It’s springtime, and the sound of the birds chirping on campus proves it. There is still a notably missing and much-needed chorus on campus, though: moderate conservative and libertarian voices.
Colleges are mostly comprised of liberal faculty and students. We can debate the reasons for that and what it means for the average student, but for the sake of this editorial, it is only relevant to acknowledge that most colleges are liberal, and conservatives on campus are a minority.
One consequence of this state of things is that it’s very tough to define the UNC Left by one or two people: places like this opinion page, the Campus Y and other organizations on campus provide platforms for diverse leftist viewpoints and personalities. By way of contrast, who comes to mind when you think of prominent conservatives at UNC or any other college setting?
If you’re anything like us, you probably thought of a few individuals — people who are especially vocal and willing to court controversy with their views. And that makes sense: an organization that finds itself at a demographic disadvantage can draw attention if it has even one person willing to argue on every platform.
While this kind of grandstanding may be useful, it doesn’t come without a consequence for the other people in the minority viewpoint. If one person is allowed to become the voice of a political ideology — whether they asked to play that role or not — they might end up marginalizing dissenting opinions on their own side.
We are not saying conservatives are an oppressed group. The recent elections should show that is not true. We just want to highlight how dialogue between ideologies is being hindered.
Which brings us to our second point: the domination of campus conservatism by a few well-known intellectuals whose ideologies are drastically different than their vocal leftist peers makes fruitful, cross-ideological public conversations less likely.
Let’s take an internal debate going on within conservative circles as an example. Say one outspoken conservative student supports laws making abortion access nearly impossible and essentially making the practice illegal.
If that person is accepted as the “voice of conservatism on campus,” then it becomes incredibly easy for people on the Left to be dismissive of other differing conservative viewpoints. This is wrong, and it is certainly something this board is guilty of.
