Thread by @JeffreyASachs

New from me: No, liberal professors are not brainwashing their students.

You all know the Indoctrination Thesis. For large sections of the Right, it is taken as Gospel proof. But the overwhelming weight of evidence says it does not happen.

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The research is clear. If you enter college a conservative, you're almost certain to leave it a conservative. If you enter it a liberal, you're going to leave it one too. The liberalizing effects of higher ed, which were fairly robust in the 1940s-1970s, have largely disappeared.

There's more. Faculty aren't just failing to indoctrinate students -- they probably aren't even trying. A university's Lib:Con ratio has NO observable effect on student political beliefs, and students who spend the most time with faculty actually become more *moderate*.

I also run through the most recent research on peer effects, partisan grading, and implications for non-partisan political behavior (e.g. voting, canvassing).

Lastly, I make the case for why, even though the Indoctrination Theory is a myth, we should all still care about the academy's political imbalance.

Check it out, and be sure to follow @ArcDigi!

arcdigital.media/no-professors-…

@ArcDigi CODA: Let me just make two further points, in anticipation of some objections. 1) Some of these studies were conducted by conservatives. Many more are by people who, as far as I know, are politically unaligned. Don't just dismiss this all as liberal claptrap.

@ArcDigi 2) This doesn't mean that your own personal experience with professorial bias didn't happen. Lots of people, on the Right and the Left, allege bias. But anecdotes aren't data, and the data is clear. I didn't make it up and I didn't misreport it.

That's it!