<p>I come from a pretty liberal place(west coast-not arizona or utah).small towns, seeing churches on every corner and having only one race around scares the crap out of me. it's not that I'm intolerant of the conservative side, but, because of my appearance(minority)/beliefs(assumed b/c I'm a minority), I've been heckled very badly the times I've gone to a land-locked eastern state(nebraska,ohio, or W.Virginia!eek!).what can I expect in pittsburgh? I didn't see alot of diversity when I visited, which makes me worried. and the cmu students? is there a very close-minded contingent among them ? :(</p>
<p>I’m not there yet, I feel odd answering, but it’s pretty chill. Like, I come from a place of nearly all hispanics so I was worried but race is just not a big deal there. It’s like “oh, okay, whatever. I’m too busy building robots/juggling/being artsy/playing frisby/camping outside to care about race”. I don’t know, I felt odd at some schools but there it was really cool (but then I was there on diversity days so that might have had something to do with it, maybe they go around in white coats every other weekend besides diversity ones)</p>
<p>and there were a large amount of churches, like me and some others went through a real pretty one between the dorm we were at and the school</p>
<p>You’ll find that there are very few hispanics among the population, but Pittsburgh is enormously diverse in terms of black/white with a large Asian and Indian population as well. It is also (apparently?) a really big hub for gays in the east from what others have told me.</p>
<p>There are a ton of churches in the city; it is known for being a city of churches. But they are of all denominations and there is no really prominent religion in the city. No proselytizing, at any rate. I have yet to meet someone who was super conservative. They exist on campus (there was a kid that we called squirrelkid in my dorm… uber Christian, uber conservative, used to hunt squirrels and then skin them in the kitchen and nail their pelts to his door.) But they’ll stay out of your way if you stay out of theirs, and I have never met anyone who was remotely racist. </p>
<p>CMU campus is very, very ethnically diverse in terms of campuses. Definitely moreso than what you’d find at a UC or a similar school in the west.</p>
<p>Carnegie Mellon actually is in an area with a ton of religious places.</p>
<p>Across from Mudge there’s a MASSIVE synagogue, and then two distinctly different churches (I think one is Catholic…) in a row 1, 2, 3. Further North from Mudge is a Unitarian church. In Squirrel Hill, which is very close to campus, 20% of the population is Jewish and a lot of the Jewish people there are very religious.</p>
<p>So yeah, you are going to find that there are a lot of religious buildings, but they are from a lot of different faiths and tend to look pretty nice. It’s diversity and religion.</p>
<p>The closest religion ever came to affecting my life on campus was when someone representing a church gave me a frisbee when I was on my way to class. I’m an Atheist, and nothing that happened to me in Pittsburgh pertaining to religion could be considered “heckling.” It’s really just no big deal.</p>
<p>As for the student body, this is one of the most diverse schools you are going to find. There is no majority ethnicity at CMU… as in, no ethnicity has more than half of the campus population.</p>
<p>@completelykate</p>
<p>My floor called him “squirrel boy.”</p>
<p>Was he on your floor?! I only saw the squirrel pelts come out the one time… I really, really hope he didn’t dress his kills in the dorm kitchen. I don’t mind what other people do with their spare time, but…we cook food there. ):</p>
<p>Also we do have a super christian group who tends to do things like bake abortion cupcakes and set up little crosses on the Cut to show how many babies are killed via abortion each year. If you are one of these types, you will find your calling with them. if you are not, do not touch the free lemonade or free hot cocoa booths. They are a trap and will often entail you getting a lecture about “choosing life” from whoever is manning the booth.</p>
<p>Nah, I wasn’t on his floor, but pictures of his door with the pelts attached got spread around.</p>
<p>You know,it’s rumored that Dahmer the famous serial killer used to ride around his neighborhood as a teen with dead squirrels on his bicycle…just saying…</p>
<p>This sounds really creepy-- who kills animals and more critical – in a dorm room–where was public safety??-- rabies, hello!!</p>
<p>Yuck…</p>
<p>Yeah, it’s definitely not clean… but I think he got yelled at for it maybe, because I didn’t see the pelts again for the rest of the year. At least, I hope he got yelled at for it. Rabies in a dorm would suck. He’s not a Dahmer character, just one of those backwood-conservative “I live in a log cabin with my shotgun” types. He lined up all the dead squirrels on a log, took a picture of them, posted it on facebook and then tagged his friends as their corpses. :P</p>
<p>But the fact that people are aware of and notoriously disgusted by this kind of behavior backs up the notion that we, as a campus, are really not the hardcore conservative type.</p>
<p>^fox news would be creeped out by that</p>
<p>that is just…so freakin’ odd</p>
<p>Okay, but can someone tell me why there is a campus Republican party club but nothing on the other side?</p>
<p>The Democrats go to Pitt. lol</p>
<p>I’d actually say that’s because most of campus is very liberal. So the conservatives need a way to connect because they are more of a minority.</p>
<p>Yeah, I just need to open my eyes to find liberal people. It’s college.</p>