Political Discussion

Imagine you are sitting at the local coffee shop, discussing topics with your friends and maybe the owner of the shop, who you greatly respect. As your coffee begins to cool the topic turns to politics. The conversation centered on anything from the latest presidential candidates to current House representatives. Just a normal day, right?

Now picture this same situation, only the setting is a classroom, the friends are classmates, and the coffee shop owner is your professor. Does anything change?

Some would argue that a classroom is not the proper setting for social or political topics and that professor should not “bias” their students with their opinions on political issues. However, it occurs to me that politics is an important part of life. College students are at the age where they are beginning to need to think about issues in their government.

The argument has been made that professors who speak of politics in their classes bias students. But the vast majority of college students are over the age of 18 and, in my opinion, should be capable of making up their own minds and forming their own opinions.

For that matter, are we not influenced everyday by those around us? Our college professors are just a few of many people who we speak to everyday of our life. Should all talk of politics be banned so that we are not influenced by the views of those around us? Sorting through the information we are given from sources around us is just another thing we all have to do to form our own intelligent opinions.

If professors speaking politics in the classroom does anything it exposes a student to thoughts and views that may differ from their own. A college student should be intelligent enough to sort out what they should and should not believe.

I believe that college professors should be allowed to speak their opinions about politics in their classroom. I personally believe it creates an environment of debate and discussion in the classroom; and I feel that in that sort of environment a student can learn many things about the world and him or herself.