^^^^^ Holy Moly…wow…stereotype much? And there is your answer as to why the OP even needed to ask the question.
Oh please. If you don’t think some white, Christian men believe they’re persecuted in this country then you don’t get out much.
I was being generous by saying “some.” I’ve seen enough Faux News to believe it’s more than some.
“half of the incoming PhD students in Women’s Studies here at U of M are men”
Is this year some sort of odd outlier? A quick perusal shows that about 10%-15% of the faculty in Women’s Studies are typically men, running only slightly higher for current crops of graduate students.
In fact, at U of M, departmental rosters show about the same.
I can recall back in what might have been the “early” days of Women’s Studies when two women I often ate dinner with were talking about their WS class. They attempted to relate it, but concluded that you really needed to be there to believe what happened in that class. To make a long story short, they invited me to sit in with them and it didn’t go well. For simply being male (and having the temerity to set foot in the class) I was subjected to one of the most vehement and vile assaults I’ve ever experienced in civilized lands. Luckily, I’ve only had to witness spittle fly from shrieking lips on a few occasions. Men clearly not welcome. I’m sure that has changed over time.
Interestingly enough, the whole thing was witnessed by a staff writer from the newspaper, herself a student in the class, and the event lived on in print and public debate for some time thereafter.
In a similar vein, I was privileged, as a student, to get a glimpse of the inner workings at a powerful and influential school of international relations. Professors and lecturers were generally aligned with either the current administration or the opposition and related think tanks. Departmental students furtively identified themselves with one camp or another and when required to take a class from the opposition for scheduling reasons and whatnot, acted like life for the next quarter was effectively over. There is no doubt in my mind that 80% of the education took place in the 20% of classes having professors with whom they don’t see eye to eye, however.
I think the take home message is that education isn’t always comfortable.
Well, nobody has mentioned yet that you may indeed get some flak, and in science classes in particular, if you would like to argue that evolution didn’t happen and the universe was created in six days. But lots of Christians–probably most Christians–don’t think this, so this may not be an issue for you.
I’m a devout Catholic and I had to write a paper defending abortion rights for a rhetoric class.
My professor was a liberal Democrat, and I got my A not because she agreed with the paper but because, despite my personal opinions, I wrote a rhetorically effective paper and understood the lens through which I was writing.
If I can survive that, then you can survive anything, too. It’s all about separating your beliefs from your education when you need to do so.
Thank you for your concern, your generosity and for proving my point even more vehemently.
As for Christian Men believing they are persecuted…well…they have a well developed script to follow…developed and advanced by the grievance disciplines, so…why reinvent the wheel when certain other groups have so kindly showed the best way to successfully cry’‘’'but what about meeeee…I’m a victim.
Again, thanks for that and keep up the good work.
Justonedad, there are only ~6 incoming WS phd students in any given year. For that reason, there is no “typical” entering class. This year, it happens to be 3 men and 3 women. Actually, it was 3 and 3 admitted and I know 3 and 2 matriculated. I was the only accepted person who choose another program and I don’t know if a man or a woman took my spot.
Actually, 42% of the US population in 2014 believed in divine creation of the universe within the last 10,000 years. This rises to 69% of weekly churchgoers.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/170822/believe-creationist-view-human-origins.aspx
And there goes whatever remaining faith I had in the American people…
Aaaaand that’s the kind of attitude that OP is likely fearful of. People who just shake their heads and sigh. Not an uncommon reaction, but obviously one that would embarrass the OP and other Creationists.
Not interested in starting an Evolution vs. Creationism argument, just making a point. Condescension is never helpful, and it’s a valid concern for OP.
Oh my, bravo to you for having to put up with that. Yes, that shows the important point that whatever you do, don’t sound like a raving idiot if you choose to disagree - stay classy. I just took an English class, and the teacher specifically banned “hot” topics like abortion, gay marriage, gun rights, religion, purely political things, etc. If your teacher is smart, he/she will do the same. Some may have an agenda and be trying to push it, but it can happen that the teacher be fair and open-minded. (I actually think my English teacher was a bit on the conservative side, but I’m not sure. It was an online class, so I never had to hear her lecture.)
That is another option - take the general ed/opinion classes online if possible. There will still be participation, but mostly in the form of posting a few comments on written work (at least in my experience). Having a few minutes to think before typing can make all the difference. 
Yes, but I can express these views on a forum. I don’t express them in the classroom and I don’t grade accordingly UNLESS it’s directly contradictory to the evidence. In a STEM class, creationism is generally contradictory to the evidence.
I teach humanities classes. Last semester, I taught a class about the Holocaust. As someone with Jewish and Romani grandparents, I have strong views on the Holocaust. However, that never affected my grading. I had people that earned A grades on their papers despite having viewpoints that made my skin crawl. And I had students whose views aligned with mine and yet had terrible papers… and were thus graded accordingly.
College is about expanding your worldview and learning new things. Professors are there to challenge you and make you think, so yes, some professors may be vocal about their opposing viewpoints, and they won’t hold your hand/tiptoe around you if you’re a dick about something. And that’s the thing: #1 rule of thumb in college and in life: don’t be a dick. It’s totally cool to hold whatever beliefs you’d like, but when facing those with opposing views, if you’re not an a-hole, you are fine. Even if the OTHER person is an a-hole, as long as you’re not, you’ve maintained the higher ground. Every once in a while you will get a professor or TA who is an arrogant, awful person (and they can be on either side of politics or religion!), and they may take out their dislike of your position on you in your grade. People at school talk–you’ll likely figure out pretty quickly which classes to avoid.
Generally: don’t go around like a bull in a china shop espousing your views, especially not if your school is super liberal. Keep it on the DL–not to hide it, but to not present it as your dominant identifying feature. Test out the waters and find people you know you can have respectful and fruitful conversations with. Being extreme on either end of the spectrum is not attractive–you’ll meet plenty of nasty super liberals, just as there are plenty of nasty ultra conservatives. If you were a person asking me the opposite question (ie: if you were a super liberal atheist minority), I’d give you the same answer: ie: be yourself, and be smart about how you discuss politics and religion, which are the two things our mothers are supposed to tell us never to discuss in polite company. It rarely ends well.
And re: Women’s Studies, which of course I realize OP didn’t bring up, but others did. I say go ahead and take a women’s studies class if it is offered and is genuinely interesting to you. Just, you know: don’t be a dick. There is always someone in the WS class (male OR female) who broadly and loudly proclaims things unilaterally, with little foundation, and when challenged cannot adequately defend their position. Don’t be that guy (or girl). FWIW, the one WS class I took the professor was a slightly prickly 2nd waver, and she equally was frosty to one or two of the guys in our class and one or two of the girls. Anyone in that class who espoused “Sex in the City feminism” was not received particularly well by her XD If you walk into any such class genuinely interested in learning about something that may be counter to the views you’ve held/information you’ve been presented with, and take it in and explore the topics thoughtfully, you should be fine.
Correction: creationism is generally contradictory to Your Interpretation of the evidence. An evolutionist scientist and a creationist scientist can look at the same piece of evidence and draw entirely different conclusions. Your interpretation of the evidence may be correct, but it’s still your interpretation vs. a creationist’s interpretation.
It seems like many of these replies assumes I’m a close minded person; I would like to think I’m the opposite. Of course I don’t force my opinion on others and no I am not going to go haywire if I hear a contradicting opinion. And no, I do not believe that evolution does not exist, however my background may imply. I can tell many of you are thinking that and giving me advice to “accommodate” someone of my type. We are not all close minded assholes people.
Derpy, I’m glad you’re open-minded. What caught a lot of us by surprise is that you were afraid that you might experience bias in college because you are a white male republican Christian, when the opposite is much more likely to be true. Rush Limbaugh often bashes higher education, claiming that universities are bastions of liberal extremism. Of course he’s wrong, and most people, other than his ardent followers, know that. Sadly, it’s still true in this world that non-whites and females and non-Christians are often subject to bias – sometimes subtle, sometimes overt. That ironic concern of yours made some of us assume that you were either an extremist (like Limbaugh or others of his ilk) or that you were naively unaware or close-minded to the daily biases that others who are not Christian white males such as yourself often experience. I’m glad we were wrong. I think it is good that you asked the question and that you reflected upon the answers you received. Continue to do that and you’ll have a positive, enlightening educational experience!
Just one more point, though. You’ll notice that I talked about biases based on skin-color, gender, and religion. I make a distinction between those things which, for the most part, we are born with and are core to our being versus our political views, which are more of a choice and more subject to change and refinement over time. If you choose to debate a political issue in class (say, health care reform or prison policy, etc.) and someone wants to give you “grief” for your views, I say fair game – so long as it’s done in a respectful way that does not try to undermine your value as a person or imply that you don’t have a right to hold differing views. Similarly, I would hold you to the same standard if you are critizing someone else’s political views. I agree with most posters here – STEM professors will probably not even touch sensitive political issues, because they just don’t come up in math class or chemistry class. There are some other classes where political issues will arise, and I don’t think you should shy away from those classes or from speaking your views in them. Most professors will respect all differing political views and will value the ability of students to hear and see differing sides of a debate. Few if any will mark you down because you don’t agree with them. Rare exceptions exist though. I had one conservative economics professor mark me down because I did not buy into his conclusion that slavery as an institution did not have a significant effect on the pre-civil war economy of the south. If I just kept my mouth shut I would have been fine, but I tried to argue with him. As a result my grade was one letter grade lower than it should have been, but so what … it was just one grade in one semester over four years. Overall it had no effect other than the experience stayed with me.
Enjoy college. It should be a rewarding experience for you!
I believe every faction of everything ever is discriminated in some way; some more than others. In my case its less. I’m not posing this thread because I feel like this label as (insert type of discriminator) A hole is ruining my life. In fact my life so far has been a very good one, and I can’t complain. All I’m doing is acknowledging that this stereotype exists and I was just asking you guys if extreme liberal professor bias is a tangible concern. According to most of you it shouldn’t be, and I thank you for that. I’m not trying to round up a pity train in any way, I wouldn’t give a crap if you judged me in the way I presume to be judged. I was just wondering if professors would be the same way, which I would in fact care about.
Short answer: no.
Best of luck to you in college!