Diversity in America's Universities - A total Lie

[ironmonk]

Some ask why do so many kids that go to college in the US loose all sense of morals and proportionate reasoning? I believe the article below makes a very valid point...

The group that cries unfair the most is the most unfair of them all... a true icon of hypocrisy.

I ask those here that care about truth to take a stand, speak up, and speak out. Get the word out about how so many of our top schools fail. Please do this small part to save our country.


[b]America's one-party state[/b]
[b]If you loathe political debate, join the faculty of an American university[/b]

From: [url="http://www.economist.com/world/na/displayStory.cfm?story_id=3446265"]http://www.economist.com/world/na/displayS...tory_id=3446265[/url]

TOM WOLFE'S new novel about a young student, “I am Charlotte Simmons”, is a depressing read for any parent. Four years at an Ivy League university costs as much as a house in parts of the heartland—about $120,000 for tuition alone. But what do you get for your money? A ticket to “Animal House”.

In Mr Wolfe's fictional university the pleasures of the body take absolute precedence over the life of the mind. Students “hook up” (ie, sleep around) with indiscriminate zeal. Brainless jocks rule the roost, while impoverished nerds are reduced to ghost-writing their essays for them. The university administration is utterly indifferent to anything except the dogmas of political correctness (men and women are forced to share the same bathrooms in the name of gender equality). The Bacchanalia takes place to the soundtrack of hate-fuelled gangsta rap.

Mr Wolfe clearly exaggerates for effect (that's kinda, like, what satirists do, as one of his students might have explained). But on one subject he is guilty of understatement: diversity. He fires off a few predictable arrows at “diversoids”—students who are chosen on the basis of their race or gender. But he fails to expose the full absurdity of the diversity industry.

Academia is simultaneously both the part of America that is most obsessed with diversity, and the least diverse part of the country. On the one hand, colleges bend over backwards to hire minority professors and recruit minority students, aided by an ever-burgeoning bureaucracy of “diversity officers”. Yet, when it comes to politics, they are not just indifferent to diversity, but downright allergic to it.

Evidence of the atypical uniformity of American universities grows by the week. The Centre for Responsive Politics notes that this year two universities—the University of California and Harvard—occupied first and second place in the list of donations to the Kerry campaign by employee groups, ahead of Time Warner, Goldman Sachs, Microsoft et al. Employees at both universities gave 19 times as much to John Kerry as to George Bush. Meanwhile, a new national survey of more than 1,000 academics by Daniel Klein, of Santa Clara University, shows that Democrats outnumber Republicans by at least seven to one in the humanities and social sciences. And things are likely to get less balanced, because younger professors are more liberal. For instance, at Berkeley and Stanford, where Democrats overall outnumber Republicans by a mere nine to one, the ratio rises above 30 to one among assistant and associate professors.

“So what”, you might say, particularly if you happen to be an American liberal academic. Yet the current situation makes a mockery of the very legal opinion that underpins the diversity fad. In 1978, Justice Lewis Powell argued that diversity is vital to a university's educational mission, to promote the atmosphere of “speculation, experiment and creation” that is essential to their identities. The more diverse the body, the more robust the exchange of ideas. Why apply that argument so rigorously to, say, sexual orientation, where you have campus groups that proudly call themselves GLBTQ (gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered and questioning), but ignore it when it comes to political beliefs?

This is profoundly unhealthy per se. Debating chambers are becoming echo chambers. Students hear only one side of the story on everything from abortion (good) to the rise of the West (bad). It is notable that the surveys show far more conservatives in the more rigorous disciplines such as economics than in the vaguer 1960s “ologies”. Yet, as George Will pointed out in the Washington Post this week, this monotheism is also limiting universities' ability to influence the wider intellectual culture. In John Kennedy's day, there were so many profs in Washington that it was said the waters of the Charles flowed into the Potomac. These days, academia is marginalised in the capital—unless, of course, you count all the Straussian conservative intellectuals in think-tanks who left academia because they thought it was rigged against them.

Bias in universities is hard to correct because it is usually not overt: it has to do with prejudice about which topics are worth studying and what values are worth holding. Stephen Balch, the president of the conservative National Association of Scholars, argues that university faculties suffer from the same political problems as the “small republics” described in Federalist 10: a motivated majority within the faculty finds it easy to monopolise decision-making and squeeze out minorities.



[b]Ivy-clad propaganda[/b]
The question is what to do about it. The most radical solution comes from David Horowitz, a conservative provocateur: force universities to endorse an Academic Bill of Rights, guaranteeing conservatives a fairer deal. Bills modelled on this idea are working their way through Republican state legislatures, most notably Colorado's. But even some conservatives are nervous about politicians interfering in self-governing institutions.

Mr Balch prefers an appropriately Madisonian solution to his Madisonian problem: a voluntary system of checks and balances to preserve the influence of minorities and promote intellectual competition. This might include a system of proportional voting that would give dissenters on a faculty more power, or the establishment of special programmes to promote views that are under-represented by the faculties.

The likelihood of much changing in universities in the near future is slim. The Republican business elite doesn't give a fig about silly academic fads in the humanities so long as American universities remain on the cutting edge of science and technology. As for the university establishment, leftists are hardly likely to relinquish their grip on one of the few bits of America where they remain in the ascendant. And that is a tragedy not just for America's universities but also for liberal thought.



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God Bless,
ironmonk

[Kilroy the Ninja]

I can see this. I attend the University of Houston at Clear Lake which, while a part of the larger Univeristy of Houston, is actually reserved more for students in their junior and senior years and those working on graduate courses. We have a wonderful diversity of people (all races, religions and walks of life), but our professors have a democratic bent, as do many of the out spoken students. I, myself am somewhat outspoken, (ha, go figure), meaning I actually try to discourse on the topics of our courses in class, but I feal getting into politics there simply because I fear being singled out for being ganged-up on by the democrats or worse, biasing my instructors against me. This last election night I had to be at school and I dreaded going because I knew the kind of crowds that would be gathered around the various monitors (tv's) we have scattered thoughout the main building and I just didn't want to hear either the celebration or the complaining - which ever might have occurred.

I was pleasantly surprised when I heard neither.

Now, I will say this. I believe we have a large contingency of Republicans there as we have many older men (27-45) as students. I've found that the younger men are more likely to be democrat as well as most of the women of any age - particularly the baby-boomers.

But what is sad is that while I don't agree with the democrats political views, I can separate that from school life, but I can tell that when they don't agree with mine I've been labeled and singled out.

My professors did a good job this year of keeping their personal politics out of the courses. I only hope that trend continues.

[Snarf]

I love being a white student at the nation's most diverse university. Irrational fear of the ivory tower does amuse me, but when it devolves into slander it just gets annoying. The saving irony is that students for whom this was supposedly written--the Ivies and such--are intelligent enough not to read this garbage.

Seriously, the most common article asked for by prospies and students is for a t-shirt that says "Where Fun comes to Die". My roomie has several. I guess it's just me that doesn't toss out the life of the mind completely for a quick lay. And the one gaping flaw I noticed was that at such schools, nerds are at the very top of the social ladder and athletes are pretty much ignored.

Oh, the possibilities to mock. I should just go to sleep first, I guess.

[Benedict]

Whites are a minority at my school (14% of the students) and many (if not most) whites are immigrants from other countries.

But I go to school in NYC so I am not sure I have ever met a Republican professor.

[Dreamweaver]

My college is not really that liberal. Of course, its a school in America's heartland. One thing I've noticed that is different between this year and last year is that our gay-awareness group, The Ten Percent Society, is a lot more active this year with the elections and a measure that amended the state consititution that defined marriage between man and woman only. In the twice-weekly campus newspaper, at least HALF of the time there would be something on the front page from the TPS comparing slavery and homosexual rights. I kid you not, between the beginning of school and elections, every issue had something about the TPS or a columnist whining about Republicans. Ah, The Spectrum smells of elderberries...so much liberal trash. The professors aren't bad, but then again, I'm not in any humanities or social science classes. I used to have a physics professor that would go on huge lecture about the evils of genetic engineerings. Newton's Laws, gravity, bioethics, I guess they're related somehow...

[Pio Nono]

JMJ
12/6 - St. Nicholas

If you're going to be diverse, [i]be diverse[/i]. There shouldn't be an arbitrary desire to make EVERYONE smart - universities should strive for diversity, making some smart and others stupid. It shouldn't be trying to make EVERYONE responsible - some responsible, some irresponsible. etc.

</sarcasm>

[Socrates]

If you're interested in an education in the Humanities, and are sick of all the carp listed in the article ironmonk provided, try [url="http://christendom.edu"]Christendom College[/url]!

[track2004]

So I go to Indiana University. Yeah, Indiana University, the one with The Kinsey Institue and The Kelley School of Business and the Lilly Library. That Indiana University.

I think the article has some valid points. The students are diverse, but when you look at the numbers its still 80% white Christians. The faculty is generally liberal, but college is where liberal people tend to hang out, like the banking industry is for conservatives. The fun thing I found here is that the Kelly School really evens out how many conservatives are on campus. Its quite funny actually. I don't really mind that my psych teacher is an athesist because he doesn't teach me about God anyway. All he does is read out of the book, which is fine by me. My Social work teacher on the other hand is very liberal and her class affords an opportunity to talk about it. The thing is that whatever she believes I'm not required to believe it. She doesn't test over her morals, she tests over the book. And by the time you're in college you need to be able to know what you believe, stand up for what you believe and be able to tell what is fact and what is opinion.

[Kilroy the Ninja]

I'm able to stand up for what I believe and do time to time, but I can't afford to replace slashed tires.

Besides, by the time I get to class I'm usually tapped out energy-wise. I try to practice charity in school. No use getting all hot-headed over people who won't believe you anyway. But I know when and how to make the right words work.

[melporcristo]

I go to school in Seattle. I think that says enough about what its like to be conservative in a Liberal world. All of my teachers this quarter have talked openly about why conservatism is bad. After the elections, my Hebrew Bible teacher walked into class in a fury, made us take out a piece of paper and write how we felt about the elections and how it goes with the Hebrew Bible. Even the priests here (because this school is Jesuit) were open with being pro-Kerry. It's been a crazy crazy first quarter ....

[melporcristo]

[quote name='Kilroy the Ninja' date='Dec 6 2004, 06:25 PM'] I'm able to stand up for what I believe and do time to time, but I can't afford to replace slashed tires. 

[/quote]
Yep ... I've managed to make people very angry at me this quarter as well. A friend of mine had her Bush/Cheney sticker on her car spit on, another friend had her car key'd ... ahh, the nice people of Seattle.

Edited December 7, 2004 by melporcristo

[dairygirl4u2c]

So simply one sided.


Professors are often against Christian stuff philosophically speaking. They need to be informed of the evidence. Then they are unreasonable. And many of them join the boat, and many of them do not. Those that do smell of elderberries. It's that way for the population in general. Older people are old fashioned. Older people are more alone and need a God for if anything else then the purpose of a back up.

I think this is a classic case of having controversial information. Perhaps controversial only because of haters but nevertheless.


yes, another one of my senseless ramblings for today...

[Kilroy the Ninja]

[quote name='dairygirl4u2c' date='Dec 8 2004, 04:12 PM'] Older people are old fashioned. Older people are more alone and need a God for if anything else then the purpose of a back up.
[/quote]
Could you clarify this a bit? What are you calling "old" and what do you mean by "back up"?

Thanks!

[burnsspivey]

[quote name='ironmonk' date='Dec 5 2004, 10:43 PM'] monotheism is also limiting universities' ability to influence the wider intellectual culture.

[/quote]
So much potential for misquotation!

[quote]Bias in universities is hard to correct because it is usually not overt: it has to do with prejudice about which topics are worth studying and what values are worth holding. [/quote]

Last time I checked, students get to determine their own major -- thus deciding what is worth studying. And how, exactly does a university teach students about what values to hold? Shouldn't they already have a value system in place? That's some pretty bad parenting if they don't.

Overall, that's just an overtly one sided article. The author glosses over the part about how conservatives dominate the sciences and maths so that he/she can concentrate on how the liberals dominate the humanities.

[spathariossa]

My school was mentioned in this article. I go to the University of California, Santa Barbara. And I have to say I agree.

Some examples:

UCSB has one of the biggest Halloween parties in the country. Some 50,000 people show up to take part in it. Most of these people are drunk, and most of the girls seem to think that their underwear and demon horns qualify as a costume.

I have only had one single conservative professor and this is my fourth year. He was an economics professor who rightly stated that Karl Marx was a joke and an economic disaster waiting to happen. However, all of my other professors have been completely left wing and none of them have been Christian. Some examples:

One of my professors was crying the day after Bush won re-election this year.

I've heard many professors make reference to stolen elections over the past three years.

I've seen whole hallways plastered with newspapers saying that Bush is the equivalent of Hitler.

Christianity is always referred to in a derogatory manner and furthermore whenever Christianity is mentioned people feel the need to bring up intolerance, blood libel stories (that means killing jews), and the crusades. Oh, and mention of pedophilia and catholics for good measure.

I've had one professor this year list all of the accomplishments of my former patron, Saint Joan of Arc, and then tell the class that these feats were so incredible that they were "almost miraculous."

I've also been told by an Orthodox Christian classics lecturer that it is against university policy to say anything that could be construed as supporting Christianity in class.