid 250 Easter eggs around campus with Bible verses inside. Neidert told the host that they received backlash on social media from students who said they were going to stomp on the eggs and replace the Bible verses with condoms.

As the Fox News host introduced Neidert, a chyron that said, The rise of cancel culture, flashed across the screen. She asked Neidert why the students were so angry.

This has been a pretty common theme when my group does any type of activity on campus, Neidert said. Its very liberal here, and these students dont know how to interact with those who have a different opinion.

A few weeks before the Younger event thrust UNT into the spotlight, Neidert used her TikTok account to draw attention to the event. She posted a video online of an interaction she had with a student in the library who she said confronted her as she was printing fliers for the event that said, Criminalize child transitions.

In the video, the student asks Neidert, How do you all live, honestly? Yall pretend to be Christian, youre not.

When Neidert responds, How do we live? he interrupts: Fuck you. Stop this Im kind shit. Dont do that. Fuck off.

Youre going on TikTok, and I have 64,000 followers, she told him as he walked away.

The video has 1.2 million views on Twitter.

In March, the videos of students screaming, standing on desks and cursing during the Younger event flooded social media. Neidert joined Younger on the conservative network Newsmax a few days after the event to discuss the incident with host Rob Schmitt.

As the two of them spoke, the hashtag #CrisisofMiseducation flashed across the screen over Neiderts video of herself exiting the building, escorted by police. Students are heard screaming, Fuck you, Kelly!

Most of the students know who I am by now, so I was expecting some backlash, she told Schmitt, adding that she was terrified when police pulled her into a closet as antifa ran up and down the hallways.

When I see kids like that, I honestly just feel bad, Schmitt said. Theyve been completely indoctrinated by some really sick people in our society.

Left-leaning students on campus said theyre aware Neidert is using their reactions against them on conservative media and social media.

They acknowledge that some protesters behavior during the Younger event particularly those who searched for Neidert inside the building wasnt productive. But they said they cannot just ignore her rhetoric.

Theres two options: Let her grow passively and slowly, pretty much unfettered, or get attention for a countering voice, said Emily, a transgender student who said she started to organize in opposition to YCTs actions because she felt targeted on campus. She asked to be identified only by her first name because her family doesnt know shes transgender.

For transgender students in particular, Emily said, Neiderts rhetoric about their existence made the fight more personal.

Meanwhile, thousands of UNT students want Neidert gone from campus. A petition calling for Neiderts expulsion from UNT had more than 20,200 signatures online as of Thursday, and students also have demanded in another petition and during protests that the university remove YCT from campus.

In the video of Smatresk talking to student protesters, multiple students claimed Neidert had harassed them and used hate speech against transgender students. Smatresk repeatedly told those students to file gender discrimination or civil rights complaints with the university without a formal complaint, he said, the school could not act.

When asked whether students had submitted formal complaints, the university said in a written statement that it received informal complaints about Neidert and the campus YCT chapter via email, and a review of those complaints did not yield any policy violations. The university also said the YCT chapter has not violated any university policies.

UNT student Tara Olson, who helped organize protests calling on the university to hold YCT members accountable for their actions, said she was disappointed the school wouldnt punish YCT or remove Neidert from campus.

Its almost like theyre afraid of getting backlash from the conservative media that Kelly has become a part of, she said.

Neidert and the YCT chapter have also drawn fire from other UNT conservatives. Immediately after the Younger event, three leaders for the UNT chapter of Young Americans for Freedom issued a scathing statement on Twitter calling YCT a radioactive force to conservatism and accusing Neidert of stoking conflict on campus to fuel her own media career.

If she can manufacture more outrage by provoking the campus left, she can create the narrative that the left is evil, said the statement, which was later deleted without explanation. In her mind, such narratives are attractive to media outlets.

Group leaders declined to be interviewed by the Tribune.

Neidert said shes not pursuing a media career. And in hindsight, she said, Youngers decision to engage with the protesters, calling them communists and snowflakes, did make it seem as if her group was just trying to provoke liberal students on campus and get attention.

I definitely think that that kind of painted the situation in a different light for people on the left, she said. [Younger] calling them communists and screaming at them, I didnt really like that, honestly.

Neidert is calm and matter-of-fact when she reflects on the controversies that have swirled around her for the past few months. She doesnt see herself as a political radical; she considers herself part of the broader conservative movement and repeatedly refers to her beliefs as mainstream, particularly regarding health care for transgender children.

Yet she understands how she is perceived, quipping that her online presence and the attention from the Younger event might make it difficult for her to find a job after graduation.

She was raised Baptist in Denison, 75 miles north of Dallas, and credits her family for her political leanings. She remembers watching Fox News with her grandfather before school, but she really started paying more attention to politics during her junior year of high school when Donald Trump was elected president.

She said she appreciated Trumps willingness to state his opinions without trying to appease everyone in a way that waters down the message.

I definitely think theres a lot of positives with just saying exactly how you feel, she said.

When she enrolled at UNT after a year at the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor, a small Baptist college in Belton, between Waco and Austin, Neidert said she was encouraged by her twin brother, Jake who was involved in the YCT chapter at Baylor University to resurrect UNTs dormant YCT chapter. Neidert attended a weekend leadership training held by YCTs statewide organization, which she said further fueled her interest in campus activism.

She said students from colleges across Texas learned about political campaigning, how to make attractive flyers for events and how to use social media effectively. There was an entire session about using internet memes, Neidert said.

Thats what our generation likes. So they were kind of talking about how to make good ones, trendy ones that people might like, she said. A lot of it was not even political at that point. It was just marketing.

Under her leadership, YCT has aligned itself with far-right Texas political candidates. The group had an Instagram Live event with Allen West, the former chair of the Texas Republican Party who ran to the right of Gov. Greg Abbott in the recent Republican gubernatorial primary. It also hosted a rally with Shelley Luther, who became famous for refusing to close her hair salon during the pandemic and later ran unsuccessful campaigns for both the Texas Senate and the Texas House. (Neiderts brother served as Luthers campaign manager in her House race.)

We dont have to align ourselves with every Republican, said Neidert, who has not ruled out running for office in the future. We can kind of pick and choose who we think is the most conservative.

Her group also sued the university over its tuition rates. The Texas Public Policy Foundation, a right-leaning advocacy group, recently won a lawsuit on behalf of the campus and statewide Young Conservatives of Texas groups that blocks UNT from charging out-of-state students higher tuition than undocumented students who qualify for in-state tuition. UNT has appealed the ruling.

A few weeks after the Younger incident, Neidert was back on campus, wearing her MAGA hat. This time, she was waiting to meet a team for conservative commentator Steven Crowder. His team had reached out to Neidert to be its campus liaison as they recorded a debate segment called Change My Mind for his YouTube channel, which has 5.6 million followers.

The topic that day was whether transgender women should participate in womens sports.

As the film crew started setting up and students realized YCT was involved, they started to alert each other on social media that the group and Neidert specifically were doing something on campus.

As Neidert waited, students stared. Some took her photo. Neidert smirked, then turned and waved at them.

They really hate when you do that, she said.

Disclosure: The Texas Public Policy Foundation, the University of North Texas and Baylor University have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.

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A Texas college student has thrust her campus into the national culture wars - The Texas Tribune