Okay readers, you can help me out here. As I’ve been studying higher education more closely in connection with my imminent full immersion experience, I’ve become convinced that a lot of campus leftists don’t think they’re very far left. Even if they admit to being liberal, they think of their views as close to mainstream, because on our cloistered campuses, their views are “mainstream.” (Wait till they get a load of me.) Many campus liberals simply do not know there is any debate to be had about their premises, their methodology, or their conclusions—their general disposition overall. The education of students in the classroom becomes very narrow as a result. More on this–lots more–in due course.
So I’m working on a quiz I can have professors take to yield their true “Leftist Quotient.” Here’s the first six questions, most of them yes/no format, that I’ve come up with so far:
1. Does inequality of income mean ipso facto that the United States is an unjust society?
2. Do you believe the United States Constitution is obsolete?
3. If you were king for a day, would you repeal the Second Amendment?
4. If you were king for a day, would you change the First Amendment to allow the government to regulate political speech? (Trick question: if they answer “No,” then I’ll say, “Ah, so you agree with me that the Citizens United case was correctly decided.” The common theme among left-of-center folk is that Citizens United is on par with Dred Scott. I’m not making this up. They really say that.)
5. Is the United States overall a positive or negative force in the world?
6. Do you believe that the culturally conservative views of middle class Americans are chiefly the result of insufficient education?
I’d like to get the quiz up to 10 or more questions. Your suggestions in the comments field most welcome.
UPDATE: Wow–there are a ton of terrific questions here from readers. I’m going to use a lot of them, except it will probably turn my short “quiz” into something resembling the SAT. That’s okay. Keep ’em coming. This looks like fun.
In the fullness of time I’ll go through the questions selected and do a sort of Thomistic commentary on each of them. But short hint: the post may well be called “A Tortoise Named Rawls,” or “Rawls All the Way Down.” Helps if you know the “turtle” story. I’ll tell it again in due course.
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