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Opinions


Trigger Warning: I Disagree With You
Photo Credit: wiredforlego On paper, the Claremont Colleges present a unified commitment to inclusion, openness, and intellectual...
Naya Dermenjian


Disintegrated Sciences
Construction work on the Robert Day Integrated Sciences Center. As the final panels are placed on the Robert Day Integrated Sciences...
Henry Long and Charlie Hatcher


Correcting Grammar Is Not Racist
Claremont McKenna's Center for Writing and Public Discourse. Alexandra Wofford contributed reporting. This spring, we were hired by...
Greta Long


Rushdie Doesn’t Speak for Me—and That’s Fine
Sir Salman Rushdie at the 2014 PEN America/Free Expression Literature Conference (credit: Ed Lederman/PEN American Center ) On April 25,...
Henry Long


Great Colleges Are Built on Great Missions
Image via Claremont McKenna College . Much ink has been spilled over the decision of Pomona College President G. Gabrielle Starr to...
Shiv Parihar


The “Free” Wall — How Procedure Strangles Expression at Pitzer
Pitzer Free Wall on March 6. The Free Wall’s History and Recent Controversy Pitzer College’s Free Wall has recently become the canvas...
Dhriti Jagadish


Professor Jon Shields on Understanding the Conservative Tradition
CMC Professor Jon Shields. On February 22, the Independent and the Salvatori Center co-hosted CMC professor Jon Shields for a lunch talk...
Naya Dermenjian


Bring Back Standardized Tests
Image Credit: Baxter Brew On Friday, January 24, CMC faculty voted to recommend that the Board of Trustees reinstate the school’s...
Baxter Brew and Violet Ramanathan


Mental Illness is Losing its Meaning
Image credit: Baxter Brew Thankfully, mental health has largely escaped the antiquated corner into which our parents’ generation pushed...
Baxter Brew


Student Protesters Should Embrace Suspensions
Posters set up outside Carnegie Hall. On October 23, a statement from Pomona College President Gabi Starr announced that ten students had...
Violet Ramanathan


The Athenaeum is a Serious Project – We Should Dress Like It
Image via Calisphere. Copyright Honnold Mudd Library . As a freshman eagerly anticipating my arrival at CMC, I couldn’t wait for my...
Greta Long


Antisemitism and Anti-Zionism Through the Lens of the Soviet Experience
Student protesters on October 7th. Lenny Fukshansky is a professor of mathematics at Claremont McKenna. A version of this article was...
Lenny Fukshansky


A Call for Persuasive Means In College Protests
Protesters blocking the entrance to Carnegie Hall. I attended October 7th’s pro-Palestine protests as a reporter for the Independent ,...
Greta Long


President Biden’s Student Loan Debacle
Image via Flickr. Copyright The Review University of Delaware. The average CMC graduate owes the federal government $13,962 in student...
Will Chance


Pomona Is Right to Press Charges
Image via Flickr. Copyright of Carpathiar . In a 2016 essay titled How My Friends and I Wrecked Pomona College , alumnus Harry Stein...
Charlie Hatcher


EDITORIAL: The Claremont Colleges Should Require Test Scores for Admission
Photograph from 2y.kang. For years, standardized test scores were the primary metric used by admissions officers. Last year, more than 80...
Editorial Board


The EU Should Not Rush Membership for Ukraine
Colorful flags waved outside the European Union (EU) headquarters in Brussels on June 23, 2022. Inside, 27 EU leaders, protected by a...
Polonius (pseudonym)


No, Israel Is Not to Blame for Terrorist Attacks
Hamas parades through Gaza. (Ashraf Amra) These past few weeks, pro-Palestinian groups on college campuses across the country have lauded...
Pierre Aronnax (pseudonym)


False History Drove Call for Removal of American Flag at Pitzer
A sculpture of Columbus beheaded in Boston's North End. (NBC Boston) The call for the removal of an American flag from the Pitzer College...
José Najas


Rebuttal: CMC Should Not Renounce the Claremont Institute
Image via Claremont Institute The Claremont Institute, a modest building in an Upland office park, is home to a cluster of influential...
Charlie Hatcher


When Dictators Speak, We Should Listen
Image via Washington Post Winston Churchill once said, “Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” In Taiwan,...
Pieter van Wingerden


Leftists Don't Really Hate America
Leftists don’t hate America. They hate America’s problems. They may conflate these problems with the country, but the two are not the...
Margot Rosenblatt


American Semiconductors Will Give the US an Edge Over China in the Technological Cold War
The United States is engaged in a technological cold war with China because of our dependence on East Asian semiconductors....
Henry Schulz


Twitter Bans Threaten Free Speech
Twitter suspended the satire site The Babylon Bee after it gave Dr. Rachel Levine, a transgender Biden administration official, the title...
Santiago Barreto


The Chain of Decision Making: Where Are COVID-19 Rules Coming From?
Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, LA County’s precautions have been among the strictest in the country. For example, the county recently...
Leonora Willett


Ayanna Pressley And The (Un)Logic of Critical Theory
Opinion by Wolfgang Hutton “We don’t need any more brown faces that don’t want to be a brown voice. We don’t need any more black faces...
Wolfgang Hutton


The Race Against “Racism” In Universities Has Gone Too Far
UCLA suspended Professor Gordon Klein last spring for refusing to give Black students free passes on the final exam to account for the...
Santiago Barreto


Class Elections Imbued With Activist Sentiment
As apprehension mounted amidst impending Claremont McKenna College (CMC) class presidential elections, aspiring student leaders scrambled...
Theodore Pasquesi


The US Should Boycott The 2022 Olympics In China
China is destroying promised liberties in Hong Kong, committing genocide in Xinjiang, and oppressing more people than any other...
The Claremont Independent


Why Financial Literacy Is Necessary for Socio-Economic Equality
Finance has traditionally been a field reserved for the social elite. Generally, the image of an expensively dressed, middle-aged white...
Shanie Roth


Joe Biden Didn’t “Give Up” on the $15 Minimum Wage
President Joe Biden recently signed into law the American Rescue Plan, a $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package. The bill sends $1,400...
The Claremont Independent


California Needs to Save Itself Before It’s Too Late
Since achieving statehood in 1850, California has retained its appeal to people across the country. As the most populous U.S. state,...
The Claremont Independent


Pomona Needs to Bring International Students Back to Campus
With the beginning of the second half of the academic year, the Pomona College community has endured another semester of online...
The Claremont Independent


The Future of the GOP: How They Lost in 2020 and How They Can Win in the Future
Disclaimer: This article is not an endorsement of any political party or candidate. This article simply makes observations based on...
The Claremont Independent


Everyone Can Wear Hoops: How Fear of Cultural Appropriation Hurts the 5Cs
“White Girl, take off your hoops!!!” students wrote on the free speech wall at Pitzer College in 2017. According to one of the students...
The Claremont Independent


Buybacks Aren’t Evil
Lately, it has become very fashionable to be against stock buybacks. Critics argue that corporations repurchasing shares are killing the...
The Claremont Independent


The Far Left Undermined Biden Before He Was Even Elected, And They Aren’t Stopping There
After nearly losing her seat during this year’s election, Representative Abigail Spanberger said that Democrats should never utter the...
The Claremont Independent


Time Zones And Zoom Fatigue: Why The Claremont Colleges Should Give Students Their Spring Break Back
The recent announcement of the Spring 2021 Academic Calendar has left many students feeling unheard, in despair, and worried for the...
The Claremont Independent


The I-Place Shutdown: Many Hands Make Poor Decisions
Most of us have heard the adage, “your college years are the best years of your life.” For some, this statement is less true, especially...
The Claremont Independent


Academic Diversity In The Classrooms Is More Important Than Ever
With the upcoming election and the battle over Ruth Bader Ginsberg’s replacement growing more contentious by the day, we are in an era of...
The Claremont Independent


The Democrats’ Golden Retriever Complex
Trump’s campaign has finally settled on a negative message. In Joe Biden’s America, cities will burn as radical leftists control his...
The Claremont Independent


A Call For 5Cers Not To Give Up Hope
Far from the familiar flurry that comes upon us as we prepare for move-in, this August, our community is spread all over the world taking...
The Claremont Independent


Democrats Need To Reclaim Patriotism
This summer, my stepdad saw an American flag dancing in the wind and assumed its owner was conservative. It is a common reaction by...
The Claremont Independent


New DOE Title IX Regulations Not The Correct Fix
Earlier this week, the Claremont Consortium announced the creation of an interim sexual assault policy in accordance with the regulations...
The Claremont Independent


Why You Should Support #Defundthepolice Even If You Don’t Think Our System Is Racist
By Margot Rosenblatt I’ve never seen “The Purge,” but it seems like an unpleasant movie. Although it’s fiction, I believe it holds some...
The Claremont Independent


Pomona and Scripps Must, and Have the Means to, Support International Students
Earlier today, Pomona and Scripps Colleges became the Claremont Colleges’ first to announce conducting classes entirely remotely for the...
The Claremont Independent


An Open Letter To The Claremont McKenna And Harvey Mudd Presidents
Dear Presidents Klawe and Chodosh, Harvey Mudd College (HMC) and Claremont McKenna College (CMC) share much in common. Most obviously,...
The Claremont Independent


Charity And Bullying Can’t Go Hand In Hand
As reported by the Independent earlier today, the producers of “Love is Blind: Claremont,” an online dating show run and participated in...
The Claremont Independent


LETTER TO THE EDITOR: A Case Against Universal Pass At Scripps
The following opinion was sent to the Editors of the Claremont Independent by a Scripps College alumna who wishes to remain anonymous....
The Claremont Independent


Opt-In Letter Grade Policy Exposes Huge Inequalities
I still remember the morning I found out I’d been accepted into Pomona College. The virtual confetti raining down my laptop screen will...
The Claremont Independent
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