As a conservative, I find few things more tiring than hearing like-minded peers whine about the classroom bias of liberal professors.
The complaint, in many ways, misses the point of our academic training. If anything, conservatives are getting a sweet deal. While paying the same amount of tuition as our liberal peers, conservative students are often getting a better education by virtue of having our views constantly challenged.
Campus conservatives need to realize that the purpose of our undergraduate education is not for us to hear what we want to hear. Indeed, a proper liberal arts education should challenge our deepest beliefs and force us to reevaluate and reflect on them. Yes, there are excesses of political expression among the faculty. But these instances are atypical and should not be hyped up to be more common than they really are.
The notion that liberal Duke professors are generally politically intolerant is much-exaggerated. The perception likely originates at least in part with the actions of the Group of 88 during the lacrosse incident and the controversy that ensued. But there are more than 2,500 full-time Duke faculty. To draw broad conclusions, as so many do, based on the actions of a few is surely misrepresentative.
Students ought to remember that the overwhelming majority of their faculty members are not tone-deaf ideologues, but individuals who through their years of specialized education have been inevitably exposed to a variety of differing viewpoints. You are not the first conservative your professor has met. In fact, your professor, depending on his or her area of academic specialization, might even have a better understanding of your political views than you do. There is usually little reason for conservatives to fear that they cannot express their views in a classroom setting.
Still, because of the prominence of a few misrepresentative cases, many conservatives enter the classroom in a defensive position. Worse yet, many remain in this pose perpetually.
This approach to one’s education often manifests itself in a kind of reactionary thoughtlessness, an impulse to view criticism or disagreement as an attack on one’s character rather than an opportunity to reflect more deeply and mature intellectually. At other times, conservatives shrink into a shell and insulate themselves from participation in classroom dialogue. This is a lost opportunity, to say the least.
At its root, this defensive reaction can reflect an ideological narcissism unbecoming of a 20-year-old. Political views are not sacred principles immune to criticism, especially since most of us have held them no longer than five years. At the point where you can’t handle criticism for views you’ve basically just arrived at, maybe you should reevaluate your interest in politics.
Moreover, to attribute certainty to views which are so fundamentally and frequently debated is little if not intellectual egoism. That’s not to say that you can’t have strong beliefs—obviously not. But students should seek to actively recognize the difference between belief and fact. If not for the sake of challenging and developing your own understanding, engaging with a liberal classroom environment will make you a more effective advocate for your own principles. People of all belief systems benefit tremendously from understanding why and how others might disagree with their positions.
Yes, there are legitimate criticisms to be made of the current state of affairs as it pertains to politics in the classroom. Too often, course syllabi skew to the left in their representation of the major authors in a field of study. Liberal students lose out under this scenario from not having their views sufficiently challenged, and all students get a distorted picture of a field. It is also true that there is some benefit to having ideological mentors who share your basic worldview and can guide you as you seek to flesh out its full implications and assumptions.
Classes could also benefit from professors trying to be more actively self-aware of how they are presenting themselves. Ultimately, there is a power disparity inherent in classroom interactions. Even if students should not be deterred by the fact that their professor articulates a certain viewpoint without reservation, the reality is that a good number will be regardless.
But in most cases, these kinds of precautions should not make or break a student’s learning experience. To avoid those few radicals in the faculty who do not respond well to disagreement, a look at the standard course evaluation Web sites while book-bagging is usually more than sufficient.
So conservatives have little reason to complain about the fact that they attend a liberal university. Indeed, we should be thankful for the opportunity. If complaining is to be done, it should come from liberal students. They’re the ones getting a raw deal.
Vikram Srinivasan is a Trinity senior. His column runs every other Thursday.
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