After arriving as a Republican, the liberal arts have made a mark

Country First: Republicans struggling to find ideal candidate

As the summer approaches and edges closer to next year's presidential campaign, the opportunity to charter a new course for the party has arisen. Thus far, polls consistently show Republicans thoroughly unhappy, unimpressed and unengaged with the list of likely, and even far-fetched, candidates for the party's nomination. Each of them has been trying to lay claim to the Reagan-mantle of conservatism, one that embraces social, fiscal and foreign policy conservatism.

Country First: Forbidding hate speech contradicts need for open discourse

Free speech has long been considered the cornerstone of American democracy. Indeed, our society values free speech so much that we judge other nations based on if they allow their dissidents to speak openly.

Country First

After arriving as a Republican, the liberal arts have made a mark

This piece represents the opinion of the author:

Jose Cespedes

Columnist

September 23, 2011

The old adage that college is a place where people "find themselves" is cliché, sappy and a little trite. But for many, it's also true.

The changes in personality, attitude and interests that I have observed in my friends over the past three years has continued to impress upon me just how transformative college can be and I, for one, am not exempt from its effects.

When I first began writing this column in the midst of the 2008 presidential election, I identified as a fairly staunch Republican.

My column reflected those values and I tried to bring an alternative political perspective to Bowdoin that would contribute to the College's rich political discourse. It would be disingenuous for me to claim that each of my contributions to the Orient has truly reflected my own values.

Admittedly, there were times when I represented the mainstream conservative viewpoint because I thought it needed to be shared with the Bowdoin community.

My sense of obligation to conservative values was rooted in family influences, my life experiences and notions of patriotism.

The funny thing about going off to college, though, is that you learn to do a lot of things on your own for the first time.

You learn how to do your own laundry, set your own schedule, pay your own bills and be held accountable for your actions.

Beyond that, you learn how to think for yourself. The past three years have introduced me to such a cross section of individuals that my understanding of the human experience has changed in ways no one, least of all myself, could have predicted.

Seeing the difficulty that some students have acclimating to Bowdoin has given me a newfound respect for the impacts of economic inequality.

Realizing that the America I have always believed in and admired has often times failed to protect its most vulnerable members has fundamentally altered the way I think.

Despite all that, however, I was still unwilling to acknowledge that my political affiliation was little more then a vestige of the value system I had in high school.

I let my political orientation become my identity, and that's a mistake many people make.

At some point in our political history, Americans decided to choose their values like they choose their cable packages: if you subscribe to one view, you must also subscribe to others since that's how the political parties bundle the issues.

Bowdoin has taught me that I'm an intelligent enough human being to recognize that the political and social issues our nation grapples with don't always have just one solution. What's more, no one political party has a monopoly on solving problems.

Where that leaves me—and my column—is not something I'm clear on.

And it is exceptionally difficult to write a political column without a firm idea of my personal politics.

Yet I would argue that I have a clearer understanding of politics now then I ever have in the past, precisely because I'm relying on myself, not talking heads on television, to determine my values. Bowdoin has been invaluable in giving me the confidence to challenge preconceptions and embrace a new mentality.

Yet my experience is not one of "teenager enters college a conservative Republican and graduates a liberal Democrat."

To simply embrace an alternative political dogma would be an egregious sign of disrespect to the numerous faculty members, friends and acquaintances that have helped me reach this point of political independence.

My issues with the Democratic Party and the Obama administration are as forceful and ardent as they have ever been.

My hope for the final year of this column is that those who read it walk away willing to question both sides of the political spectrum.

Being a college student from the Northeast doesn't give anyone permission to unquestioningly accept the talking points of a particular party.

One of the biggest and best reasons for attending a small, liberal arts school like Bowdoin is that intellectual discussions are easily fostered. As a community, we object to the diploma-mill philosophy of other schools precisely because we believe that people learn best by talking to each other. To abandon that value in the political arena, where it is most needed, denies us of education's most rewarding gift: the ability to change and grow.

Comments are permanently closed.