The Watchlist That Terrorized Academia

Charlie Kirk didn’t just debate ideas. He turned professors into targets.

Everyone’s busy playing the empathy card right now. Politicians, pundits, and people who probably couldn’t name a single professor on the Professor Watchlist are posting tributes like Charlie Kirk was America’s campus guidance counselor.

But here’s my reality: Charlie Kirk ran an organization that threatened people I love.

Let’s cut through the post-assassination nostalgia tour. Charlie Kirk wasn’t a plucky campus debater bravely taking on the ivory tower. He was the guy handing out torches and pitchforks, then livestreaming the chaos for clicks.

The Professor Watchlist wasn’t a benign “bias checker.” It was a hit list. It took real professors — real human beings — and turned them into targets. And once your name went up, you weren’t debating ideas. You were dodging hate mail, harassment, and in some cases, violence.

By the end of its first year, nearly 200 professors were listed. Today there are more than 300. That’s 300 lives, careers, inboxes, and in some cases, physical safety thrown to the wolves.

📬 The Harassment Wasn’t a Side Effect. It Was the Point.

Once you were listed, it was open season.

Take Dr. Stacey Patton, professor and journalist. After her name went up in 2024, her inbox filled with every racist and misogynist slur in the book. She got voicemails promising violence. The harassment was so relentless the head of campus security offered her an escort to class because they were afraid one of these trolls might do something more than type.

Kellie Carter Jackson, a historian at Wellesley, received threatening letters and even postcards sent directly to her office. Imagine prepping a lecture on Reconstruction while hate mail shows up with a stamp on it.

And then there’s David Boyles, an ASU English instructor and co-founder of Drag Story Hour Arizona. He was stalked by TPUSA affiliates, confronted on camera, and shoved hard enough to injure his face.

That’s not free speech. That’s organized intimidation with a side of assault.

🎯 Who Ended Up in the Crosshairs

The bar to get on this list was so low you could trip over it. Professors were listed for writing op-eds critical of police brutality, tweeting support for trans rights, assigning books on race, or encouraging students to contact legislators about tuition hikes.

None of this was indoctrination. It was literally what professors are supposed to do: teach critical thinking and connect classroom learning to the real world.

And it hit hardest on women, Black faculty, and queer scholars. People already walking a tightrope between being visible enough to inspire students and quiet enough not to make administrators nervous. The Watchlist turned that tightrope into a firing squad.

🧊 Fear Was the Feature

This wasn’t about calling people out. It was about shutting them up, and it worked.

Adjuncts quietly cut anything “controversial” from their syllabi. Tenured professors scaled back their public profiles, canceled speaking engagements, and stopped talking to the media. Entire departments worried about what would happen if their faculty were next.

The American Association of University Professors has labeled targeted harassment one of the greatest threats to academic freedom. That is academic-speak for “this is dangerous and getting worse.”

🧨 The Ecosystem of Fear

The Watchlist wasn’t just sitting on a website. It was plugged into an outrage machine.

A name went up. Conservative media ran segments about the “radical professor poisoning young minds.” Angry followers flooded university phone lines and inboxes. The professor got doxxed on forums. Their personal info shared. Sometimes their kids’ schools or partner’s workplace posted. And then the threats started.

Universities had to spend real money on security. Professors reported being followed on campus. Some stopped using their offices altogether. Others had to get police involved.

This was not theoretical. There are documented cases of professors being stalked, threatened, and attacked after being listed. Violence wasn’t a glitch. It was part of the design.

🎻 And Now, the National Eulogies

Fast forward to 2025. Kirk is assassinated at a campus event. Suddenly he is remembered like Mister Rogers with a megaphone, a kindly figure who just wanted a conversation.

No. For hundreds of professors, he wasn’t a curious campus debater. He was the guy who opened the gate and said, “Have at it.”

🎤 The Punchline

Nobody should be shot for their politics. Period. But we cannot pretend Kirk was just some innocent champion of dialogue.

He built a culture where intimidation was the product. Where harassment was a feature, not an accident. Where fear was monetized and turned into speaking fees, merch sales, and donor applause lines.

If we want a serious conversation about political violence, we have to include this kind of violence too. The kind that made professors lock their office doors. The kind that forced universities to assign security escorts. The kind that pushed educators out of public life.

Every authoritarian regime has its list-makers, the ones who tell the mob where to point their rage. Hitler had his propagandists and blacklists. Kirk had the Professor Watchlist.

🕊️ Virgin Monk Boy’s Blessing

Blessed be the professors who keep showing up,
even with hate mail stacked on their desk.

Blessed be the ones who teach truth,
while the mob pounds on the door.

Blessed be the scholars who refuse to shrink,
who still light a candle in the lecture hall,
even when someone has tried to blow it out.

May their courage outlast the outrage cycles,
and may their classrooms stay holy ground.

— Virgin Monk Boy

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