Last Updated on September 7, 2019
A poll conducted by College Pulse found that 73% of Republican students do not speak out about their opinions in class for fear that their grades would suffer as a result.
The poll of 1000 Republican students was commissioned by The College Fix, and included those who identified as strongly Republican, weakly Republican, or Republican-leaning Independents.
The question asked them, “Have you ever withheld your political views in class for fear that your grades would suffer?” 73% of those who identified as strongly Republican agreed, along with 71% of weak Republicans, and 70% of the Republican-leaning Independents.
This does not come as a surprise, given that many polls over the years have found that liberal professors dominate their fields, with there being 30 to 1 liberals to conservatives in music studies, 8 to 1 in political science, and 1.6 to 1 in engineering.
There are no fields of study where the number of conservatives outweighs the number of liberals. The same is true across the Western world – in the UK, 8 out of 10 university lecturers are left wing, according to a 2017 study by the Adam Smith Institute. National File has also reported on a number of left-wing lecturers who are concerned their students have been “radicalised” by GamerGate i.e. now hold normal, conservative views.
Republican students who took the poll also had the chance to submit comments, many of which display the shocking bias in the higher education system:
- Western Kentucky University: “I wrote a 19 page research paper on a Christian pro-life movement. I was the only one in the class that, when presenting my paper, had a “surprise visitor” (who was the teacher’s very liberal friend) argue [with] me about their views.”
- Clemson: “When writing papers for gen ed classes? Absolutely. I know a guy who chose to write a pro-border wall argumentative essay for our super liberal professor and the prof just wrote “this whole paper is one big fallacy” and bombed him. Me? I wrote about the evils of horse racing. Perfectly safe topic.”
- University of Louisville: “I am conservative. I would be crucified. I heard enough horror stories from friends and family to keep my mouth shut and avoid politics in class if at all possible.”
- Arizona State: “In my sociology class, my professor asked us if we would give our child hormone blockers if they believed they were transgender (that was the day’s lesson). One guy said he would rather teach his daughter to love her body the way it is than change it. She [sat] straight up said “so you would be a bad parent then? What was your name again?” Then she went to type something on her computer. Not a good day for him, I’m sure.”
- Kansas State: “Professor the day after the presidential election kicked two students wearing MAGA hats out of class. I was appalled. We’re all people, if someone disagrees with you — love them anyways.”
Karin Agness Lips, President of the Network of enlightened Women (NeW), told The College Fix that this poll does not surprise her:
We hear from students regularly that their campuses don’t foster intellectual diversity… Professors and administrators should be encouraging an environment of free intellectual exchange, challenging students, not silencing them. This makes groups that provide an intellectual home for conservatives all the more important.”
Writing in National Review, the conservative commentator Kat Timpf was appaled at the results:
If such huge numbers of [Republican students] are really too uncomfortable to share their honest views in the classroom for fear of getting lower grades because of it, then they are not getting the kind of educational experience that they deserve… After all, college should be a place where people with all different kinds of views can feel free to express them — and have them challenged — so that they can learn and grow, and Republicans are missing out on that sort of valuable expression…
It hurts liberal students as well. Think about it: If Republicans are missing out on the valuable learning experience of having their views challenged because they do not feel that they can express them honestly, then liberal students are missing out on the same experience because they don’t have anyone challenging theirs… [this] leaves them ill-prepared to engage politically in a real world that very much does include people who feel differently.
This reporter himself has had experience with politically-biased lecturers at university, with one lecturer teaching a class on Marxism in International Theory, and refusing to give any criticisms of it. With the education full of cultural Marxists and globalists, it is likely that conservative students will still live in fear of being ostracised or punished for their views for years to come.
