Author: Sarah Mofford
Dear Occidental College, you are not as liberal as you think you are.
There, I said it. Send me your angry e-mails, letters or carrier pigeons. A definition by the Oxford English Dictionary describes “liberal” as “willing to respect and accept behavior or opinions different from one’s own; favorable to individual rights and freedoms.” That said, you should prove your liberalness by reading the rest of this article before you send that pigeon.
Oxy is not open-minded when it comes to ideas it disagrees with. For starters, where are the Republicans? Everyone in America is not a Democrat, as some students seem to believe. In fact, there are a few Republicans on campus, maybe even some conservatives. Vocal or not, the fact that they rarely seem to be heard is a major sign that we are not “willing to respect and accept behavior or opinions different from [our] own.” As a school and student body, we simply seem to leave no room for the opinions of Republicans. For example, while watching presidential debates in Thorne Hall last fall, a lone McCain supporter expressed agreement with the Republican platform, causing the rest of the bewildered crowd to attack the student with suspicious glares. Oxy talks about dialoguing, but I rarely hear Republicans giving their side of the issues we discuss. How about we ask someone why they disagree with abortion or why they feel the war in Iraq was a good choice? You are allowed to disagree, but respectfully.
A lack of Republican voices isn’t the only sign that we aren’t as liberal as we think we are. In fact, we attack those that express typically “liberal” ideas too. This close-mindedness can be seen in an article in The Weekly last year criticizing the open female sexuality in the Vagina Monologues. The article said that if someone had walked around in a penis outfit there would have been angry outcries, and that it was distasteful for the women of the Vagina Monologues to walk around in a vagina costume. If Oxy is so liberal, then why was this event that promotes the open-minded, liberal ideals that Oxy says it stands for, so controversial?
The opened-mindedness that does exist at Oxy is embodied in the Critical Theory and Social Justice (CTSJ) department, but the ideals behind such a program are not unique to Oxy and cannot substantiate our claim of liberalism. Many schools have Women’s studies, Gay and Lesbian studies and Ethnic studies. The long list includes Agnes Scott College (GA), UC Berkeley (CA), Mills College (CA), Bard College (MA), Bennington College (VT), Cornell University (NY), Dension University (OH) and many others. Furthermore, much of the student population has less-than-stellar feelings towards the CTSJ department. I have heard on numerous occasions that it is an easy major, implying it is somehow less rigorous than other more traditional majors. As soon as a CTSJ major begins to point out a racist, sexist, homophobic or otherwise disrespectful behavior, they’re labeled as oversensitive and too politically correct. Sometimes the conversation abruptly ends with a “are you a CTSJ major?”
Even as an institution, Occidental is not as liberal as it is assumed to be in the comments they make and support. A perfect example is its lack of diversity. For all its bragging, Oxy is not diverse, racially or socio-economically. On the Oxy Web site, the statistics on the demographic of the student body describe it as, “5.9 percent African American, 14.6 percent Asian American, 58 percent Caucasian, 2.3 percent international, 14.0 percent Latino/a, 1.2 percent Native American.” Meanwhile, faculty is “6.7 percent African American, 13.5 percent Asian American, 10.9 percent Latino/a.” These numbers are not statistically impressive considering the community and city we are surrounded by. In 2005-2007, the U.S. Census Bureau reported that Whites made up 29.3% of the Los Angeles’ population. African Americans made up 9.7% of the population, American Indians 0.5%, Asian Americans made up 10.4%, and Hispanics or Latinos 48.5%. Oxy seems far less diverse compared to the surrounding city. When you remember that Oxy pulls its student body from across the United States, in which Whites are a fast-shrinking percent, Oxy’s population seems even less diverse. Worse still is how little we utilize and explore our surrounding areas. I ask the reader this: Can Oxy be liberal if it is so stuck inside its Oxy bubble, if we have never walked around Highland Park (outside the surrounding party-hopping radius) or taken the metro downtown to explore the diverse city we are in? How liberal is the bubble at all?
Beyond race, the economic backgrounds of students are even less diverse. Oxy is an expensive private school that has cut its financial aid from past years. For example, last year students were told that their financial aid would be lowered should they choose to live off campus. I understand that college is a business. Oxy needs the money. But the administration must have known that by cutting financial aid, it would mean future classes would be much more financially homogenous. In our society where race and class are often intimately intertwined, this often leads to a more racially homogeneous class as well. What’s worse is there was no great outcry for change at this – at least not one large enough to stir the administration. In fact, almost the opposite seems to be enforced. How often have students complained about diversity being “shoved down their throats”? A school that does not stress the importance of diversity of all kinds and isn’t willing to help out students who need help is not liberal. Ironically, Oxy has a whole department almost designed to point out its institutionalized hierarchies.
Last year the Princeton Review hailed Oxy as the number one most liberal student body. However, liberal is as liberal does, and simply holding the title from a review that is based on student surveys (in itself a somewhat flawed system) is not enough to make it true. For Oxy to be truly liberal, the population and administration would have to seriously consider their own privilege and consequences of policies.
Sarah Mofford is an undeclared sophomore. She can be reached at smofford@oxy.edu.
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