By Bre Payton
Wednesday, April 26, 2017
A new survey of students at Dartmouth College found that
those who identified as Democrats are the least tolerant on campus.
In the campus-wide field survey, students of all
political stripes were asked how comfortable they would be about living with a
roommate who holds opposing political views. Of the 432 students surveyed, only
39 percent of students who identified as Democrats said they would feel
comfortable living with a Republican, 16 percent said they felt neutral about
the proposed arrangement, while 45 percent, a plurality, said they felt
uncomfortable.
A majority of students who identified as Republicans (69
percent) said they were comfortable living with someone of opposing political
views, 19 percent said they felt neutral about it, and only 12 percent said
they felt uncomfortable. Among Independent students, 61 percent said they felt
comfortable living with someone with opposite views, 22 percent were neutral
about it, and 16 percent were uncomfortable.
It’s no surprise that students who identified as
Democrats were less tolerant than their Republican peers. Students across the
country routinely protest against conservative speakers who visit their
campuses, and in some cases, pressure campus administrators into cancelling
them. Conservative commentator and author Ann Coulter told Fox News on
Wednesday that she is cancelling a speaking engagement at the University of
California at Berkeley after students threatened violence.
It also makes sense that Republican students are the most
comfortable about living with those who hold opposing political views, because
conservative college students often find themselves as a political minority on
campus. If conservative students refused to live with their liberal peers, it
would be more difficult to find a roommate.
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