When You Teach Narcissism and Self-Absorption, You Get Narcissists and Self-Absorbed Students Protesting on Campus

Monday on radio, Glenn talked with Dr. Everett Piper, President of Oklahoma Wesleyan University and long-time friend.

Glenn came to know Piper after reading his take on a student who felt victimized and voiced his discomfort at the university’s sermon regarding 1 Corinthians 13.

Piper wrote, “You want the Chaplin to tell you you're a victim rather than you need virtue, this may not be the university you're looking for.”

Glenn spoke with Piper about the danger of ideological fascism and how universities are teaching students to play the victim if they ever feel convicted, attacked or uncomfortable.

“When you teach narcissism and self-absorption, you shouldn't be surprised to find narcissists and self-absorbed students protesting on the campus,” says Piper.

GLENN: I am about to reintroduce you to a friend of ours and a guy who I absolutely love. I love his intellect, and I love his bravery. It was two years ago on Thanksgiving that he wrote these words:

This past week, I actually had a student come forward after a university chapel service because he felt victimized on the sermon on the topic of I Corinthians 13. It appears this young scholar felt offended because of homily on love that made him feel bad font showing love. In his mind, the speaker was the wrong for making him and his peers feel uncomfortable. I'm not making this up. Our culture has actually taught our kids to be this self-absorbed and narcissistic. Any time their feelings are hurt, they are victims. Anyone who dares to challenge them and thus make them feel bad about themselves is a hater, bigot, oppressor, victimizer. I have a message for this young man and all others. That feeling of discomfort you have after hearing a sermon is called a conscious. It's supposed to make you feel bad. It's supposed to make you feel guilty. The goal of a good sermon is to make you confess your sins, not caudle you in your selfishness. The primary objective of the church and the Christian faith.

So here's my advice. You want the Chaplin to tell you you're a victim rather than you need virtue, this may not be the university you're looking for. And he goes on.

His name is Dr. Everett Piper. He is the president of Oklahoma Wesleyan university and our guest. Welcome, sir.

EVERETT: Well, first of all, I owe you a thanks. Thank you for posting that article. It was Thanksgiving morning two years ago, someone gave that to you. I don't know who it was to this day.

GLENN: I wonder who it was.

EVERETT: And it caught your attention, and you posted it. And as a result of that, 3.5 million people viewed it within the course of about a week or two. The response was interesting. 97 percent of the comments were positive. 3 percent were negative when we did our internal statistical analysis of that.

It was interesting. The secular world was more interested and complementary than the Christian world, the church. Here's a poster child, for example. I receive a hard copied letter from a full bright scholar of a university in the south. And he essentially said I read your day care piece. I went to your website and read more about you. I'm an atheist, and I disagree with your religion, and I disagree with your politics. But on this issue, thank you. Kudos to you. Carry on. It needed to be said. Signed full bright scholar University of X, Y, Z.

So the reaction has been quite interesting. And I do believe what this says is that the secularist, the humanist, if you will, the average college and university faculty member out there is recognizing that this monster he's created is turning around to bite him. And he's frightened.

GLENN: Yes, they are. By the way, the name of the book is not a day -- not a day care. The original op-ed pretty much relentlessly pounded that. This university is not a day care. You're here for a reason. I was just out in L.A. I was with people who do not have my political bent by any stretch of the imagination. We had great conversations. Several of them told me they were concerned about what was happening in universities and the way dissent is being shut down. They said that is absolutely anti everything, you know? The left is supposed to stand for. They said two of them in this meeting openly said they are more concerned about what's happening on the left than they are that's happening on the right because they don't think the people on the left have really woken up to the monster that they -- that they're sleeping with.

EVERETT: And they should be frightened. I would call it idea logical fascism. Is this intellectual freedom or idea logical fascism. Do we believe in a free, robust, open exchange of ideas? The idea of the classical liberal arts academy. If you want to go back 1,000 years to the founding of Oxford, what was it established to do? It was established to educate a free man, a free people, a free culture to educate people and what it meant to be liberated. It was an education in liberty and thus the classical definition of liberal.

Ironically today, it's the conservative such as myself who is more classically liberal than my left of Center-Counter part because I believe in a debate. I believe in a robust exchange of ideas because I can trust the truth to judge the debate. Not politics and power and people, not the pundit. But the principles of truth. GK Chesterton told us when you got rid of the big laws of god, you don't get liberty but rather thousands upon thousands of little laws that rush in to from the vacuum. We have a situation where we actually have been teaching students for decades that it doesn't matter what you believe, as long as it works for you. And that vacuum is being filled by fascism, ideological fascism rather than intellectual freedom.

GLENN: So you are writing this. The devastating consequences of abandoning the truth, the book is not a day care. What are the consequences?

EVERETT: The consequences are ultimately the loss of human dignity, human identity, and human freedom. If you can't even define the human beings any longer, if we don't know the definition of simple words, such as male and female, if we can't define what it means to be human, we're going to dumb down the definition of the human being to the imago dog. What do I mean by that? I am the imago dei. I have moral capability, moral understanding, I can engage in a debate. I care about the answer. When you drive through the cattle rancher in Oklahoma, you don't see the cows arguing with one another. There's a reason for that. They don't care. They're not the imago dei. They're the imago dog, if you will. They follow their base inclinations and appetites and instincts, and that's how they're defined. Today, we've dumbed down the human being to nothing but the sum total of his or her inclinations, that's their identity. And therefore, we have insulted the imago dei by suggesting he's the imago dog. The result of that is the total collapse of freedom and liberty within a culture because there's no longer any boundaries as Chesterton said in which we can live freely.

GLENN: So I read -- have you read the ten-page memo from the Google software guy? I'm trying to remember what his job was. He wrote -- this was just released last week. He won't put his name on it. But it was about the lies of Google diversity. And he's, like, you're telling us that there is no difference between a man and a woman, and you want to get more women into, you know, software design, et cetera, et cetera. But that is a job that mainly men are interested in because of X, Y, and Z. It has nothing to do with sexism. And he goes through ten pages. He just takes apart everything that they're talking about.

Google finally responded to this unnamed memo with their head of -- I can't even remember what it is. It's not the head of diversity. It's some ridiculous clown title, and she writes "I won't even dignify that -- what was being said by requoting it here because it has nothing to do with reality and who we are as Google."

While at the same time saying that we have to have a vigorous debate on the Google campus. They're shutting all debate down. How does this society -- in the old world, it doesn't survive. But in a society where Google is working on AI and teaching computers, you know, artificial intelligence, the difference between right and wrong. When we can't define it, what happens to that society?

EVERETT: Your question goes back to what's going on in the academy right now. What's taught today in the classroom is going to be practiced tomorrow in our culture and our courtrooms and our living rooms. What's taught today in the classroom will be practiced tomorrow. Ideas have consequences. If you go back to Richard weaver 1948, his seminal work title, what was his point? Ideas of consequences. You hardly even need to read the book to understand his point. Bad ideas will breed bad culture, bad people, bad community, bad government. And good ideas will bring the opposite. Good culture, good community, good kids, good behavior, and good government.

Ideas have consequences. What's -- why is the timing of his book, 1948 important? Because he was writing it as a response to World War II. And he was looking backward just a few short years to Hitler who said let me control the textbooks, and I will control the state. And at the same time, we've got or we will and Huxley writing dystopias total power and total control. Ideas have consequences, and we have to attend to what we're teaching our students today because it will bear itself out tomorrow. And when you teach narcissism and self absorption, you shouldn't be surprised to find narcissists and self-absorbed students protesting in the campus.

GLENN: So Tonya and I have this conversation a lot. My kids are 11 and 13. My older kids are already out of college, and I keep saying I don't want to send them to college, honey. First of all, I don't know if college is going to be all that because, you know, show me the teacher that is as smart as Google on the facts. I can just look up the facts. I want to find somebody who is more of a guide that will help me apply these things that I can find. And I said, you know, but even if we're not even at that place yet, I don't want my kids going and being indoctrinated.

What is going to happen to the university? What is going to happen in the next five years, ten years as these things are getting worse and worse? And people know it.

>> I think you should let your pocketbook speak. Okay? If moms and dads, if parents will actually start recognizing that they're paying the bill, you're going to drop 30 grand, 35 grand, 40 grand for your kid to go to an institution. You spend 18 years of your life training your kid the way they should go. And then the first 18 minutes they take pride and start taking his soul and his mind and ridiculing everything you've tried to instill in him. Why would you want to pay for that? Ask yourself is education about integrity or is it about information? Is education just to learn how to make more money, or is it about how to learn to be a moral person? Is education about character, or is it about just getting a career? There was a day when education was about the big ideas, the first things. Not the small ideas and the second things. I'm a student of Chuck Colson, and he was found of telling us over and over again that if you get the big ideas, the first question wrong, everything thereafter will suffer. You have to provide an education to your kids that focuses on the big ideas.

GLENN: What's the push back on you from academia? You must not be very popular.

>> Well, it all depends on who you're talking to. Interesting, this is the right answer. I've had lots of people peers, other presidents and whatnot pull me aside privately and say I agree with what you're saying, but I can't say it publicly for fear of losing my job. And that's the reaction. That's sad, but it is true.

PAT: Let's out them now. Who are these?

GLENN: You know, it's funny because I think there's a lot of that. And not just in universities. There's a lot, and we're dealing with a situation now in Oregon where the CPS I think has gone way over the edge and out of control because of one particular person. I think this is what's happening. And we have people now starting to come out saying. Okay. If you guys think you can actually expose it and win, I have some information for you. But I'm not in, unless you can win. I mean, it's valkyrie. You don't win. A society doesn't survive if people stand on the sidelines.

EVERETT: Well, I know you're a fan of Bonhoeffer, as am I, and one of the famous quotes is "not to speak as to speak, not to act as act, silence in the face of evil as evil itself." That's worth the price of admission. Not to speak as to speak, not to act as act, silence in the face of evil as evil itself. God will not hold us guilt willingness.

Do we believe in our trues. Do we believe those things are right and true and revealing, those self-evident trues. Do we believe in them enough to speak and to act? Because if we don't, we're actually acting and speaking for the opposite. We have to have courage and some conviction. The academy, presidents and professors need to get a spine and start teaching truth rather than just opinions.

GLENN: Is it hard -- I've got to take a quick break. But is it hard to find those professors and teachers that still will?

EVERETT: Yes. But you can. There are a handful. And if parents who are paying the money do the research necessary, you can find those institutions that actually say we believe that truth is revelation as opposed to a construction. That's the answer you need to hear. Is truth self-evident? Is it given by someone bigger and better than you and me? Or is it just constructed by the populous. If it's constructed by the populous, it's dangerous. If it's given by God, if it's given by revelation, then it's enduring, immutable, and true.

The West is dying—Will we let enemies write our ending?

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The blood of martyrs, prophets, poets, and soldiers built our civilization. Their sacrifice demands courage in the present to preserve it.

Lamentations asks, “Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by?”

That question has been weighing on me heavily. Not just as a broadcaster, but as a citizen, a father, a husband, a believer. It is a question that every person who cares about this nation, this culture, and this civilization must confront: Is all of this worth saving?

We have squandered this inheritance. We forgot who we were — and our enemies are eager to write our ending.

Western civilization — a project born in Judea, refined in Athens, tested in Rome, reawakened in Wittenberg, and baptized again on the shores of Plymouth Rock — is a gift. We didn’t earn it. We didn’t purchase it. We were handed it. And now, we must ask ourselves: Do we even want it?

Across Europe, streets are restless. Not merely with protests, but with ancient, festering hatred — the kind that once marched under swastikas and fueled ovens. Today, it marches under banners of peace while chanting calls for genocide. Violence and division crack societies open. Here in America, it’s left against right, flesh against spirit, neighbor against neighbor.

Truth struggles to find a home. Even the church is slumbering — or worse, collaborating.

Our society tells us that everything must be reset: tradition, marriage, gender, faith, even love. The only sin left is believing in absolute truth. Screens replace Scripture. Entertainment replaces education. Pleasure replaces purpose. Our children are confused, medicated, addicted, fatherless, suicidal. Universities mock virtue. Congress is indifferent. Media programs rather than informs. Schools recondition rather than educate.

Is this worth saving? If not, we should stop fighting and throw up our hands. But if it is, then we must act — and we must act now.

The West: An idea worth saving

What is the West? It’s not a location, race, flag, or a particular constitution. The West is an idea — an idea that man is made in the image of God, that liberty comes from responsibility, not government; that truth exists; that evil exists; and that courage is required every day. The West teaches that education, reason, and revelation walk hand in hand. Beauty matters. Kindness matters. Empathy matters. Sacrifice is holy. Justice is blind. Mercy is near.

We have squandered this inheritance. We forgot who we were — and our enemies are eager to write our ending.

If not now, when? If not us, who? If this is worth saving, we must know why. Western civilization is worth dying for, worth living for, worth defending. It was built on the blood of martyrs, prophets, poets, pilgrims, moms, dads, and soldiers. They did not die for markets, pronouns, surveillance, or currency. They died for something higher, something bigger.

MATTHIEU RONDEL/AFP via Getty Images | Getty Images

Yet hope remains. Resurrection is real — not only in the tomb outside Jerusalem, but in the bones of any individual or group that returns to truth, honor, and God. It is never too late to return to family, community, accountability, and responsibility.

Pick up your torch

We were chosen for this time. We were made for a moment like this. The events unfolding in Europe and South Korea, the unrest and moral collapse, will all come down to us. Somewhere inside, we know we were called to carry this fire.

We are not called to win. We are called to stand. To hold the torch. To ask ourselves, every day: Is it worth standing? Is it worth saving?

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. Pick up your torch. If you choose to carry it, buckle up. The work is only beginning.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Stop coasting: How self-education can save America’s future

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Coasting through life is no longer an option. Charlie Kirk’s pursuit of knowledge challenges all of us to learn, act, and grow every day.

Last year, my wife and I made a commitment: to stop coasting, to learn something new every day, and to grow — not just spiritually, but intellectually. Charlie Kirk’s tragic death crystallized that resolve. It forced a hard look in the mirror, revealing how much I had coasted in both my spiritual and educational life. Coasting implies going downhill. You can’t coast uphill.

Last night, my wife and I re-engaged. We enrolled in Hillsdale College’s free online courses, inspired by the fact that Charlie had done the same. He had quietly completed around 30 courses before I even knew, mastering the classics, civics, and the foundations of liberty. Watching his relentless pursuit of knowledge reminded me that growth never stops, no matter your age.

The path forward must be reclaiming education, agency, and the power to shape our minds and futures.

This lesson is particularly urgent for two groups: young adults stepping into the world and those who may have settled into complacency. Learning is life. Stop learning, and you start dying. To young adults, especially, the college promise has become a trap. Twelve years of K-12 education now leave graduates unprepared for life. Only 35% of seniors are proficient in reading, and just 22% in math. They are asked to bet $100,000 or more for four years of college that will often leave them underemployed and deeply indebted.

Degrees in many “new” fields now carry negative returns. Parents who have already sacrificed for public education find themselves on the hook again, paying for a system that often fails to deliver.

This is one of the reasons why Charlie often described college as a “scam.” Debt accumulates, wages are not what students were promised, doors remain closed, and many are tempted to throw more time and money after a system that won’t yield results. Graduate school, in many cases, compounds the problem. The education system has become a factory of despair, teaching cynicism rather than knowledge and virtue.

Reclaiming educational agency

Yet the solution is not radical revolt against education — it is empowerment to reclaim agency over one’s education. Independent learning, self-guided study, and disciplined curiosity are the modern “Napster moment.” Just as Napster broke the old record industry by digitizing music, the internet has placed knowledge directly in the hands of the individual. Artists like Taylor Swift now thrive outside traditional gatekeepers. Likewise, students and lifelong learners can reclaim intellectual freedom outside of the ivory towers.

Each individual possesses the ability to think, create, and act. This is the power God grants to every human being. Knowledge, faith, and personal responsibility are inseparable. Learning is not a commodity to buy with tuition; it is a birthright to claim with effort.

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Charlie Kirk’s life reminds us that self-education is an act of defiance and empowerment. In his pursuit of knowledge, in his engagement with civics and philosophy, he exemplified the principle that liberty depends on informed, capable citizens. We honor him best by taking up that mantle — by learning relentlessly, thinking critically, and refusing to surrender our minds to a system that profits from ignorance.

The path forward must be reclaiming education, agency, and the power to shape our minds and futures. Every day, seek to grow, create, and act. Charlie showed the way. It is now our responsibility to follow.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Glenn Beck joins TPUSA tour to honor Charlie Kirk

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If they thought the murder of Charlie Kirk would scare us into silence, they were wrong!

If anything, Turning Point will hit the road louder than ever. On Monday, September 22, less than two weeks after the assassination, Charlie's friends united under the Turning Point USA banner to carry his torch and honor his legacy by doing what he did best: bringing honest and truthful debate to Universities across the nation.

Naturally, Glenn has rallied to the cause and has accepted an invitation to join the TPUSA tour at the University of North Dakota on October 9th.

Want to join Glenn at the University of North Dakota to honor Charlie Kirk and keep his mission alive? Click HERE to sign up or find more information.

Glenn's daughter honors Charlie Kirk with emotional tribute song

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On September 17th, Glenn commemorated his late friend Charlie Kirk by hosting The Charlie Kirk Show Podcast, where he celebrated and remembered the life of a remarkable young man.

During the broadcast, Glenn shared an emotional new song performed by his daughter, Cheyenne, who was standing only feet away from Charlie when he was assassinated. The song, titled "We Are One," has been dedicated to Charlie Kirk as a tribute and was written and co-performed by David Osmond, son of Alan Osmond, founding member of The Osmonds.

Glenn first asked David Osmond to write "We Are One" in 2018, as he predicted that dark days were on the horizon, but he never imagined that it would be sung by his daughter in honor of Charlie Kirk. The Lord works in mysterious ways; could there have been a more fitting song to honor such a brave man?

"We Are One" is available for download or listening on Spotify HERE