<p>My son is very liberal, as are we, and attends a very progressive school in the northeast. Seing that Rice student body is half from Texas makesnhim think that Rice student body will be mostly politically conservative. This isn't appealing to him. Can anyone address if this is true? Thanks</p>
<p>Nope.</p>
<p>Rice, like any other non-religiously affiliated private university, tends towards progressivism. Rice students are, for the most part, very socially progressive and fiscally moderate, with a slight bent towards the left.</p>
<p>But what define’s Rice’s political scene more than anything else is that the discourse is not defined by partisan disputes, but rather by a sort of mutual respect for fellow intellectuals’ opinions. As long as your opinions are well-informed, other Rice students will respect those opinions.</p>
<p>Not in the least. We have a good representation across the student body for all ideologies. There are groups for Republicans, Democrats, socialists, libertarians etc.</p>
<p>On the whole, I would say the campus is very liberal. There is still respect and freedom to believe in anything. So you are not looked down upon for being conservative or very liberal.</p>
<p>I would say that we have a very progressive student body in many ways. It is not like going to school in Berkeley but it isnt worse per say. Just different.</p>
<p>Part of that is the state. Houston, in general, is liberal (one of the main Gay and Lesbian communities is right down the street from Rice). The mayor of Houston, Annise Parker, is gay as well (and a Rice Grad). From a political standpoint, Harris county went blue in the last election. </p>
<p>I consider Boston home (although I lived in Nor Cal and abroad as well) and I find it comfortable and dont feel repressed or looked down upon.</p>
<p>I think your son will have a great time at Rice.</p>
<p>In terms of political orientation, I would say most are actually pretty apathetic. The political scene at Rice is really quiet compared to other schools, especially the likes of Yale and Harvard. And that can be an upside for some people. But coming from a really liberal place like Vancouver,Canada, I would say for me that it’s more socially moderate rather than socially liberal. A good portion also come from Republican families, although if you ask, they probably would say that they’re apathetic.
Let me give you some examples when I was in Undergrad: </p>
<ul>
<li><p>For the Obama campaign when Kerry Washington came to talk, about 50 ppl attended (yeah that’s how apathetic we are). When asked to put up hands as to whether we would vote for O, about 30% put their hands up. That said, the majority was probably undecided at the time. </p></li>
<li><p>There were about 3 gay people in my college, that is, 3 gay people who are publically gay. 2 of them confessed being stared at and shunned at times. That said, they do have a solid group of close friends. </p></li>
<li><p>In my Freshman English world literature seminar, when my professor made a historical reference to the Bible undermining some of its claims, one of my classmates actually took out a Bible and nervously flipped through it. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>I’m currently at Yale now, so I guess I’m in a pretty good position to compare. And I would say that compared to the Northeast, Rice would probably be considered conservative. But compared to Houston and Texas, Rice would probably be considered liberal.</p>
<p>We’re from Berkeley…I guess that speaks for itself. We wondered about the same thing you are, but it’s turned out to be a non-issue. My daughter’s first year at Rice was during the 2008 Presidential election and we wondered if she’d be in the minority. Far from it. Rice students went strongly for Obama, as did Houston, I believe. Rice is a wonderfully diverse place in every way, as others here have already said. I hope you and your son will get a chance to visit and talk to students and see for yourselves.</p>
<p>Yes, Houston did lean toward Obama. Don’t worry about not having him fit in. (:</p>
<p>
Not my daughter’s experience at all. She was very active in the gay community at Rice and took part in lots of activities and was very supported.</p>
<p>To be honest, Rice is not the most active university politically. Given the choice between science and politics , we tend to lean towards science (or academics in general). However the statement made before about intolerance towards gay people is completely false. One of the most beloved figures at our college is a publicly homosexual individual in a committed relationship. If anything we might tend towards the ultra-tolerant end of the spectrum. We are extremely proud of our alumnus, the first openly gay mayor of Houston. </p>
<p>The only form of discrimination you will find at Rice will be between Residential Colleges. That said, Hanszen still sucks. <3</p>
<p>Ah but Hanszen is where DD is and she has numerous openly gay friends. No big deal around there except not great for her own dating scene 
and I have forgotten the Hanszen cheers she told me about which rivalry. .</p>
<p>I’m a new Owl like Tllgaham and agree with what he’s said. My only bone to pick with you, Aniger, is that your son shouldn’t be looking for a homogenous student body. Political diversity is diversity after all, and it’s not a good thing to be “very liberal” – as with everything, moderation is important, and you ought to encourage your son to expand his horizons. Maybe he’ll like something about conservatism that he never knew before, or at the very least he’ll learn how to defend what he believes.</p>
<p>I agree with Tilgaham - I have not seen said discrimination in my time at Rice either.</p>
<p>Just because you haven’t seen it doesn’t mean discrimination doesn’t exist. I also did not make a generalization saying that discrimination against homosexuals exists in every case.</p>
<p>Obviously, there are gay students here who aren’t discriminated against, and I think that often depends on a variety of factors: whether they are physically transgendered or not, popularity, personality (outgoing or not), etc. The one transgered student I knew told me that there definitely were some people who shunned him, but in a discrete way that’s harder to label as discrimination. He was not very social by nature though. He graduated when I was a sophomore. I have noticed that in the later years when I was at Rice, this was definitely not the case. </p>
<p>As for other forms of discrimination, here is an apology letter issued by one of the colleges about a racist incident (toward African Americans) taking place at a college public party in 2008: </p>
<p>[Letters</a> to the editor | The Rice Thresher](<a href=“http://the.ricethresher.org/opinion/2008/02/08/letters_to_the_editor]Letters”>http://the.ricethresher.org/opinion/2008/02/08/letters_to_the_editor)</p>
<p>This happened when I was a sophomore at that college. Some of us had an idea about the people who were behind it all (but who were never found out). This group of guys, thankfully, finally graduated two years ago (although one is still hanging around since he keeps failing his classes). He was, ironically, a minority himself (hispanic). One was from Chicago. This incident did not encompass all the stupid things this group of people did. My freshman year, my roommate was very upset coming back on a Friday night, because members of this group kept asking her inappropriate questions when she got on to the elevator: Why are your eyes so squinty? Why are you so short? Granted, they were drunk. But the other people in the elevator who were not drunk simply hung their head and stayed quiet. She was the only girl in the elevator. Again ironically, the guy who made fun of her was the only other minority in the elevator, although he was Hispanic, not Asian. </p>
<p>This was not all. The Hispanic guy mistook me for my roommate the next morning when I went down to get breakfast. He called at me from across the cafeteria and said “Hey Asian girl, do you remember what happened last night?” The cafeteria was empty except for their table and mine. I left as fast as I could. One of them snickered. Most others looked ashamed. </p>
<p>This is in no way representative of the Rice student body, but the point is - you can never deny discrimination. The possibility of it always exists. And the fact that I had experienced it first hand shows that it can exist. </p>
<p>I’m glad to say though, that having this experience has really toughened me up for the real world. Now I can shrug things off really easily and not let them get to me. But it did take a lot of soul-searching and angst right afterwards, but I believe that this was something I would have had to go through eventually, might as well meet it earlier on right? I’m even happier to say that, after this particular group of guys graduated, the entire culture of the college changed for the better, so stuff like this hadn’t happened again since then (at least, that I’m aware of).</p>
<p>It’s ridiculous that a discussion of conservatism at Rice has turned into a discussion of racism on campus. I’m also shocked that I’m the first to notice the illogical direction this thread has taken.</p>
<p>Owl2014</p>
<p>Sidanius, J; Pratto, F; Bobo, L (1996). “Racism, conservatism, affirmative action, and intellectual sophistication: A matter of principled conservatism or group dominance?” (PDF). Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 70 (3): 476–490. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.70.3.476. <a href=“http://www.wjh.harvard.edu/soc/faculty/bobo/pdf%20documents/Racism.pdf[/url]”>http://www.wjh.harvard.edu/soc/faculty/bobo/pdf%20documents/Racism.pdf</a>.</p>
<p>I’m not even going to humor this.</p>
<p>Even so, I’m glad you replied, three days after the previous poster, in order to let us know that you didn’t feel like providing a relevant response.</p>