Thursday, November 18, 2004

Shocking news! Democrats outnumber Republicans in academia

The New York Times > Education > Republicans Outnumbered in Academia, Studies Find

Two new studies show that professors at Stanford and UC Berkeley are overwhelmingly Democrats -- by at least 9:1.

Possible reasons:
1. Federalist Papers points out that a "small republic" can become dominated by a cohesive faction that using majority voting to outnumber and oppress the rest.

2. Lakoff thinks it's because academia attracts people interested in "helping society as a whole", which tends to be more consistent with Democrats' values. This is Robert Bork's view also.

I think that no matter what the explanation, it's bad news when academia is no longer a place where ideas are debated from all sides.

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