This column caught my eye today. I find it to be true - and frightening.
We find that respondents significantly underestimate the proportion of conservatives among their colleagues. … that conservatives fear negative consequences of revealing their political beliefs to their colleagues. Finally, we find that conservatives are right to do so. In decisions ranging from paper reviews to hiring, many social and personality psychologists admit that they would discriminate against openly conservative colleagues. The more liberal respondents are, the more willing they are to discriminate.
Substantial anecdotal and quantitative evidence indicates that there is a decided leftist bent to colleges and universities, particularly the most prestigious institutions … Moreover, as several of the following contributions discuss, this political imbalance likely stems from practices within the academy that discourage conservatives from pursuing academic careers. … We maintain that the relative absence of conservative, libertarian, and neoliberal thinkers and thought from the academy is in part caused by discriminatory academic personnel practices.
Perhaps conservatives have failed to realize that this hostility of liberals is not limited to the sphere of public debate. Conservatives, believing in a free exchange of views and in public debate, welcomed liberals into the universities, the media, and into other organizations as well. Liberals, hostile to a free exchange of views and hostile to public debate, then drove conservatives out.
This appears to explain how our universities and media first became not merely inclusive of liberal views, but also subsequently exclusive of conservative views.
There is much more; such as liberal family and friends who are incapable of discussion and debate with those who do not share their political views. I assuredly do not tar all liberals with this brush. Nevertheless, I do have more than a few people in my life who have literally abandoned me because I do not plan to vote for Obama this November!
That our universities and our media have so many who are biased to the point of wanting to restrict the free flow of ideas and debate is frightening. I find this to be one of the major issues of our time and our nation. We were founded on the ability to exercise these freedoms. If we are in fear of expressing how we think, due to retribution and consequences, we have deep and serious difficulties.
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