I have a generally high opinion of the general intelligence level of the average Rice grad, formed mostly from my days on campus. While I certainly do not agree with everyone's positions, and did not back in the day, I do miss the higher-than-usual level of discourse that could regularly be found at lunch or dinner, especially during family-style gatherings (do they even have one or two of those any more, or did they abolish them all?)

That being said, in perusing some of the threads on the Quad, it occurred to me to inquire from those who'd like to share their overall opinion of where Rice leans (and you may parse that into admin/general student body/present-day vs past/your own particular time/experiences/athletes, etc...)

From my own experience, late 80's era, I generally found the average campus student to be Left of center, with significant pockets of far-Left. Routine merrymaking of anything approaching the center-Right or Right and the few YRs on campus seemed de rigueur. I was still trying to figure out where I stood on a lot of things, but one thing I remember bothering me was how two declared Young Republicans I knew in my college were often lambasted and ridiculed by the majority, yet they both seemed like pretty nice people and certainly were among the most intelligent and articulate of the folks I knew at the time. Agreeing with their positions was routinely shamed, but almost exclusively without meaningful explanation, which gave me pause at the time.

The admin seemed pretty Left, yet was still held by many as conservative and adversarial to the average student's ideals, which is probably as much a function of age as anything. I can't recall any professors who seemed blatantly from the right, although I do now know a few were from later reading about their lives. I definitely saw several caricature-type lefty professors and their behaviors at times put me off. The athletes I hung around with did not seem to get too political or discuss as much in-depth, though they often just seemed tired from all the drills/running/games, and stuck mostly to discussing issues related to getting through Rice with their schedule and their sport.

I have a sense Rice must have been more conservative at some undefined time in its past. Where the radical shift happened and how, is probably better left to those posters who were there then, so I'd be interested to hear, as well as those from before.

Too, I'm curious as to what more recent grads posters would say about how things are contemporarily.

Thanks.

During my time in school (73-77), I found Rice to be mostly apolitical. Of course, there were those that were more vocal in one direction or the other, but they seemed to be the minority. The most prevalent attitude seemed to be do/think whatever you want as long as you are not hurting anyone else. So maybe libertarian leaning?

Of course, I lived off campus, so my view is probably not typical.

(03-16-2019 12:27 PM)Tomball Owl Wrote:  During my time in school (73-77), I found Rice to be mostly apolitical. Of course, there were those that were more vocal in one direction or the other, but they seemed to be the minority. The most prevalent attitude seemed to be do/think whatever you want as long as you are not hurting anyone else. So maybe libertarian leaning?

Of course, I lived off campus, so my view is probably not typical.

You beat me to it. Apolitical is the correct answer, especially in comparison to lots of other schools at the time. Graduated 1991. The most political things on campus in my 4 years were Life in Hell, Bloom County, and Doonesbury in the Thresher's comics section. When I went to Illinois for law school, that totally struck me as way more of a political atmosphere than Rice, and Champaign is nowhere near being like a Berkeley or Madison.

I didn't see any of the conservative-shaming or shunning of the sort that GoodOwl describes in my time but I absolutely do hear from friends with kids at Rice now that this is very much a thing today.

Rice was actually pretty middle of the road when I was there in the late 1960s, certainly way more conservative than places like the Ivies or Berkeley or Stanford. IIRC we had about as many in our College Republicans chapter as in our College Democrats chapter. I remember an anti-Vetnam-war protest that was held on a Wednesday afternoon. A bunch of us Army/Navy ROTC guys were coming back from the drill ground and we stopped to watch. There were more ROTC guys in uniform than protesters.

I didn't see much change when I came back for my Master's in 1974-75. I think Rice has moved more to the left since then, but I think it's still probably basically apolitical. My son was raised in a house with two basically conservative parents, and he never brought any ideas home from Rice in the early 2000s that seemed left-wing to us.

IMO, Rice is FAR from apolitical these days.

There are lots of ravenous leftists on campus and very few conservatives. I’m not even talking Trumpy-conservatives...

That said, most Rice students live a life of contradiction where they’ll complain about gentrification and then move to Midtown or the Heights after they graduate. Also, most Rice students are more concerned about “social” issues than economic issues...

(03-17-2019 02:22 PM)ExcitedOwl18 Wrote:  Also, most Rice students are more concerned about “social” issues than economic issues...

I think that is very possibly true. And if true, that is a big change from my undergraduate (1965-70) and graduate (1974-75) years there.

(03-17-2019 02:22 PM)ExcitedOwl18 Wrote:  IMO, Rice is FAR from apolitical these days.

There are lots of ravenous leftists on campus and very few conservatives. I’m not even talking Trumpy-conservatives...

That said, most Rice students live a life of contradiction where they’ll complain about gentrification and then move to Midtown or the Heights after they graduate. Also, most Rice students are more concerned about “social” issues than economic issues...

Midtown and the Heights are no longer gentrifying - they already are gentrified and there really aren’t a lot of areas left there that are inexpensive and at risk for significant property value increases. East downtown is probably the biggest area of gentrification at the moment.

Back on 2007-2011, Rice was rather apolitical. I’m not sure where most people fell politically because there weren’t a ton of conversations that brought politics into the fold and there were not a lot of politically focused events held on/around campus.

(03-17-2019 02:33 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(03-17-2019 02:22 PM)ExcitedOwl18 Wrote:  Also, most Rice students are more concerned about “social” issues than economic issues...

I think that is very possibly true. And if true, that is a big change from my undergraduate (1965-70) and graduate (1874-75) years there.

I didn’t know you were THAT old!

(03-17-2019 03:35 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(03-17-2019 02:33 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(03-17-2019 02:22 PM)ExcitedOwl18 Wrote:  Also, most Rice students are more concerned about “social” issues than economic issues...

I think that is very possibly true. And if true, that is a big change from my undergraduate (1965-70) and graduate (1874-75) years there.

I didn’t know you were THAT old!

Thanks. Fixed it.

I was there Fall 2005-Spring 2009 and remember it being very apolitical

mid-2000s - definitely apolitical. Not sure how any of us made it through without safe spaces though.

Seemed pretty "balanced" to me in the early 2000s. 20% right of center, 40% left of center, 5% looney toon left, <1% looney toon right, 35% don't care/voted for Nader because it was cool is my estimation. The on campus anti-Iraq war protest in 2003 was extremely benign compared to what you see today w/ women's rallies, immigration protests, etc.

(03-18-2019 11:44 AM)Hou_Lawyer Wrote:  mid-2000s - definitely apolitical. Not sure how any of us made it through without safe spaces though.

In the mid-70s, our "safe space" was Kay's.

I was at Rice from 1993-97 and was involved in the Rice Republicans. I think my junior and senior year I actually served as co-chairman of the club. The meetings generally had 2-3 people in attendance. Even during the run-up to the 1996 Presidential campaign, the largest meeting I can remember had about 10 of us. On the other hand, the Young Democrats met in the RMC and their meetings took up the entire lounge (which now has a coffee shop) and looked to have well over 100 people.

During my senior year, we tried to get the Young Democrats to do a point/counterpoint piece in the Thresher on a periodic basis. They declined. We tried to convince ourselves that it was because they couldn't adequately defend their positions against ours. But in reality, we all knew that it was because they didn't need to even recognize our existence, given the disparity in the size of the two organizations!

Question for those of you that have been students in the last 5-10 years: how active is/was the Rice Libertarian group?

I matriculated in 1976.

Based on the number of "Boys State" t-shirts I saw during Orientation Week it suggested that the Admissions Office must have been making a conscious attempt to influence/moderate any (70's) liberal/conservative political perspective. I wore an American Legion hat during my impromptu admission's interview. (That might have sealed my fate, for better or worse.)

I found most of the students from Texas and the South fairly conservative (right leaning). Other students, especially from the Northeast, were more left leaning.

I believe a fair number of students were libertarian or apolitical (just generally not politically motivated).

You need to remember that Texas was still transitioning from a one party state. I first voted as a conservative Democrat. Four years later there was no room for my (conservative) views in the Democratic Party so I switched and 'became' a Republican.

I would love to see the Young America's Foundation hold a lecture on campus. But saying that I would be afraid of some left-leaning Rice student being destroyed by Ben Shapiro and it receiving 1M+ hits on YouTube.

I'm not sure liberal/conservative is the dichotomy it once was. I mean Liberals and Conservatives share a number of beliefs and are happy to discuss issues with one another. The Left, not so much. Political labels can be confusing. You can find a number of political commentators, et. al., on YouTube, etc., that once identified themselves as "alt-right". The definition of "alt-right" at that point had nothing to do with white supremacy.