Current Events > Why does college brainwash people into becoming liberal?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Are you telling me that getting a higher education teaches you critical thinking and how to establish new viewpoints foreign to your own?

No, it must be the children who are wrong

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I dunno. I was pretty far right before college, and was around the same when I left college. I didn't think my school was actively brain washing me.

I went more moderate (and in some stances, pretty far left) after my time in university for reasons unrelated to university.

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Yup. College opens your mind and teaches you facts you were unaware of.

Rather, the average college UNbrainwashes you. But to the far right, that's evil.
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It's more so a capitalist by-product of forced "inclusivity" PC feelgood-mumbo jumbo to attract as many customers as possibly. College is basically Disney World.

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to undo the indoctrination of high school

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MildlyIrkedOwl posted...

teaches you critical thinking and how to establish new viewpoints foreign to your own?

Too bad that's not what colleges do

Not anymore anyway

You can be brainwashed by YouTube videos, but not college somehow.

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deupd_u posted...

It's more so a capitalist by-product of forced "inclusivity" PC feelgood-mumbo jumbo to attract as many customers as possibly.

This is certainly a large part of it.

Never felt brainwashed in college, freshman year is oh shit! My professors told me how the world is fucked and no one has any answers! And then that kinda blows over and you dgaf.

Could be different these days as I graduated several years ago, but if anything no brainwashing, just critical thinking skills and becoming impervious to low IQ traps, like thinking taxes ever need to be raised or that we cant give US citizens healthcare at the same price as any other first world country.


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I mean, politically liberal is a broad generalization and I would ask what colleges/universities were talking about. I think the main thing with the high tier universities in the US is that their campuses can be very insulated from outside life. So after a couple years in a bubble you can be a bit disconnected. And maybe more so with liberal arts colleges. But I dont think that necessarily applies as much to name brand state schools. At least as far as being insulated.

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Since conservatism conflicts with reality, education is "biased" liberal.

As you get more educated, you're more likely to become more liberal.

Seems like "brainwashing" is a term someone who's less educated might use to describe the process of learning.

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There's a reason why the right is so against education.

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these topics are so weird when you know how college educated people actually vote

I got a science degree so I wasn't exposed to any so called liberal brainwashing so I couldn't tell you if it's real. The closest thing I ever saw was a history professor who insisted that the Civil War was fought for the one and only reason of slavery, even giving a question on a test to sum up the reason for the conflict in one word. I don't know if that was supposed to be indoctrination but it was pretty bad teaching.

EdgeMaster posted...

just critical thinking skills and becoming impervious to low IQ traps, like thinking taxes ever need to be raised or that we cant give US citizens healthcare at the same price as any other first world country.

Lmao what

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Meeting new people with other views, learning critical thinking skills, and generally learning more about the world you live in all tend to teach you things that fly in the face of conservative ideology.

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A lot of the people I went to high school with were left-leaning already so college probably just double-down on that POV.

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I dont think it changes a person drastically. It either emboldens an ideology or it might make someone lean a little more back to the middle, but it doesnt flat out indoctrinate you. I went to a baptist liberal arts college...hardly a liberal breeding ground.

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People who like to learn and are curious are generally left-leaning anyway. Also, it depends on what people are interested in. If you're a business/finance/accounting major or something else that has to do with money, I think you probably are more likely to be more conservative than someone who goes into the arts.

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I used to be staunch Rush Limbaugh listener when I went to college. I was so scared of being brainwashed but I never saw any of it. If anything the right is trying to brainwash people. If they criticize someone it's almost always a projection.

Republicans don't like critical thinking itself. They don't just want people to be bad at math... They want people to fundamentally not be able to logically criticize indifference as a concept. Straight-up 1984 doublespeak.

Knowledge-Based Education We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) (values clarification), critical thinking skills and similar programs that are simply a relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE) (mastery learning) which focus on behavior modification and have the purpose of challenging the students fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/texas-gop-rejects-critical-thinking-skills-really/2012/07/08/gJQAHNpFXW_blog.html

An obvious contributor to the declining education level within the GOP is the partys hostility toward higher education
https://www.alternet.org/2018/03/republicans-are-becoming-less-educated/

College opens up your mind. I wouldn't call it becoming liberal or anything. Just enlightened I guess.

Twitter and YouTube reach the insane levels and probably cause far more brainwashing.

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MildlyIrkedOwl posted...

Are you telling me that getting a higher education teaches you critical thinking and how to establish new viewpoints foreign to your own?

No, it must be the children who are wrong

It's too bad most people don't get that out of college. I graduated highest honors from a top engineering school, and it's really obvious most people don't fully get the material enough to be critical of it. That's why they had to curve the grades. After working with people from other universities, I found they are even worse, and adopt business fads without a second thought. Conversely, I worked with people who never went to college who are sharp as a whip.

Most people who go to college stay sheep. All that happened is that there they copied blue people in big cities instead of red people at home.

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iwasapoetonce posted...

I dunno. I was pretty far right before college, and was around the same when I left college.

This. I only changed my views dramatically when I started working.

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It doesn't. However that lie helps strength the conservative base so it is a lie of convenience.

If college truly made people more liberal then we need to offer free college to all conservatives.

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There are plenty of right leaning private colleges

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University provides not only more education which breeds a different way of looking at the world, but importantly exposure to a lot of cultures and people that people who grew up in homogenous communities otherwise wouldn't see. That latter part is very important.

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Rexdragon125 posted...

I used to be staunch Rush Limbaugh listener when I went to college. I was so scared of being brainwashed but I never saw any of it. If anything the right is trying to brainwash people. If they criticize someone it's almost always a projection.

Republicans don't like critical thinking itself. They don't just want people to be bad at math... They want people to fundamentally not be able to logically criticize indifference as a concept. Straight-up 1984 doublespeak.

Knowledge-Based Education We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) (values clarification), critical thinking skills and similar programs that are simply a relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE) (mastery learning) which focus on behavior modification and have the purpose of challenging the students fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/texas-gop-rejects-critical-thinking-skills-really/2012/07/08/gJQAHNpFXW_blog.html

An obvious contributor to the declining education level within the GOP is the partys hostility toward higher education
https://www.alternet.org/2018/03/republicans-are-becoming-less-educated/

This is maybe the scariest thing I've ever read

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It depends on teacher like 99% of them are liberal. A Jordan Peterson type teacher can probably turn some kids alt right.

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Everyone: Go to college

Student: *goes to college, gets crippling debt* yo what the fuck

Republicans: lmao sucks for you. Pay up.

Liberals: I actually want to forgive all student debt and make college free

Student: Wow I'm voting with that liberal guy

Republicans: Colleges are liberal indoctrination

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I always feel like old conservative boomers are like "once you understand how the REAL world works you'll see why I vote the way I do".

You go to college, become indoctrinated in liberal ideology and think it's your hill to die on, then actually get a job, work for your money and pay taxes, and learn that conservative ideals protect your wallet and ability to buy stuff.

Such is my perception.

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I thought conservatives wanted less government overhead in exchange for increased privatization because "capitalism is good" and "it's not wrong to try to get rich" and "if you're complaining about it then you're just mad that you're poor, get off your ass".

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reality has a left wing bias

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Leaving cult-like echo chambers exposes you to the logical fallacies and incorrect assumptions that keep far righters brainwashed.

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It doesn't. Different levels of education are geared to reinforce a specific type of response for any given situation.

School: To obey.
College: To act.
University**: To question.

** Originally, it was "To create better citizens: logical and impartial with empathy for all." Today, few graduates are taught and learn how to stand using all legs of this *tripod*.



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I think there's some confusion among Republicans about what the term "Liberal Arts" means

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The humanities are generally left wing bias. This was really obvious to me when taking electives like "her-story" (a play on history) or having to write a report on problematic representation in media. This was back in 2010.

People that are already more left wing have their views reinforced while everyone else either adopts it or spots it early and just plays the class for the grade.

https://www.amazon.com/Help-Mom-There-Liberals-Under/dp/0976726904

well going to college did help me gain new points of view and expand my horizons...

deupd_u posted...

It's more so a capitalist by-product of forced "inclusivity" PC feelgood-mumbo jumbo to attract as many customers as possibly. College is basically Disney World.

Er, have you been to college?

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If anything college led to me becoming more moderate. Still pretty left wing though.

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Rexdragon125 posted...

I used to be staunch Rush Limbaugh listener when I went to college. I was so scared of being brainwashed but I never saw any of it. If anything the right is trying to brainwash people. If they criticize someone it's almost always a projection.

Republicans don't like critical thinking itself. They don't just want people to be bad at math... They want people to fundamentally not be able to logically criticize indifference as a concept. Straight-up 1984 doublespeak.

Knowledge-Based Education We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) (values clarification), critical thinking skills and similar programs that are simply a relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE) (mastery learning) which focus on behavior modification and have the purpose of challenging the students fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/texas-gop-rejects-critical-thinking-skills-really/2012/07/08/gJQAHNpFXW_blog.html

An obvious contributor to the declining education level within the GOP is the partys hostility toward higher education
https://www.alternet.org/2018/03/republicans-are-becoming-less-educated/

Holy shit.

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I was still still moderate to right and mildly religious when I was attending college.

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They have no life experience so they dont know any better.

I too was brainwashed conservative, in the tank with Limbaugh and Hannity. You don't realize how manipulative it all is, and how it's all a self-perpetuating misinformation-fueled echo chamber where distrust of "out of touch" experts is the norm. When you're exposed to anyone outside that echo chamber, they comes across as naive and they need to be "educated" about how things "really are."

I didn't realize just how insane it was until this COVID thing, where I literally had fellow conservatives call me basically every name in the book for daring to say that my medical expertise was such that I knew Trump was wrong objectively.

It's all just a big propaganda-fueled lie, and the sad part is just how obvious it is in retrospect.


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TheOrgyPorgy posted...

reality has a left wing bias

Reality has no bias. Its just reality. Platitudes like these expose the inability to rub two brain cells together.

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onedarksoul posted...

Reality has no bias. Its just reality. Platitudes like these expose the inability to rub two brain cells together.

Rubbing 2 brain cells together is called a concussion

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China

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onedarksoul posted...

Reality has no bias. Its just reality. Platitudes like these expose the inability to rub two brain cells together.

US conservatism is biased against reality