April 06, 2005

A Conservative European in American Academia

Oh, this is a must-read for anyone who cares about freedom of speech as well as academic freedom. A European who is now teaching at an "elite Liberal Arts college" was shocked to discover how biased the faculty at American universities can be:

Despite my European background I found myself deeply surprised by the political bias on college campuses here in America. Left-wing bias is almost undetectable among European college faculty compared to AmericaÕs academic institutions. The bias that I have encountered has so many facets that I am still encountering new ones.

But wait, there's more:

In fact, their uncritically positive image of Europe astonished me so much that I began trying to convince them that they were wrong. (In the name of free speech and an educated academic conversation � things that you would expect to find on a college campus.) This turned out to be a bad idea: my colleagues slowly but steadily changed their attitude toward me. I refused to acknowledge that the politics in Europe was as superior as European wine, cars or cuisine. (In fact, I prefer California wine, I drive a Chevrolet and I love pumpkin pie!)

The most feverishly liberal among my colleagues now began looking at me as a traitor. One told me to stop expressing my political views when other faculty was around. Why? Because, he said, ÒI do not want to have to defend why we have a conservative hereÓ at our department.

The writer of this article on Front Page Magazine is anonymous, and who can blame him? If word got out to his colleagues that he dared to write about the fascist goings-on, he'd lose his job in a nanosecond.

It seems as though on college campuses across America, the only individuals guaranteed free speech are those like Ward Churchill, Jane T. Christensen and those who follow them blindly like lemmings off the cliff.

Please click on the link below and read the entire piece. It's like going into Alice's looking glass, but scarier.

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