Thread by @JournoJoshua

A major study led by a lifelong Republican finds no evidence that professors are deliberately giving conservative students bad grades. psmag.com/ideas/no-profe…

Wanted to give my thoughts on this as an instructor. The idea of bias towards conservative students from teachers is incredibly overblown. Especially considering institutional dynamics and the ethics of classroom pedagogy.

Concerns of "liberal indoctrination"...let's assume bad faith first. Assuming it in bad faith, for conservatives, teaching from any perspective other than through the lens of conservatism is going to be considered "liberal indoctrination" no matter what.

If we say the quiet part out loud, their issue is that students *aren't* being indoctrinated: being taught from the conservative historical, sociological, historical, etc. canon.

Assuming good faith, non-STEM academia is probably always going to be much more liberal than conservative. Saying the quiet part out loud, I don't necessarily see how it could function if it wasn't.

Might be an oversimplification, but the philosophical core of conservatism assumes many fixed "truths." Inherently, being an academic asks you to at least question some of them (on a moderate level) or all of them (on a more extreme level)

The general comportment of "Liberalism" is to ask new questions.
What don't we know?
Expand the canon.
The general comportment of "Conservatism" is most of our questions have already been answered.
Just teach what we already know about history/culture.
The canon is fine as is

This discourse also assumes people can’t separate personal politics from their job.
On day one, I tell my students I won’t discuss my personal politics in class, and will stay out of capital “P” political discussions (only interrupting to give context or correct facts)

I think the irony tho is many “liberal” instructors truly do not experience themselves as such. “Liberal” is such abused term, it’s often used to just mean “anything that isn’t explicitly conservative.”

What people say is “liberal indoctrination” is literally just teaching new facts. But because conservatives generally perceive things as a war between ideologies, new facts seem like feel like an assault.
Take gender as an example.

Whether we are liberal or conservative, we are all taught that their are two genders.
Two scholars (one liberal, one conservative) both ask themselves “where did this transgender movement come from?”
What lines of inquiry are they going to go down in order to find the answer?

For the sake of argument, let’s say they go down the same line of inquiry, and read a book where an anthropologist documents 3 or 4 genders in indigenous cultures.
What does the “liberal” scholar do with these facts?
What does the “conservative” scholar do with these facts?

But to be honest, I don’t think a truly conservative scholar opens that book. I don’t think they’d be interested in that line of inquiry, and if they were, going down that tunnel & reaching any conclusion other than “there are only two genders” is by their definition “liberal.”

Imagine a scholar as some apolitical android learning information in a vacuum. You ask it “are there only two genders?”
It researchs.
Learns about the Dogon, Hijra, etc.
Android says “No”
By conservative definition, that android is “liberal”

But yeah, call me a fish who doesn’t see the liberal water, but I just don’t see it. What I see is conservatives wanting indoctrination, just towards conservatism. & most professors just see themselves as rational people pursuing knowledge, not aligned to an ideological project.

And saying the quiet part out loud again, what some students see as their professor’s “liberal bias” is literally just the professor saying “support this claim with evidence, context and reasoned analysis”

Lastly, most instructors try hard to separate personal convictions from their field of instruction. Personally, I’m a Christian. I very much view life from a monotheistic, spiritual ontology and epistemology.

That framing is functionally irrelevant when I’m teaching journalism.

That's all I got thought. Thanks all who read it and responded. If you made it this far, here's an essay on a different subject: why white supremacy thrives in the philosophical framework of the “Marketplace of Ideas” and can't be debated out of society. link.medium.com/VYNrtIvy5W