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Academia is highly liberal - which is fine. I don't mind liberals in general. However I voted for Trump.

I had a weird experience recently. I was chatting with some people at a conference at dinner and one older, well established, professor started talking about Trump supporters. He talked about how awful Trump supporters are and started naming names. He said that such and such person at such and such university was a Trump supporter. As a Trump supporter this made me nervous. I try to hide my support for Trump but of course some people know.

Given that there are a lot of people who think Trump supporters are evil, and given that people have no problem naming names, and given that people know I support Trump, how do I best control the damage? Should I "repent" so to speak? Should I just keep my mouth shut and hope for the best?

user82952
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    This probably depends largely on how much you want to discuss your political views at work. Do you want to talk about it and share your point of view in that kind of situation, but you're worried about how it might affect you professionally? Or do you not want to talk about it at work, and want to avoid being dragged into political disagreements? Can you [edit] your post to clarify? – ff524 Nov 15 '17 at 05:25
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    Moderator note, because I suspect this post will be irresistible for some commenters: comments that are not about asking for clarification, suggesting improvements to the post, or linking to related posts, will be deleted. (For example: answers in comments, comments that express your personal opinion about Trump supporters or about liberal academics, etc.) – ff524 Nov 15 '17 at 05:54
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    It might help to know what discipline you’re working in, what career stage you’re at, and which part of the US you’re located in, as those things could affect the advice people might be inclined to offer in connection with your question. – Dan Romik Nov 15 '17 at 08:56
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    Can you be a bit more precise on what you fear will happen? Have you observed any problems for the people mentioned by the professor? Right now it kind of reads like you are asking how you will "survive" being made vaguely nervous. – nengel Nov 15 '17 at 09:55
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    Voting to reopen (have enough reputation points for that ;-)) – fedja Nov 15 '17 at 14:43
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    I fail to see how this is on-topic for this site at all. Note that, in general, "boat programming" questions are off-topic. This seems to be almost exactly that... how do I discuss politics in academia? – eykanal Nov 15 '17 at 18:41
  • Voting to reopen, this question is not boat programming and is very similar to Brexit debate in academia... highly dishonest to cut discussion about how to preserve political views in D universities – SSimon Nov 17 '17 at 06:59

2 Answers2

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I have political views, too, but I learned not to communicate them too much.
No matter what is your view and what you vote for or believe in, there will always be someone having a different opinion. Now we might of course think that in an academic environment, such opinions can be calmly and objectively discussed, but that is often not the case.
There are, in my eyes, two ways to deal with it:

1) You voice your opinion and stand behind it, support it with arguments and stand your point; all the while respecting other view points and staying calm of course.
2) You keep quiet about your views and if you get stuck in a political discussion, you try to take the position of a neutral, outside observer, discussing the current politics like you would discuss the pro and cons of political choices in history.

The first option will make it easy to make friends, but will also make you enemies. The second option is harder, as you have to cover your opinion, but it makes it easier to get along with everyone, as you don't openly oppose their believes.

I personally chose the second option for myself and it is really interesting to look at current political developments like a historian would do; seeing how both sides influence the people and witnessing so many fail to see things critically (even, as in your case, highly educated people).

It is up to you how you deal with these things, but you should be aware that both speaking up and staying quiet has its pros and cons.

PS: These two choices do not only apply to "Trump vs. Clinton", but to almost every topic where people have different opinions and where the "others" are evil for believing "the wrong thing"...

Dirk
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    In issues where a big part of academia thinks that the right choice is obvious, and I guess that Trump vs Clinton is one of these issues as much in the US as here outside, option 2 of course will repeatedly have you listening quietly to people calling you (or people of your opinion) names, because they can't imagine you being one of them and thus don't stick to basic rules of politeness (i.e. they use the Anti-Trump in-talk because they think you're one of them anyways, being otherwise a reasonable person). This can be hard to swallow. – sgf Nov 15 '17 at 13:14
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Indeed, answers in comments get deleted. :lol: My first reaction was to post "How about comments in answers?" as an answer, but since the OP is really in distress, I'll just repost my full comment here.

If it makes you happy, I also preferred Trump to Clinton. As to people, just listen to what they say, and if you decide to pick up an argument, argue about issues, not about personalities. Above all, remember that you are free to make your opinions and to choose your political affiliations regardless of all the -ist words the liberals (or conservatives) may throw at you and that this freedom we should firmly uphold.

fedja
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