Cornell University Students Vote Against Intellectual Diversity, on Grounds It Would Harm Diversity

Robby Soave:

First, let me draw your attention to some recent news out of Cornell University, where the Student Assembly considered a resolution that would call for a committee to look into the matter of whether the campus lacks ideological diversity. The resolution cites the fact that 96 percent of Cornell faculty political donations are given to left-of-center candidates and causes as evidence of a problem.

Note that the resolution did not actually call for some kind of intellectual-diversity-affirmative-action, which would likely be ill-conceived and harm the university’s ability to make good hiring decisions. Nor would the resolution have created an actual committee. It merely calls on the faculty to consider creating a committee, in order to study the issue of ideological diversity at Cornell.

“Common sense and research indicate that it is students on the left who have the most to gain from [exposure to different ideas],” New York University psychologist Jonathan Haidt told The College Fix, in support of the resolution, “and the most to lose from spending four formative years in a politically homogeneous institution.”