In my recent Substack, I wrote about the subject of moral character, and whether it is declining in America. Perhaps we need look no further than our elite college campuses to help answer this question.

There the world has been witnessing the worst displays of antisemitism and moral corruption in my lifetime, perhaps since the Holocaust.

Is this confirmation that values in some circles are waning? Or … that our nation’s brightest (supposedly) are suffering from an acute lack of knowledge and wisdom?

Probably both.

Most clear-thinking Americans are aghast.

I debated writing about this because it can tilt into the political madness besetting our nation. My Substack lane is U.S. history and culture, so I’ll make it short and sweet, now that we can take a breath. Allow me to borrow some words from a recent column in The Free Press, written by Douglas Murray, British author and conservative political commentator. He expresses my sentiments perfectly.

(Check him out. Go to https://douglasmurray.net)

I quote, “Watching the breakdown on American college campuses in recent days, I can’t help thinking—like almost everyone else—what went wrong?

“These beautiful institutions, such as Columbia and Yale and Harvard, used to be places of learning. How did they end up being the American epicenter of Jew-hate and everything else that is moronic? How could a place of learning become a place where automatons shout and repeat phrases just taught to them, and think that screaming the same thing over and over is any kind of persuasive tactic?

“Such actions are, in fact, the antithesis of what the university is meant to be about. One reason that intelligent, educated, civilized people do not spend their spare time screaming the same slogans over and over is that it is the opposite of intellectualism. It is the opposite of dialogue, inquiry, and rationalism—all things that the universities were meant to encourage.

“How did this happen?”

A perplexing question. Indeed … how?

These demonstrations with utterances of death and destruction to Jews and the State of Israel are deplorable, and surely don’t reflect the opinions of the majority students on these campuses. (I pray not.) I must believe that most of these students just want to study and learn, have some fun along the way, and continue their college experience toward graduation.

Too bad certain schools have cancelled graduation ceremonies because of the few, robbing the majority of the ultimate celebration of their hard work.

The violence and destruction of school property are beyond disturbing. It’s not enough that people were arrested. Will the perpetrators, students or not, be held to account? And what about the school administrators and faculty on these campuses, most of them unwilling or slow to denounce such deplorable behavior? They’re supposed to be the adults here, but I suspect they are cheering on these disruptors.

I, like Mr. Murray, am asking…

What went wrong?

A decline in values? Moral confusion, perhaps?

Gee…ya think.