The Cultural Impact of Anti-Americanism in Colleges

BUCK: We are breaking down all of the latest for all of you, including this ongoing conversation, because it is July 5th. Well, today involved on the federal holiday, of course. Clay and I are still working, though, because that’s how we get it done. We have a moment here where we’re wondering.

Why is it that not only do you have some Democrats out there publicly, but a lot of public figures and celebrities who clearly think it is advantageous, to dump on America over Independence Day weekend. Mind you. Why is that something that’s happening in this country?

And also, is there something to be taken from the fact that we’re not allowed to have immigration policies and borders in this country, according to the left? Every other country — France and Japan, find a country — is allowed to have borders and immigration control. If you talk about that in America, the left wants you to know that you’re racist.

If you just love your country, and you don’t spend a lot of time criticizing it and undermining it and saying it’s a bad place, the left also has a problem with that. Anywhere else…. You can be from Albania, Fiji, England, you name it — you know, Thailand.

CLAY: (chuckling)

BUCK: Find a country somewhere. You’re allowed to love your country. You come here, and you have tremendous patriotism and love. But, Clay, it is trendy to undermine America, and it’s only on one side of the political aisle.

CLAY: Well, not only that, Buck. We’ve got the Olympics coming up. You say anything critical about any other countries, left-wingers come at you and say, “Oh, that’s racist and xenophobic of you,” right? So they’re fine destroying our own country and our values and our institutions.

We talked about this some when the U.S. played Mexico in soccer, which is probably a big rivalry game, and the U.S. won. And Mexican fans, were screaming homophobic slurs. Like they’ve actually been suspended, which is an irony. Because people have given the World Cup, to a Middle Eastern country, but that’s another story, where basically they still behead gay people there. Whatever.

And then they also were throwing bottles and refuse on our players. If you said anything negative about Mexico, it was like, “Oh, that’s super racist of you. How dare you criticize the Mexican soccer fans!” But yet, the same people will denigrate America, while screaming to the heavens, even though everything has gone their way, which proves the slippery slope argument.

You’re right, Buck. I think you nailed it. As long as you and I exist — and all of our listeners out there in the Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show army, as long as we exist — the left wing can’t be happy, because what they really crave is authoritarianism and totalitarianism. They don’t want anyone to disagree with anything that they say, because they’re so convinced that they are right that they are vastly, rapidly advancing towards the same perspectives that the Taliban, and Kim Jong-un reflect, which is there’s only one opinion that is allowed.

BUCK: Politics is the religion replacement for the left in the country. You can see it. You can feel it. That’s why there’s a devotion. That’s why you have people who will march around in the streets and scream about how climate change is an existential threat, because they need something to believe, that is existential. They need something to believe in.

I’ve said many times. You know, climate change is a religious belief for people who think they’re too smart for religion. And, really, the left is a religious belief for people who think that they are above it, who think that they don’t have the need of it. And I will just say, you know, Andrew Breitbart — rest in peace — said, “Politics is downstream of culture.”

I think that’s something that conservatism has really had to take to heart, and wake up in recent years. And it’s just, what do people say? But when you ask somebody at a place like Georgetown University… I want you all to hear this. I have a family member who went to Georgetown.

I used to live, when I was a CIA officer, right next to Georgetown — I mean, a block away from the campus — so I know that place pretty well. And when you ask college kids at an elite institution that costs something like 55 or $60,000 a year? You ask them, what do they think about America?

OPHELIE JACOBSON: Are you proud to be an American?

FEMALE STUDENT 1: No. (snickers) I feel embarrassed to be an American every day. (snickers)

FEMALE STUDENT 2: I just think that our economy just cares about money and not, like, humans, like, yeah, in general.

OPHELIE JACOBSON: Do you think that America is the greatest country in this world?

FEMALE STUDENT 3: I would honestlyyyyy rather kind of live somewhere else?

FEMALE STUDENT 4: I’d say that it’s like the greatest in, like, the Olympics. Go Olympics!

OPHELIE JACOBSON: Can you name a better country than the United States, in your opinion?

FEMALE STUDENT 5: (laughs) I’m not sure if I can.

FEMALE STUDENT 1: I don’t think I can.

FEMALE STUDENT 6: A really tiny European country?

OPHELIE JACOBSON: Would you be willing to give up your U.S. citizenship?

FEMALE STUDENT 3: Yahh. It’s not that necessary. I mean, I can still take vacations here.

OPHELIE JACOBSON: Would you say that college has helped shape your perception of being not proud to be an American?

FEMALE STUDENT 1: Yes, absolutely. I mean, I went to American, which is an extremely, like, liberal bubble school. So I know it’s kind of, like, lots of liberals just preaching to the choir. But I think I learned a lot that… I’m from Georgia, and I would have never learned if I had not taken those classes, just about the way the justice system works and zoning laws and everything else. So I think college opened my eyes to a lot of these things.

CLAY: Buck, I also went to college in Washington, D.C. I was a scholarship kid to George Washington University. And right now, George Washington is the Colonials, which is because of the Colonial Army, which is kind of a big deal in the revolutionary universe we’re in right now. GW students, Buck, are demanding that the word mascot “Colonials” be removed!

Even though, we were fighting — we were the colonized and the colonists we were fighting against the British. They don’t understand that. And I look at this stuff. And I don’t know if you agree with me on this, or not. But so much of this is about a loss of perspective. And a failure to understand, the larger landscape, of the world.

I really do feel, the more and more I think about it, I think if every American, had to live overseas for a year in a normal country — I mean, “normal” in quotation marks. Meaning, you’re not getting to go to live high-end in a democracy, where people are also really wealthy. Right?

BUCK: Yeah. You can’t go to the South of France and live in Monaco for a year, for this experiment.

CLAY: Yes. But if you had to go and see the way the average person lives. The Peace Corps, I think, is very ennobling in many ways, honestly. You give up a year of your life, and you get to experience the way the rest of the world lives. You have so much more of an appreciation for what you have.

And I like to use this stat: India is a rapidly growing democracy, Buck. Our poorest people in America, live on a standard-of-living wealth scale, wealthier than the 20% who are the 20% wealthiest in India. Right? Our poor people in America are not poor. In fact, they are wealthy, relative to most standards in the world as a whole.

BUCK: Yeah.

CLAY: Most people don’t that know.

BUCK: But “relative” is the big issue here. This is why you have college kids today who are walking around, talking about how America is oppressive and awful and it’s so hard. And, look, I’m a graybeard Millennial. You’ve just aged out. You’re just beyond Millennial, is that correct? You’re like a year out?

CLAY: I missed Millennial by a year.

BUCK: Yeah. You’ve got kids walking around, and all they can think about is,yyou know, “There are Instagram stars who are 25 who are making millions of dollars a year.”

CLAY: Yeah.

BUCK: My point being that everything is going to be relative in the society you’re in for people’s perception of how well off you are. That all said, there is a lack of context and perspective and I think you’re addressing that and pointing this out appropriately with a lot of Americans, who because they don’t have an experience of what it is to be in a country… I’m just going to say it. There are countries that are way more racist, than America. I mean, culturally.

CLAY: Almost every country in the world, Buck, is way more racist than America.

BUCK: Mmm-hmm.

CLAY: We’re about to have the Olympics in Japan, and later this month. Look at the citizenship requirements to become a citizen in Japan.

BUCK: You basically can’t.

CLAY: You can’t.

BUCK: They don’t want anyone to show up. That’s what I mean. The rules are constantly changing and shifting, and these Georgetown students… And I just want to point out. Georgetown is probably, you know, on the one-to-ten scale — ten being Wesleyan where they have naked dorms and everyone is doing interpretative dances to, you know, post-feminist theory and, you know, whatever.

CLAY: (laughing)

BUCK: Wesleyan may be at a ten, and one would be, like, you know, Hillsdale College in terms of being, you know, conservative. I mean, Georgetown is probably a seven. You know, it’s liberal, but it’s not the most liberal of the schools. The point is here, if you were around asking American colleges today, our elite culture — our elite culture — is such, that they know, the safer response to, “Do you love this country?

“Do you think America is amazing,” is some hand-wringing, “On the one hand… On the other hand… Oh, I don’t know.” Kind of cringing. “Well, I want to make sure that everyone knows I’m woke and we confront our past.” I’m just want to say, this isn’t just… It’s kind of fun to talk about because it’s so absurd, which is true. This has real effects on our culture, on our society, and on our perception of what America is and should be.