As a non-leftist who moves in academic circles, I have to say it's still very difficult. Even in the hard sciences, I find that every social gathering I go to winds up turning into a classic left-wing whine-about-everything, and I have to bite my tongue. More than once I've wanted to get out of academia, just because the lack of intellectual diversity was getting too much for me. And that's leaving aside the direct hostility which I have encountered when I've actually made my views known (which I've avoided doing at the couple of places I've worked most recently).<p>Of course, it's a vicious circle. If I'm thinking of leaving due to the hostile environment, then surely other non-leftist academics are actually leaving, keeping the environment hostile.<p>As is usually the case in a New York Times "let's collect a couple of anecdotes and extrapolate a huge trend" articles, the data doesn't back up the conclusions.
I think that activism not political is the keyword. As a current college student, within most of the conversations that I have had with other students, they seem to be heavily opinionated and "passionate" about politics and their ideals but lack any real knowledge over the topics or positions they discuss. In a half hour drunken conversation, you could turn a "hardcore democrat" into someone who believes they are actually more libertarian leaning (which I do believe most inherently gravitate towards when questioned over their positions).<p>Nowadays (even thought I have no clue what it was like in the past), the youth support politics as a fashion statement rather than a representation of their ideals. They seem to fall in line with the parties and mindlessly support the policy that they believe they should. Their knowledge of politics only goes to the extent of what there five minute glance on the news says it should be, which is quite saddening. I am not stereotyping, but the trend I see most is that individuals fall in line with what ever there social groups expected political stance would be, the "frat-boy" types all tend to support republicans because they support the troops and are against gay marriage, the "socially conscious intellectual" student strongly supports democratic principals (or what ever the author of the book they are reading at the time supports) and so on and so forth. Politics for many at the college level seems to just be an extension of their fashion or lifestyle, or simply what they think they should support because of the image they portray.<p>The truth is very few actually give a shit and will continue to not care until there cushy lifestyle is taken away or they are oppressed in some way or another. Most likely at that point it will be too late. I know I come off as a cynic but sometimes it is just too easy in this world.
I wish people included intellectual diversity in their quest for universal diversity on college campuses. There is a good movie about this:
<a href="http://indoctrinate-u.com" rel="nofollow">http://indoctrinate-u.com</a><p>It's from the guy behind Brain Terminal, whose videos are hilarious:
<a href="http://brain-terminal.com/posts/category/bt-video/" rel="nofollow">http://brain-terminal.com/posts/category/bt-video/</a><p>Thank god engineering departments exist. If they didn't, I'd question the need for most people to go to college. $200K to earn $25K/yr at a non-profit - doing work you could have done in high school.<p>I went to a tour of Stanford recently. The tour guide mentioned the increases in tuition. I asked what they went to. He didn't know. I know most research labs are funded by a combination of government grants and undergrad tuition. What about the rest?
I think the problem is you have liberals but not actual conservatives. The conservatives we currently have, care more about gay marriage than keeping the government small and having a balanced budget.
Balance is a good thing. Challenging beliefs is a good thing. Variety in political, social, economic, religious, and personal beliefs is a great thing.
This article completely misses the point. Instead of citing outlying cases, maybe it should have dealt with the elephant in the living room:<p>Vietnam<p>College students in the 60's weren't "playing politics". They were protesting an illegal, immoral, and unwinnable war. Hell, half the men on campus were there so they wouldn't have to go to Vietnam.<p>I imagine today's generation of professors would feel a little differently if TV news showed maimed soldiers in Iraq every night, their classes were full of young men who didn't want to be drafted, and their campuses were occupied by armed National Guardsmen who shot unarmed students.<p>[Prediction: This will be voted up by those who actually experienced the absurdity of the 60's and voted down by those who can't imagine it could have been that bad. Since the average age in this community is probably below 40, this post will end up negative.]
Human beings are political creatures. So politics suffuses everything. Unfortunately, I've met many people who seem to believe that politics is the foundation to everything. If it weren't widely known and ridiculed, I sometimes wonder if these people think that the Indiana state legislature attempt to make Pi = 3 would've worked!<p>I think the atmosphere of political contention on campuses sometimes exacerbates this.
Agree with Mystalic. I'm probably more conservative than liberal, but I want people to HAVE choices and be able to think critically, even if they make different choices than I do. This is saddening news.
"A seminar on great books at Princeton jointly taught by two philosophers, the left-wing Cornel West and the right-wing Robert P. George."<p>I'd like to hear that.