Many academics I see online are leftist whereas many laypeople I see online are right wing.
I know a right wing guy who has a PhD, speaks 5 different languages and is an immigrant. He says that you can tell which immigrants are terrorists by just looking at them and everyone who looks like that should be arrested.
I know another right wing guy who has a PhD in Informatics and owns 20 houses in Amsterdam. He doesn’t see the problem. People can just move somewhere else.
Both of them don’t just have PhDs, they work as academics, one in Berlin the other in Amsterdam.
Let them
eat cakemove countriesseems like the second is more wealthy, and he likely comes from wealth which are often more conservative.
Being smart doesn’t keep someone from being racist, so yes there are plenty of academics in the right wing.
Go to any school of economics, comp sci faculty, school of business and dare i say biology and you’ll find a lot of em. They tend to be less vocal. Historians too.
In my experience Biology not as much, but maybe that differs by country.
Probably depends where the Bayer funding is at.
Historians you say? What decade i wonder…
i’m not sure what you mean. of what generation?
I think they’re referring to the observed propensity for those who are “really into” world war II history to be right-wing, so 1930s-1940s-ish. This obviously isn’t ubiquitous, but having a particular interest in the second world war has definitely taken on a reputation.
Anecdotally, playing Paradox’s grand strategy games, Hearts of Iron has more noticeable fascists, or at least players who near-exclusively play fascist nations “because it’s just so interesting”. I have some cousins who mostly play fascist Germany.
I play Deep Rock Galactic, a game where you’re a dwarf in space and are enslaved by a dystopian mining corporation with no hopes of escape. The game is a survival horror mission thing where you go into mines, shoot the hostile wild life and get minerals so the mining corporation can profit. I wonder what that says about me…
I wrote a reply earlier but my app was being futzy and it looks like it didn’t send. Apologies if this double-posts.
I wasn’t making an absolutist statement on folks’ tastes in games (or any media). I don’t believe that most Hearts of Iron players are fascists any more than I believe that most Crusader Kings players want to bang their sisters and play eugenics, or that Factorio players want to terraform an alien planet into a concrete and steel wasteland and kill all native life.
You don’t need to be a fascist to enjoy playing as a historical “bad guy”, but, especially as it concerns real-world politics then and now, media centered or themed around the time during which fascism evolved will naturally attract a greater audience of that leaning than media that doesn’t. I personally have a greater interest in the mid 19th-mid 20th centuries than many other points in history due to the rapid sociological, political, and technological advancements of the era – particularly labor theory and uprisings – so I get drawn to games like Victoria for those systems.
heh yeah, was just making a joke.
I’ve definitely seen several examples of the stereotypes you pointed out in your previous post, too, so no argument here.
The 1800s must have definitely been a wild ride. Interesting study case too. New forms of mass media running wild, automation generating a handful of people unimaginable wealth. Yep yep. Definitely worth looking into.
Thanks for taking the time to share. :)
They exist, but the problem is reality has a liberal bias and academics tend to follow the evidence.
what is liberal bias
It operates in many ways. One way is looking at outcomes. For instance, compare abstinence-only to more comprehensive sex-ed and look at what happens to teen pregnancy rates. Reality would favor the liberal policy.
Conservative policy does not care about outcomes, it just cares about preserving the hierarchy, which is why conservatives have to work overtime to discount academics.
Certainly it’s not none, but there’s a trend where college educated people tend towards leftist ideals purely because they’re exposed to more ideas, more people, more things, and that tends to lead to broader acceptance, which is, unfortunately, a polarizing thing. Many right-wing points are grounded in xenophobia, racism and an ‘us vs. them’ mentality, and it’s harder to hold those ideals when folks are put into situations where they have to actually interact with and get to know the people they’re “against”, rather than them just being faceless boogie men to be feared and hated.
alot of them now are being propped up by right wing billionaires to spread thier message.
Current STEM researcher who also happened to have met a few academics on the right side of the political spectrum… I am very qualified to speak about this I hope. I’ll try to use as unbiased language as possible
First of all, you are correct. It is generally true that most academics are left-leaning (obligatory not all, but you get the point)
In general, higher education attainment is associated with being left-leaning: academia is known to have extreme levels of education attainment (many jobs require a PhD). On top of it, academic jobs reward intellectual curiosity, do not tend to pay super well, tend to heavily rely on governmental funding… all of these are traditionally more associated with the political left or left-leaning. Still, there very much are right-leaning academics, they just don’t tend to scream around a lot about it
There are notable exceptions however. Economics is quite famous for being politically balanced, although what economics treat as left/right-leaning might be a bit different from the general public. If I remember, business schools (yes there are business professors!) tend to be more right-leaning. This is a smaller field and a bit more anecdotal, but quite a few prominent meta-science researchers are right-wing nutjobs: the “Why Most Published Research Findings Are False” guy and the NIH director Bhattacharya guy are both COVID deniers
There are also fringe scientists as some others have mentioned, but most people within their fields don’t consider fringe scientists as part of the academia so to speak
There was an HIV denier at NIH in the 90s but no one remembers his name. There are plenty of right wing MDs and scientist in pharma.
Damn, I am right leaning but I do not deny COVID. Interesting though. I also noticed that in Computer Science too, there are a lot of right wing people, especially these days being pro-AI is often a symbol of being right wing.
First of all: you’re good! I think there are lots of centrist and right-leaning people in academia who are doing just fine; especially in the US lots of world-class unis are in deeply conservative areas too. Most of academia don’t discuss politics that much at all as long as one cares about science. I’d wager the political leaning bias is more from a population bias rather than systematic discrimination of any sort
I could imagine AI researchers being more right-leaning yeah. The stats I got were from personal anecdote and research being done about this a short while back… there might have been an update in the AI age
You can find stats showing that support for the Conservatives falls in Canada as education rises. So depending on region and definition, it’s not just you.
That being said, that doesn’t mean there are zero. Jordan Peterson as a famous example.
“A moron with higher education is still a moron.”
see Jordan Peterson.
No, plenty of scientists and a disturbing number of physician scientists are GOP voters. They tend to be the ones who sleep with their trainees and cheat on their spouses. They don’t think sexual harassment is a real thing and don’t understand why women complain about anything. They occasionally get fired for their behavior but get hired elsewhere because they can find like-minded individuals who couldn’t care less about sexual misconduct at work. Recently there was a lot of noise about hiring a physician scientist and he was just about to start when people started pointing out that he was fired from his last job for surreptitiously filming the women’s locker room and bathroom.
OLDer MDs and scientists from the boomer era tend to be conservatives, because to be an MD and scientist in those times require you to be somewhat rich or well off.
what is GOP? I am from another country.
Republicans, socially conservative/fascist party
Being an academic means being open minded because when researching something, the outcome may be different from what you expected. In such cases do you concede that your initial theory was wrong or do you stubbornly continue to believe that you were right and keep trying to prove yourself correct?
There are plenty of right wing academics but they are a minority. It probably varies by field too. In the core sciences that minority is probably the smallest and is greater in the humanities. My professor was a right wing scientist and we often clashed on values. I felt sorry for him at times because it would be his point of view Vs the entire research group. He is fundamentally a good person that can hold illogical and contradictory opinions that felt like they were emotionally based.
Perhaps Jordan Peterson can give you some tips about where to find rabid right-wing lunatics in academia.
and lecture about why its not good idea to go to RUSSIA to treat your BENZO withdrawals.
They are all in prison for accidentally misgendering students once. /s
he is academic?? I used to think of him as Christian apologist youtuber. It is new for me to know this aspect of him.
Well, he was. I think maybe he gave it up to become a professional right-wing grifter before dropping out of public life. Not only did he have a tenured position at a big university, he was also among the ringleaders of what they called the “intellectual dark web”. That brand is pretty much defunct by now, but it was big a few years ago and its function was indeed to bring attention to rabid right-wing lunatics in academia.
That’s the thing about right-wing populism. It relies on primitive instincts. It’s a baseline. It requires no effort.
Rich people are smarter, otherwise they wouln’t be rich. No don’t tax them, they worked so much harder than anyone else to get there! Taxing them will only punish the imaginative and the resourceful, while incentivising the lazy and the worthless. I blame the immigrants because they work harder and for less money, and it’s their fault that I also have to work harder for less! We need one more lane, that would relieve the traffic so much!
These takes always seem super OBVIOUS at first, and if you never bother revising them - you’ll just be stuck with them. The longer you live with them, the firmer you’ll latch onto them.
That’s why it’s so crucial for the rightwingers to dismantle the education system. They need you to be ignorant. Take things face-value.
Yeah I have seen it myself that many right wingers don’t like the education system and they would glorify “the past”.
There are fewer right-wingers in academia, and they tend to work at schools with right-wing orientations. Turns out reality has a liberal bias.
what do you mean when you say “reality has a liberal bias”? I have heard another person saying that too but I did not get that.
The reason that there are less ‘right wing’ people in academia is that academia usually involves research and understanding of the world and its systems and most ‘right wing’ opinions do not hold up to investigation. So, therefore, reality itself appears to have a liberal bias as opposed to admitting you’re wrong about anything.
That’s the root of it, basically.
For the record, I agree with the statement, for what it’s worth.
It means most things hardline conservatives are angry or paranoid about are misperceptions, not realities. For example, most people who are different from you aren’t out to get you.
The meaning of that phrase about “liberal bias” is reflected in things like the rich exploiting the poor and polluting the earth, “liberal” viewpoint but true in reality. Or the rich manipulating elections and using the military to further imperialism, leftist “opinions” but verifiable in reality.
There are, but they often kicked out of academia pretty quickly because academic universties dont want to be associated with these people because it discredits the Universities reputation, by providing pseudoscientific beliefs.
J peterson, recently SABINE from youtube, you dint mentioned failed academics too, MDs like she claims she was “ousted from academia in germany, because shes a women” but it was actually are far right views(funded by friends of thiel), and then another one that claims " being a POC played a part why they are not “smart” enough for certian jobs, because they have tendancy towards not being intelligent.
so these people become “influencers” for the far right. when i was in CC, one of my gen bio prof told us that she had a student that was christian, and she was only giving answers on HW/tests as “GOD did it”. nevertheless, they had to drop out of COLLEGE.
if there was, they would have to constantly challenge the research, studies out there in academia that contradicts them. theres no way they stay in academia, and thier “own” research is based entirely on assumptions and outdated research.
There are a whole string of rightwing colleges created so they don’t have to listen to liberals and their science. (sorry for the formatting mess)
University Founder / Affiliation Founded
Liberty University Jerry Falwell 1971
Regent University Pat Robertson 1977
Bob Jones University Bob Jones Sr. 1927
Cedarville University Baptist (Ohio) 1887
Biola University Christian Churches 1908
Harding University Churches of Christ 1925
Maranatha Baptist University Fundamental Baptist 1943
Samford University Southern Baptist 1901
North Greenville University Baptist 1924
Grove City College Baptist 1930
Brigham Young University LDS Church 1875
Trinity University Baptist 1840
Oral Roberts University Oral Roberts (Pentecostal) 1963
Texas Christian University Methodist 1873
Wheaton College Christian (evangelical) 1860
Where’s Pepperdyne on this list? Society’s most massive assholes have degrees from there.
I never said the list was all inclusive. Feel free to add some more.
Yeah, and I guess we’ve each brought up a point that bears observing: the Right is increasingly synonymous with evangelical Christianity, which does NOT stand up to academic scrutiny. If you want to make someone an atheist, there’s no surer way to do so then send them to seminary.
Or raise them as a catholic, like me.
They shoved so much bullshit down my throat as i was growing up that i consider my self cured of that illness.
Hillsdale college?
The birthplace of conservatism.
Apart from BYU, rest of them sound like they are just Bible colleges (I know about Wheaton though 'cuz Heliocentric (a youtuber) talked about his experience in Wheaton)
I’m sure there are some academics who are right wing and some uneducated people who are left wing. But for the most part it is generally true that academics are more likely to be left wing. To put it rudely, stupid people generally believe right wing talking points. Right wing worldview is full of contradictions an uneducated beliefs. People who are curious and bother to educate themselves about the issues are generally more likely to be left wing. Than again, I am left wing so of course I’m going to be biased towards believing left wing views are smart
I initially was right but now am reconsidering that stance.
