When Is a Duck Not a Duck?
When is a politican conservative (or liberal) not a political conservative (or liberal)? When they're a college student. According to the Cooperative Institutional Research Program (CIRP) Freshman Survey of 271,441 freshmen entering college in fall 2006, 43 percent identify themselves politically as “middle-of-the road,” 31 percent identify themselves as “liberal” or “far left” and 26 percent identify themselves as being “conservative” or “far right.”
No huge surprises there, right? Well, let's continue. Based on their attitudes towards controversial social issues such as marital status for homosexuals, abortion, and the legalization of marijuana, the four most “conservative” religious groups are Baptists, Mormons, 7th Day Adventists, and “Other Christians” (mainly Evangelicals). Large majorities of students in each of these groups (58%-80%) opposed the traditional the “liberal” views on these isues of legalizing marital status for homosexuals, keeping abortion legal, and legalizing marijuana.
So these students are conservatives, right? Wrong. In none of these denominations, nor in any other religious group, do even half of the students describe themselves as being in their politics far right or even just conservative. So a lot of students are closet conservatives and just identify themselves as being liberal or middle of the road, right? Wrong again.
The most “liberal’ religious groups, based on their views of the social issues outlined above are Buddhists, Jews, Quakers, Unitarians , and those with no religious preference. Yet only half of these students identify themselves as far left or even just liberal despite their liberal views on these issues.
“These findings,” says UCLA Co-Principal Investigator Alexander Astin, “show that our popular stereotypes about political labels don’t always match the facts. Despite the students’ beliefs on these core issues, students are largely not identifying themselves as liberal or conservative.”
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