So, someone asked a group of right wingers "Why are universities left wing?" Their exact question was:
Basically the title. Universities have become more liberal and left leaning (in the modern sense) embracing wokeism, pro Palestine protests, lgbt stuff and so on. What are the main drivers behind this?
Well, the postmodernism comes from a specific ideological camp that came out of leftism but applied it to identity. You know, critical theory, the postmodern left, blah blah blah. We know this already.
As for why universities are left wing, it's because conservatism is relatively ideologically bankrupt and has little going for it. At best, you get structural functionalism that focuses on the reasons why things are the way they are and have to be that way, but often most conservatives are, quite frankly, kinda ignorant. They have a black and white worldview for how things work and how they have to be, they're very rigid in their ways of thinking, and not very open for change. College focuses on open mindedness, challenging peoples' perspectives, and encouraging people to justify their beliefs without falling into logical fallacies like argument from authority. On the flip side, much of the modern right are actually kind of authoritarian and their views come straight from religion and tradition without much thought put into them.
As someone who was conservative as a young adult, and who went through college as a conservative, I didnt feel like the institutions were inherently hostile to my views, but I did find I struggled to justify my views within the logical framework. The fact is, college teaches you things, and conservative views start to fall flat on their face. As I got older more and more liberal ideas made sense to me, and I shifted ideologically toward the end of grad school, with my grad school graduation and my deconversion from Christianity happening just about the same month. I abandoned my previous ideas as I could no longer justify holding them, if I were being intellectually honest.
Well, that's my view, let's get to what others say.
The main drivers are young, intelligent people searching earnestly for how to fix a world that seems broken, who haven’t lived long enough to see that attempts to fix things don’t work due to the horrible equilibrium we’re all trapped in. Universities are places for big ideas and abstract analysis.
Later on it becomes apparent how futile most of this is, and you move closer to a place of just wanting to be left alone, and giving up on fixing the world.
There’s no big conspiracy here to indoctrinate kids, it’s just a side effect of an environment dedicated to the pursuit of ideas and ideals.
Their goal is also to solve problems. Solutions are basically easier on the surface if you just use a tonne of taxpayer dollars and big government.
Fix homelessness? O if we just buy them all houses and give them all food its fixed. Its a lot harder to fix it the libertarian way. Ok so first we have to fix the jobs market by deregulating and reducing taxes but it will temporarily cause more homelessness, we then need to fix housing which means more infrastructure, but thats broken and requires people to accept private roads and bonds for large projects and o its all too hard and will take too long lets just bring in socialism.
You gotta keep in mind these are basically right libertarians answering this. So of course they'll make their answer ideological. Yes, problems are harder to solve within their ideology. Because their ideology sucks, and gee, maybe we should think in terms of taxes and government. They insist on having a dysfunctional ideology and then saying its hard to solve problems within their ideology.
Close to no homelessness is caused by economic reasons. It is almost entirely a drugs + mental health issue.
Really? Fricking really? I admit that is the problem with many of the perpetually homeless, but honestly there's nothing to be said of landlords, and house flippers, and other rent seekers seeking to drive up costs? Nothing about companies like blackrock (which despite being 1% of the national market may be disproportionately large locally) or the banks just keeping homes off of the market to cause a relative shortage to keep prices high? What about how the minimum wage is still only $7.25 but the average home has gotten way more expensive in the past few years? What about those algorithms that are keeping prices high that we discussed recently?
Really? It's not economic? Bullcrap.
No indoctrination, the leftist professors who've never left university unwilling to listen to opinions that aren't their own. Also, failing and giving poor grades to students that don't pull the line.
Thomas Sowell had a great quote, paraphrased, if a university professor tells you about the importance of diversity of thought, ask them how many Republicans are in their sociology department.
This may be the most honest thing I've ever read on Reddit. Your comment reminds me of an old saying
Young and conservative, you have no heart. Old and liberal, you have no brain.
You clearly haven't attended college in the past 10 years if you genuinely believe schools are not trying to indoctrinate kids. Unfortunately, many many classes are full of professors peddling their own political agendas, and mixing these agendas into assignments. For example, the year Trump won, professors from all schools sent emails out to their classes telling them they could take the next day off due to trauma. I took an English class in which the professor made us write an entire paper on the difference between "sex" and "gender." I promise you their are for more intellectually compelling things to write articles on than that, but the schools want an agenda pushed.... Or how about my civil law class, in which we spent 1/4 of the class watching Adam ruins everything videos!!!!!
In a space in which kids are supposed to be perfecting their skills on how to research, analyze, and debate. You see a lot more marching and protesting than actual campus lead discussion on the matters they are upset about. I wonder why that is if kids aren't being indoctrinated.....
Also idk what college they went to but my college had far more discussion on analyzing and researching than direct action. Seems to be a stereotype rather than reality.
For various good/bad/indifferent reasons, the spectrum of "Right vs Left" has always had a "Rural vs. Urban" flair to it.
This is easy to see on US election results maps where most of the map is red except for a few dots of blue. It turns out most people live in cities and land/crops/livestock does not get to vote.
Most universities need to be located near people, because land/crops/livestock don't need higher education.
From there, you get a narrative of young people from the red/rural areas venturing off to University to encounter more left/urban schools of thought than they've ever seen before.
From a red/rural perspective, this looks like indoctrination. Usually it's just a case of a young person encountering hundreds of new people and perspectives that their parents never introduced them to.
Me? Personally? It steered me away from my pre-installed republican, low-key racist software and towards a libertarian/NAP/civil liberties attitude.
Schools breed thinking. Thinking more should lead to your horizons broadening. It's not at all a new thing, schools have always been more liberal.
To play devil's advocate, schools focus more on process than outcome. Most professors won't power trip about exactly what your thesis is on, they'll want to see how you approach the idea, and have it explored along with multiple counterpoints. Being open minded is generally valued as the main hallmark of critical thinking in this regard.
Inversely, outcome-oriented minds don't thrive here, because they're more concerned with what is than what might be. And having to address a bunch of ideas you disagee with and treat them as equal is far more of a chore, which naturally pushes away certain people. The end result is pragmatics who support "tried and true" methodology tend to score poorly, then blame it on political ideology.
I think there's something to be said as well for the strict oversight on descrimination. It's one of the only ways to remove a tenured professor, so catching one whiff of it will put them on their guard. They can be held accountable for what they permit, so they get reactive when they sense danger.
"woke-ism" is a boogeyman for people who can't swallow their pride when they aren't forced to, and probably the best way to show in 7 letters that trying to get you to empathize with someone you've never met will be fruitless.
I will disagree with this idea that conservatives are more pragmatic or outcome oriented. As someone who sees himself as pragmatic and outcome oriented, I think my ideas are fine, and im fine with justifying my views in that sense too.
I feel like conservatives have this weird idea that liberals have their heads in the clouds and have ideas that dont work while they are the enlightened ones. No, just weirdo extremist leftists do that. Liberals tend to be pretty well adjusted and balanced. If anything many of them err on the side of pragmatism.
Universities and the like are some of the only places where terrible ideas don't get killed off from real world factors.
Yeah thats basically it. At my company we have terrible ideas all the time. Either we argue them out or we try them and go that was terrible, lets not do that again. So any good sounding idea is tested pretty quickly and results analysed.
Also the ideas tend to be larger in academia. Ie to fix Israel Palestine lets make a new island in the Mediterranean larger than Gaza and give it to Gazans. It is too expensive and unrealistic so it never gets done. But they can talk and build on it for years. As you say it just never gets tested. Except that time we tested their socialism idea and half the world went into desperate poverty and genocide.
I teach at a university. About 4 years ago, a student pulled me aside after the 4th week. He says, you know how I know you are a republican. I said, you shouldn't. He says, because you present both sides of topics.
That was my giveaway. Still irritates me to this day.
Education on subjects like checking sources, the scientific method, history, and introduction to other communities and cultures which then lead to more empathy
Socialism is: heavy on theory, divorced from reality
A person who runs their own small business or works with their hands for a living aren't going to be as interested in an ideology that only works in 500 page theoretical manifestos.
People in academia who are largely removed from reality are the perfect targets for such an ideology.
They love theory and are mostly removed from the consequences of their ideology, EX: No one with a PHD is losing their job to someone who walked across the border, nor is going to be faced with the reality of their business going under due to labor costs being artificially driven up.
It's true, but it's not a flex. As I said, work and the demands of every day life dull the mind. That's not a good thing. It's actually a bad thing. But that's what it is.
a major pillar in communism/socialism is to control the educational institutions.
It might be self-selecting. People who want to hustle and make money graduate and get jobs. People who like studying and not having jobs stay in school for more advanced degrees. They live in a bubble where leftist ideas seem to make sense.
I think what you're saying is those that continue to perform research for the sake of their field of work, typically feed the establishment. I've seen this firsthand with a friend who couldn't make it in the private industry and she had to default to staying in the university system.
Makes me think of that line from Ghostbusters when they are kicked-out of the college:
"Personally, I liked the university. They gave us money and facilities, we didn't have to produce anything! You've never been out of college! You don't know what it's like out there! I've WORKED in the private sector. They expect *results*." - Ray Stantz
This is 100% true. Liberals are drawn to jobs that don't require results. Look at the most liberal professions. They are in academia at every level, not just the university level.
The other liberal job profession is anything unionized. They are drawn to the communist nature of it. If you ever worked with or in a unionized environment, you'll see exactly what I'm talking about. They work to the lowest common denominator.
I think it's a feedback loop. Maybe Universities started with a slight left-wing bias, say 45% right wing, 55% left wing. Universities departments tend to include their staff in hiring decisions. The 55% of leftwing staff will approve hiring outspoken leftists, but not outspoken right wingers, so they hire a bit more leftwingers than right wingers, and maybe end up at 65% / 35%. Now right wingers who would be professors in a 45/55 world aren't really interested in being professors in a 35/65 world - outnumbered about 2 to 1 by opposing political views, with no outspoken minds they agree with to be found and plenty of outspoken political opponents around. So they apply in lower numbers. Now you've got 20% right wing and 80% left wing. These cycles repeat with the 80% of left wing professors choosing fewer and fewer right wing colleagues, making it less and less attractive to right wing applicants.
College teaching jobs don’t usually pay great, so they attract people with useless PHDs and student loan debt of their own who can’t do any better. Rather than accepting the fact that they made a poor choice in getting a humanities degree, they will rant about how broken the system is that they don’t get paid the same as less “educated” people who create measurable value like oil field workers. The students they teach get the same useless PHD and suffer the same fate and the cycle repeats.
Younger people tend to be more liberal, especially socially. But their position on economics and foreign policy are usually more naive or underdeveloped.
Government schooling in particular tends to indoctrinate you into having more favorable opinions about government overreach.
Their liberal opinions are further solidified by their educators and other university administrators, which are professions that attract more left-leaning people.
1) while true ive become more left wing as ive gotten older mostly. Especially as i developed my ideas. 2004 me was a neocon free market believer.
2) libertarian brained take. While kinda true, these guys are in their own echo chamber from an alternative perspective. As I like to say, "government does things, useful things." THeres a reason on the left theres the stereotype of the 19 year old libertarian and how people grow out of it as they get older. Ironically its because they learn how things work and liberalism is, ironically, the realm where ideas work better. To flip it around on the anti government weirdos who think they're so pragmatic.
3) again, i started conservative and shifted in/after college.
Students and young people lean left. Schools allow open thought and free speech and the liberal arts and humanities are very process (not results) oriented, allowing for lots of nonsensical thought processes to proliferate (on the right and the left). This freedom and environment paired with young peoples leftist attitudes creates a leftist environment, which does the heavy lifting. Also allows for these feedback loops and reinforcing to happen.
In regards to the adults in the room, higher education through faculty running schools for centuries created a union-like environment which exists to this day with many universities having unionized staff, faculty, and graduate students. This is a left oriented attitude, focusing on workers rights and union affairs.
Also a feedback loop is that leftist attitudes in young adults, being openly encouraged by free speech and lack of market based consequences, and often unionized or strong worker movements probably drives away conservative minded folks, meaning positions are filled by leftist minded folks who in turn probably feel encouraged to apply and work in such spaces.
Anecdotal but I work in student affairs at a university and women, non-binary/trans, gay, and minority communities are pretty over represented as opposed to white men (and men in general). Adults who went through schools and felt appreciated/safe/accepted in their views and existence then fill these roles and probably help to proliferate left leaning views
This take comes off as weird with the anti union stuff. Then again these guys are market worshippers so....
I believe a significant reason why universities tend to lean left is that professors themselves often have left-wing inclinations. Professors are highly intelligent individuals who have chosen academia over pursuing wealth in a capitalist system. There is a saying, "Those who can, do; those who cannot, teach," but I disagree with the implication that professors are incapable of success. On the contrary, I think professors are highly capable but more risk-averse. Pursuing tenure is a less risky path compared to seeking wealth through entrepreneurial ventures.
Once in academia, professors often find themselves in echo chambers, surrounded by like-minded colleagues. If you have chosen not to pursue wealth and instead dream of social programs that could support you, it is natural to lean more to the left. Professors then pass on their ideas to their students, who may feel compelled to validate these opinions to secure good grades.
When I was a political science major, many of my professors were Marxists. Marxism can be appealing if one overlooks its major flaw: it assumes people are inherently good and won't try to cheat the system or become corrupt. In the insulated environment of a university, it is easy to romanticize socialism and Marxism, ignoring the practical challenges and failures these ideologies have faced in the real world.
It’s like they always say: if you’re not a socialist by the time you’re 20, you don’t have a heart; if you’re not a capitalist by the time you’re 30, you don’t have a brain.
As a 20 year old i was a libertarian like them.
Young intelligent people with no life experience think they have the fairy tale solution to everything.
Old fuck professors sitting on tenure living off endowments and government grants who have never had to respond to market forces.
No wonder they're left wing.
A few of these guys had good points but a lot of it came down to conservatives are smart pragmatic and results oriented, lefties are dumb and have their head in the clouds, an idea i ironically held as a young adult in college. Except yeah, they're basically projecting the most extreme leftists onto the entire left not recognizing most liberals combine pragmatism with ideals to make the world better and get results.
Also, the fact that most of the world beats peoples' imaginations down too much it dulls their mind isnt the flex they think it is. They actually are the indoctrinated ones, ironically enough.
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