Atheists in Foxholes on the Campus Battlefield

October 28, 2010
Posted by Jay Livingston

We all know that conservatives on campus have it rough.
outnumbered by liberals by 3 to 1 even in fields known to be relatively conservative, such as economics, by more than 5 to 1 in moderate fields such as political science and by 20 to 1 or more in many fields, such as sociology and anthropology.
The numbers are cited by Richard Redding in a recent op-ed in LA Times and other newspapers (including yesterday’s Star-Ledger, which is where my colleague Arnie Korotkin found it and brought it my attention.)

If you’re a conservative like Redding, what do you see as the solution? Surely you would not be in favor of affirmative action, forcing schools to hire more conservatives to the faculty and admit more conservatives to the student body. That tramples on the sacred rights of the individual. If you oppose affirmative action based on demographic characteristics (race, sex), you would oppose it even more strongly when it’s based on ephemeral qualities like political orientation.

But no. Redding is all for affirmative action for conservatives, and he defends it on the same grounds that liberals defend affirmative action for minorities and women. It makes for greater “educational benefits.”

Campus conservatives like Redding (he’s a dean and professor at a law school) feel as though they’re in a foxhole (a FoxTVhole?), and they’re giving up their affirmative action atheism. Now they believe.

Conservatives also oppose campus speech codes. These are well-intended, they argue, but by trying to assure that feelings are not hurt, these codes trample on freedom of speech. From the conservative view, if the minorities and women on campus feel intimidated by other people’s free speech, that’s too bad. They’ll just have to man up.

But another part of Redding’s argument is very similar to the speech-code rationale. He cites a survey of students which found that “most did not think it entirely safe to hold unpopular opinions on campus . . . . conservative students feel alienated . . . conservative students lack academic role models.” Apparently, when the feelings of conservatives are involved, it’s time for action – affirmative action.

19 comments:

Bob S. said...

From the conservative view, if the minorities and women on campus feel intimidated by other people’s free speech, that’s too bad.

But in the mean time those speech codes are being used to shut down Christian organizations but not Muslim, being used to end conservative protests but not liberals.

Those codes are being used to intimidate the minorities into silence and conformity.

I don't want to see affirmative action but I want to see fairness in our educational system.

I know from first hand experience that grades are affected if you don't toe the expected liberal philosophy. After a string of A or A+ papers in an English class, I wrote one with a conservative view point -- got a C+ on it. Same number of errors as on the other papers, yet a lower grade.

This has happened time and time again, just like the speech codes have been used to shut down conservative organizations or views.

Apparently, when the feelings of conservatives are involved,

Um, no! When the rights of people are being trampled on, then it is time for action.

Jay Livingston said...

Hi Bob,

But in the mean time those speech codes are being used to shut down Christian organizations but not Muslim, being used to end conservative protests but not liberals.

I don’t know the specific instances you are referring to. But it might be that if a Christian organization was “shut down,” it was because they violated some campus policy that applied to all organizations, for example a policy that forbade excluding people from membership on the basis of race or sexual orientation. So the Straight White Christian Association isn’t being intimidated into silence because it’s Christian. It’s not being funded because its practices contravene the rules of the school or the student government association.

I want to see fairness in our educational system

The question is what to do about unfairness and other bad outcomes. Liberals favor prevention via regulation. Conservatives tend towards letting the market work its wonders. Surely, they wouldn’t want the government telling businesses or universities to give preference in hiring and admissions on the basis of political views.

When the rights of people are being trampled on . . .

Redding, the author of the article, doesn’t say that conservative students have a right to role models or a right not to feel alienated. He just thinks it would be better. What specific rights are you referring to, and what would be a conservative approach to prevent the trampling?But in the mean time those speech codes are being used to shut down Christian organizations but not Muslim, being used to end conservative protests but not liberals.
I don’t know the specific instances you are referring to. But it might be that if a Christian organization was “shut down,” it was because they violated some campus policy that applied to all organizations, for example a policy that forbade excluding people from membership on the basis of race or sexual orientation. So the Straight White Christian Association isn’t being intimidated into silence because it’s Christian. It’s not being funded because its practices contravene the rules of the school or the student government association.
I want to see fairness in our educational system
The question is what to do about unfairness and other bad outcomes. Liberals favor prevention via regulation. Conservatives tend towards letting the market work its wonders. Surely, they wouldn’t want the government telling businesses or universities to give preference in hiring and admissions on the basis of political views.
When the rights of people are being trampled on . . .
Redding, the author of the article, doesn’t say that conservative students have a right to role models or a right not to feel alienated. He just thinks it would be better. What specific rights are you referring to, and what would be a conservative approach to prevent the trampling?

brandsinger said...

Gosh, Jay. Bludgeon the poor commenter with words. He said plainly that he feels discriminated against on the basis of his conservative political viewpoints. No need to launch into an elaborate and tedious word game.

Getting a poor grade because of conservative views and values is completely plausible. We just saw journalist Juan Williams drummed out of NPR for bucking the liberal dogma. Liberals are proving to be not that liberal!

(Please try to keep your reply under 10,000 words.)

Anonymous said...

hey brandsinger

I thought you said
"I now leave your blog and insular universe not to return"

emphasis on "not to return"

Jay Livingston said...

Claude, You must not have read my comment even though by mistake I somehow managed to post the text twice. I didn't question Bob's assertion that some prof gave him a bad grade because of the politics of a paper. I speculated on the reasons that a university might "shut down Christian organizations." I doubt that Bob feels bludgeoned. He's always seemed like a fairly resilient guy and well-armed in his arguments.

I also wondered aloud that if the lack of conservatives on campus is a problem, what would a conservative solution be. I meant conservative in the sense of "based on conservative principles," not in the sense of "good for conservatives." Is this distinction the "word game" you refer to?

I do agree with Redding that a more ideologically diverse campus is better than a narrow one. Heck,I recall helping a conservative get his course and syllabus organized and suggesting people he might contact to get other teaching gigs even at my own school.

(165 words. I hope that's within your attention span.)

brandsinger said...

Hey - I think we've reached consensus here:

1 Political diversity on campus does not - but should - exist. We all seem to agree.

2 I am too dense to understand Jay's fine distinctions (all agreed).

3 Jay has kept his response to a crisp 165 words -- which is still taxing for me -- but is, we would all agree, an improvement.

4 I've been reminded of my pledge "never to return" (by an anonymous person who has neither identity appetite for playful debate) -- and I admit to being drawn to visiting this intriguing "science" cum culturally sophisticated other-world of the Montclair SocioBlog blog -- it's like stumbling upon an episode of Gilligan's Island in Spanish -- momentary fascination!

I'll try to stay away!

Best luck to all.

PCM said...

Liberals do not have a monopoly on tolerance. In my experience, quite the opposite. But tolerance versus intolerance is a separate variable from liberal versus conservative.

Certainly liberals outnumber conservatives in academia. That is beyond dispute. How much that results in bias against conservative viewpoints is unknown, but undoubtedly, to some extent it does. But some of the so-called liberal bias is the result of... what do you call it? Education. Sometimes what conservatives call “liberal bias” other simply call “facts.”

To give one example, a conservative student said he was anti-immigrant (generally a conservative position) in part because, "1/3 of prisoners are illegal immigrants!"

That "fact" is rubbish (and can be traced back to Lou Dobbs). In fact, fewer than 1 in 20 prisoners are immigrants (both legal and illegal).

Does it reflect my liberal bias to point out that immigrants are disproportionately NOT found in prison? Maybe. But it's also the truth. In my experience, right now, there is more ignorance on the politically conservative side.

And faced with real facts and data, liberals, at least in theory, are more open to the idea of changing one's mind. Conservatives are quick to disparage this as "relativism" or being "wishy-washy" or "lacking conviction." Liberals see change as growth, not weakness.

It's called a liberal-arts education not because of politics but because it's supposed to liberate your mind from ignorance. More often that turns conservatives more liberal rather than the other way around.

All that said (I'm way over the word limit), my father used to say that in faculty meetings at Northwestern's Dept. of Sociology, they would discuss ways to increase the faculty's "diversity." My dad would raise hand and inquire, "Why don't we hire a Republican?"

brandsinger said...

Yes, team, I couldn't resist a curtain call.
PCM says - as if from papal infallibility - "right now, there is more ignorance on the politically conservative side."

Well, PCM, as I understand the conservative side, it calls for enforcing laws against illegal immigration to protect citizens and bolster respect for law, opening up public schools to more charter-school innovation to serve inner-city parents who are begging for better education, permitting a portion of social security to be invested in higher yielding financial instruments, cutting back on regulations that inhibit economic growth and foster corporate influence in rule-setting, replacing career politicians with able, ordinary citizens, opening up colleges to political debate from all sides, fighting a vigorous war against extremist Muslim terrorists, keeping taxes in check in order to foster individual initiative and reduce wasteful and socially debilitating government bureaucracy, giving tax-breaks to poor families that want to put their children in private schools, opposing unions who lobby to end the secret ballot for workers considering union representation, and ending a debatable constitutional right to abortion by leaving that issue up to individual states to decide.

Underpinning these views is a foundation of clearly articulated constitutional and cultural principles (such as equal opportunity for all citizens). These principles are easily circumvented in the camp of "progressives" who use government to advance the cause of special interests – which in turn support the strengthening of government stewardship.

Now, PCM, you have the right to call this cluster of views "ignorant." But to do so is only to reveal your own prejudices which keep you from considering these views with an open and respectful mind.

You say you're not among the "ignorant." You say you have "the facts." You think you know better.
Which makes you a bona fide liberal.

Jay Livingston said...

I hope Peter will respond, but I took his comment about "ignorance" to mean a lack of knowledge. Reciting the litany of policies preferred by conservatives says nothing about who is better informed. That is an empirical question. Wanting lower taxes and charter schools, for example, is not ignorance. It's just a political preference. But if conservatives believe that tax cuts increase revenue and don't increase deficits or that charter schools have generally outperformed public schools, then they are indeed ignorant of the evidence.

brandsinger said...

Well, Jay, there you go again:
"If conservatives believe that tax cuts increase revenue and don't increase deficits... then they are indeed ignorant of the evidence." Well, yes, that's the idea -- cut taxes to stimulate growth and generate revenue. I guess JFK was "indeed ignorant" of "the evidence" too:
"It is a paradoxical truth that tax rates are too high and tax revenues are too low and the soundest way to raise the revenues in the long run is to cut the rates now ... Cutting taxes now is not to incur a budget deficit, but to achieve the more prosperous, expanding economy which can bring a budget surplus." - John F. Kennedy, Nov. 20, 1962, president's news conference

sheesh... It's a fairly well supported economic strategy. You can pronounce someone "indeed ignorant" of "the facts" when you disagree. That's the whole point of liberal intolerance. QED

(What a bunch of self-congratulators here! You are "indeed ignorant" because I say so! LOL)

Jay Livingston said...

Greg Mankiw is a highly respected economist, at least by most people on the right. He was top economic advisor to George W. Bush. Here's what he had to say on the topic:

"I used the phrase "charlatans and cranks" in the first edition of my principles textbook to describe some of the economic advisers to Ronald Reagan, who told him that broad-based income tax cuts would have such large supply-side effects that the tax cuts would raise tax revenue. I did not find such a claim credible, based on the available evidence. I never have, and I still don't."

brandsinger said...

Okay, so we will have dueling quotes and dueling experts. Differences of opinion, it seems.

But then why would you stand by your statement that those who disagree with your economist (Pres. Kennedy among them) are "indeed ignorant"? And if you stand by that statement, you are confirming that liberals are intolerant (which was the opening issue raised by the student who received a C+ because of his political views).

Amazing that you would defend and extend this kind of arrogance. Let me ask you, would you agree that "evidence" can be interpreted differently and variously by educated people? Or are those who disagree with you and "PCM" ignorant? And what's your opinion on the firing of Juan Williams? Was he ignorant too because he disagreed with the reigning political orthodoxy of npr?

Jay Livingston said...

Kennedy was not an economist; he was a politician defending his policy. He was speaking of a single instance of a tax cut. Mankiw is an economist. Presumably, his statement is based not just on one case and one variable (tax receipts), but on several cases and complicated models that involve several variables.

Mankiw has every reason to defend tax cuts since he was president of Bush’s CEA. And in fact he may defend them, but on other grounds. On the revenue-deficit question, he sticks to what he and just about every other reputable economist has found: tax cuts do not increase revenue.

Also, the Kennedy tax cut lowered the highest marginal rate from about 90% to about 70%. That’s much different from the Reagan or Bush tax cuts. And I don’t think there’s anyone who maintains that those increased tax receipts, certainly not relative to GDP. If you look at the graphs and table
here, you’ll see that the increase in revenues from personal income tax under Kennedy does not begin until 5-6 years after his death. Revenues from corporate income taxes also remained stable in the 60s, both in constant dollars and as a percent of GDP.

PCM said...

Thanks you for the label of bona fide liberal! I wear it with pride (and to the suspicion of many of my liberal friends).

Jay gets me right. I don't call that cluster of views ignorant. Not at all. Ignorant is when you don't know or refuse to accept demonstrably provable facts.

Generally it's not the policy beliefs (conservative or liberal) that are ignorant, it's what those beliefs are based on.

Against illegal immigrants? OK. Many strong arguments can be made. But against illegal immigrants because they're 1/4 of our prisoners? Not OK. Ignorant.

Against public school because the teachers union doesn't have students' best interests in mind? OK. But against public schools because they teach evolution? Not OK. Ignorant.

Don't believe Global Warming is happening? Still a chance... but pretty quickly coming into the realm of ignorance.

Think CO2 emissions don't matter because God will protect us? Not OK (but awfully hard to disprove).

Fighting a military-based war against terrorist? Again, a policy decision we can debate on its merits.

Fighting a war against terror because all Muslims are terrorists? Ignorant and not OK.

Ignorance is worthy of education, not debate.

And though it's not my main point, raising money through cutting taxes has been tried and didn't work. Just because ideologues refuse to admit they're wrong doesn't count as "competing experts." (see the war on drugs.)

Maybe it can be argued that cutting taxes is good for the economy in other ways. But it didn't (and I say won't) bring in more money. So yeah, that would be ignorant, too.

brandsinger said...

You guys are really laughable. So many red herrings and canards. So much hair-splitting. Face this fact: You are biased as anyone (and everyone is). You call people "ignorant" for the same childish reasons names are always called -- fear, lack of cogent reasoning, arrogance. The un-funny thing is your pretense to "science" and your confident use of "facts" and "evidence" as if these are truly on your side only and not on the other. Though your attitudes are common enough (Lakoff, Soros, et al), it's still kinda shocking to see your prejudices so nakedly on display.

Jay Livingston said...

"red herrings and canards" -- I love it.

Fish and ducks and geese better scurry.
When I call you names, you should worry.
When I call you names with a fury
That is over . . .the top.

Childish, fearful, arrrogant, pretentious
Naked prejudiced (not like us mensches),
Splitting hairs, you’re worse than the Frenchies –
As they’d say, de trop . . . .

(Apologies to Rodgers and Hammerstein)

PCM said...

Brandsinger, baby, talk to me...

Am I liberal? Yes. I hope so. Am I biased? We all are... of course I think my beliefs are good... or else I wouldn't believe them.

Now what part about not basing beliefs are things that aren't true don't you agree with?

Where is this fear, this lack of cogent reasoning, this arrogance of which you talk?

First you misunderstand me (by saying I think conservative beliefs are ignorant) then you simply ignore me. What am I supposed to think?

I'm just a constitution-loving, freedom-singing, equality-desiring, health-care appreciating, New York living, happy-to-pay taxes, red-blooded (and former gun-slinging) American.

You got a problem with that?

I'm willing to discuss your beliefs. Are my beliefs, which happen to be shared by many, simply beyond the pale?

I just get it.

brandsinger said...

PCM
You seem to be genuinely seeking understanding. I can't strip away the political and cultural biases that weigh you down. As they say of alcoholics, you have to want to change. It took me years to see the hypocrisy of liberal politicians – e.g. US Senators sending their kids to private schools while denying DC children the best possible educational opportunities. Or taxing working people in order to fund middle-class "artists." Or hiring corporate consultants to write "stiff regulations" that actually benefit the corporations. Or passing campaign finance reform that squelches free speech and entrenches incumbents. You won't find enlightenment in a day! But it can come if you dare to think outside the boundaries of your group-think.

You write: "Now what part about not basing beliefs are things that aren't true don't you agree with?" Start there. Start with your epistemological conundrum. "Things that aren't true." You have debated with me here opinions and interpretations. Not truths. Whether tax cutting or raising is the right economic policy is not reducible to "evidence" since the historical variables are limitless -- levels of spending, global economic conditions, appetite of consumers to save or spend, investments in capital goods, labor supply, etc. Your economist will say on the one hand and mine will say on the other, you know that. The underlying policy issue is, do you favor, in principle, having the government take more of every person's daily wages. Is that beneficial to people and economies or not?

The only common ground we might have would be starting from principles. What do you believe is this nation is all about? What differentiates the United States from France? or China? What should we value and protect? What policies might undermine what we value and protect? Do we want more citizen freedom? As much as possible? Or do we want more social services? What's the trade-off? If we build government do we or do we not build more potential for corruption from special interests -- thereby artificially enriching the few at the expense of the many?

If we honestly stripped away what you and I respectively think is "true" and started from first principles (as Lincoln did - "All men are created equal" -- and therefore slavery is a constitutional and moral abomination), we might gain common ground.

But the drive for understanding has to come from you, not me. Start by recognizing that your "truths" might be debatable biases.

A final point to consider: I find your tortured syntax reflective of a common liberal mind-set. Look at your confused rhetoric: "Now what part about not basing beliefs are things that aren't true don't you agree with?" These tortured negatives bespeak a mind dodging reality. Suppose you had dared to write what you meant to say: "Why do you object to basing your beliefs on truth?" -- With this clarity of language, you would have been able to see that you are back to square one -- claiming to have the truth just as any fool, bigot or dictator always does.

And you are not one of those.
Good luck. Over and out!

brandsinger

Jay Livingston said...

And it's liberals who are arrogant, condescending, and sure that they have a monopoly on truth?