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Left-wing Cambridge colleges

I am applying to Cambridge this year, just wondering if anyone knows which colleges have a reputation for being left wing, and if in practice they come across as such?
I'll probably apply to Caius or Emmanuel college

Reply 1

melancollege

Original post by 4nglerfish

Most of them are left-wing generally. There are a few that have reputations but generally Cambridge is a very left-wing university.

Reply 2

Stiffy Byng

I hear that Peterhouse is not quite as bonkersly right wing as it used to be.

Question: is King's the Wadham of Cambridge, or is Wadham the King's of Oxford?

Reply 3

A Light Lilt

Original post by 4nglerfish

It is largely nonsense and a joke, with those unable to spot their own confirmation bias or sarcasm as the ones who are pulled into it most. And then when people genuinely believe it and try to spread what they are convinced by, things get murkier.

Here's a few facts:
1) Cambridge students are extremely middle class as a population. The application statistics and online rhetoric goes on and on about state vs private; the reality is that the massive majority of these state school students are from grammar schools and/or affluent areas of the country. They have a totally different background and education to what certain rough comprehensives are like. And while private school kids may seem like they are disproportionately accepted, the majority of these are also from middle class families and there is no secret route to buying your way into the university.
2) Cambridge students are - as a population - very left wing. This is not unusual, all Universities have a very left-leaning student population and (separately) this is often also true of the teaching staff.

As for colleges consider:

•

The winter (and to a lesser extent the summer) pool automatically mixes up the applicant population in a way that is almost completely blind to something like political bias

•

Is there really going to be a very strong correlation between the factors people most care about when choosing a college, and the political orientation of those people

•

Even if politics (matching the college to the applicant) was considered an important factor, do you really think it trumps out certain other objective measurements for a college like its size, location, subjects offered, facilities offered, teams and societies?

I think if you consider these points for more than a few minutes you will realise that the applicant population is at most slightly biased, and its probably biased because of lingering "reputations" which people may try to re-enforce by their own application (e.g. College X is rumored to be Y. I am Y and hear this rumor and so apply to X). What is likely more true than this is that the applicant population is almost indistinguishable from just random noise.

And that was my experience as a student. I met insufferable people (this isnt just speaking politically but across all manner of things) from all Colleges, and made friends among all (undergraduate) colleges. Remove a student's college hoddie and let me talk to them for hours without asking college-specific questions, and i would not be able to do better than randomly guess at the college.

Reply 4

Stiffy Byng

Well said.

I add that choosing to live in tribes is a bad idea. University should expand the mind, not narrow it. The exchange of ideas and viewpoints is better than living in a bubble. I say this as an old lefty, and a member of a famously lefty college at Oxford.

Some students (and some academics) at some universities have succumbed to tribalism and intolerance. Some students and academics (by no means all) appear to reject the values of the Enlightenment and have turned against science, reason, and civil debate. They appear to prefer magical beliefs and crank theories, and don't admit of disagreement in some political positions. I am referring to things such as gender ideology, critical race theory, and the Israel vs Palestine (to be more accurate, Israel vs Iran) situation. Some students shout at and sometimes even threaten anyone who doesn't share their beliefs, theories, and positions. I hope that this is just a passing phase, and there are signs that it is.

There's a warning from history about this. German universities cheerfully embraced Nazi ideas in the 1930s. The fish rots from the head.