Posted on 10/20/2006 12:18:41 PM PDT by Behind Liberal Lines
A report released on Wednesday on the political views of faculty members accuses professors of liberal "groupthink," a stance that the report says puts them at odds with the beliefs of most Americans on national and international issues.
The report, by the Institute for Jewish & Community Research, was based on an online, nationally representative survey of 1,259 professors at four-year colleges and universities in the spring of 2005. It found that, in general, professors are critical of American business and foreign policy and are skeptical of capitalism.
Professors, says the report, are at the "forefront of the political divide" over U.S. foreign policy that has developed since the 2001 terrorist attacks. Faculty members have "aligned themselves in direct opposition to the political philosophy of the conservative base voting for the prevailing political power" in America, it says. Unlike most Americans, it adds, faculty members "blame America for world problems" and regard U.S. policies as "suspect."
The report labels the faculty's overall stance as liberal "groupthink," and says it is dangerous because faculty members "are supposed to provide a broad range of ... approaches to addressing problems in American society and around the world." Professors are role models for students and frequently are called upon to act as "pundits" by the media and as experts on foreign policy, it adds.
"The fact that there are more liberals than conservatives on campus is not the key issue," Gary A. Tobin, president of the institute, said during a teleconference on Wednesday. "We argue that were the political ideology reversed -- that three of every four identified themselves as conservatives rather than liberals -- the problem would be exactly the same. The presence of a dominant ideology has the potential to interfere with unbiased, honest, and creative scholarship and teaching."
The Institute for Jewish & Community Research is a nonprofit think tank that performs research on a broad range of issues, including racial and religious identity, philanthropy, and higher education. It plans to release two additional reports based on the survey. One will cover the religious identity and behavior of college faculty members, and the other will gauge professors' attitudes toward the Middle East and U.S. foreign policy.
All told, Mr. Tobin called the survey "the most comprehensive look at the beliefs and ideology of faculty ever compiled."
Gee, I'd have never guessed. /sarc
(in best Archie Bunker voice) Gee, figured that out all by yourselves, did ya?
groupthink certainl spares the poor chaps the responsibility of thinking for themselves, don't it?
Profs supporting every diversity except one: have effective representation of conservative points of view. Of course, this is simply because they have influence over every other group except that one.
ping
The last time I took a college course was five months ago at the University of Alaska - Fairbanks in the school of education for a class on social research. The prof was clearly antimale and antiwhite in her comments and behavior. It was so annoying that I got out of there with an incomplete and a hole in my pocket where several hundred dollars used to reside.
IMHO, speaking as an educator at a high school, college is becoming increasingly useless as far as the liberal arts programs are concerned. Don't get me started about the sheer uselessness of the education bureaucracy, starting with the colleges of education and working upward into the dusty cubicles where my union meets and my regulators crank out rules. I regularly warn students who are headed in that direction that they'll be confronted by leftist lunatics who will demand obedience over thinking. Fortunately, I'm in Alaska, where you can get away with that kind of truth telling. I probably wouldn't last a term in Seattle or the Bay Area with that kind of attitude.
Sounds just like JFK's staff.
btw:: The view from west ridge is spectacular.
I can think of another: professors will oppose, with violence if required, the unionization of their Graduate Student indentured servants.
And another: professors will oppose, with violence if required, the use of private school choice vouchers for minorities to use to escape from failing public grade schools.
Likewise, it won't be long before the current university groupthink causes the liberal professors to blame Jews for all problems.
From the book
"The True Believers" 1951 : " Whatever the type, [...writers, artists, professors, students and intellectuals in general] there is a deep-seated craving common to almost all men of words which determines their attitude to the prevailing order. It is a craving for recognition; a craving for a clearly marked status above the common run of humanity." - Eric Hoffer
Poor folk. They care not what harm they do.
"University Groupthink" defined:
Say whatever the Department Head likes so I can get tenure
Other reports from the same group:
Bears Sh&t In Woods
Hell Quite Hot, Says Study
Analysis Proves Pigs Can't Fly
They needed a study for this?
It is painfully obvious the MSM is also doing groupthing with the assumption that democrats are a lock on the house and senate
Explains why academics were some of Hitler's staunchest supporters. Dennis Prager often says that only college professors could accept a doctrine so illogical as Communism.
Here's a link to a good version of the article. Worth reading.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/usnw/20061018/pl_usnw/institute_for_jewish___community_research___survey_shows_pervasive__groupthink__on_american_campuses432_xml&printer=1;_ylt=AtBEhRB0uN4MIiwikJzz3kAJKekE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3MXN1bHE0BHNlYwN0bWE-
Leftists have always been big in the humanities and social sciences, and their numbers in those departments have grown since the 1960's. I attribute that to the campus radicals who refused to leave the campus. A moderate or conservative would be very hard to find in those departments.
Who has the Captain Obvious photo?
I attribute that to the campus radicals who refused to leave the campus.
It is not surprising. How CAN they leave the campus with those majors? What awaits them for employment? What else CAN they do?
It is so comfy in their departments- All regurgitation of opinions, and subjective reality.
No learning integration, valences, Strength of Materials, Periodic Tables, Elastic Modulus, or any other real, numerically defined absolutes, just soft, squishy, feel-good masturbatory futility that cushions their fragile little heads from doing anything worthwhile, except spreading their poison and perpetrating their stupid and pointless existances.
Deepest Question by Philosophy Majors:
"Want fries with that Big Mac?"
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