Mike Rowe, the award-winning host of such shows as “Dirty Jobs” and “Somebody’s Gotta Do it,” has seen what’s going on at college campuses around the U.S. — and he feels the way you and I probably do about it, pretty much.
Rowe posted a long statement to social media platform X Monday with a statement excoriating Columbia University and its president for their handling of the now week-long anti-Israel protests and “encampment” on school grounds.
Being a solutions-oriented guy, Rowe suggested some — both for the university itself, and for Americans fed up with the situation at our institutes of higher education.
First off, stop supporting Ivy League schools financially.
“For a guy who runs a foundation that sends young people to trade schools all over America — trade schools where I’m pleased to report, no one is calling for the extermination of Jews — today’s headlines are once again offering another excellent reason to consider redirecting whatever financial support you might earmark for the Ivy League, to the mikeroweWORKS Foundation,” he wrote.
“Why?” he asked rhetorically. “Because the Ivy League has truly lost its mind.”
Gee, Mike. Don’t beat around the bush. Tell us how you really feel.
What set Rowe off specifically was the fact that Columbia University President Nemat “Minouche” Shafik — an American economist who was born in Egypt — had “aannounced a new round of remote learning” to ensure the safety of Columbia’s student body and allow some time for tensions to cool.
“If I had a kid at Columbia, I’d be livid,” Rowe wrote. “It’s simply mind-boggling that the president of this university would rather consign her students to another crucible of remote learning, than permanently expel the protesters.”
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“That’s what you get for $68,000 a year at Columbia — an administration who cowers in the face of thugs and bullies, and a university president who would rather make your kids try to learn off campus, than take a truly hard line with those students calling for the murder of Jews,” he wrote.
“For the love of God, expel them,” he added after describing some of the more egregious examples of anti-Semitism that have been seen at Columbia recently. “Calling for murder is not protected speech.”
One can only imagine how Rowe is feeling today, after Shafik set a midnight Tuesday deadline for protesters to dismantle their tent city and remove themselves from campus, and then backed down, giving another 48 hours for talks to continue, as The Western Journal noted earlier.
You can read Rowe’s entire statement below.
For a guy who runs a foundation that sends young people to trade schools all over America – trade schools where I’m pleased to report, no one is calling for the extermination of Jews – today’s headlines are once again offering another excellent reason to consider redirecting…
— The Real Mike Rowe (@mikeroweworks) April 22, 2024
Protesters at Columbia and elsewhere are demanding that their schools divest themselves of financial involvement with Israel — by which they largely seem to mean that school funds should not be invested in companies that, for example, provide equipment to build Jewish settlements in land historically controlled by the Jews.
It would be ironic indeed if their protests instead led to Ivy League supporters ceasing donations to their alma maters and instead giving it to Rowe’s foundation.
Full disclosure: I’m not an Ivy League grad myself, but I’m the son of one, may he rest in peace. I do, however, value higher education — I have an undergraduate degree, a post-bacclaureate certificate and two graduate degrees. (All of which, I’m proud to say, I have actually used in my career.) That said, I’ve never given a dime to my university other than the tuition and fees I paid it.
But I’m certainly considering a donation to the mikeroweWORKS Foundation now. If you want to join me, there’s more information here.
But even if you don’t want to join me, you could do me a small favor: Just don’t give any money to Columbia. Please.
