[sidek]

In fact, current elite US college admissions seem to select for people who vote Democrat well enough. It would be hard to increase that percentage very much. Just look at the political affiliation reported by e.g. Harvard students. If anything, I would think that an institution which tested for wisdom might shift conservative a percentage point or two.[ Not because I think conservatives are necessarily more moral in the US; but because I think more conservatives are religious and churches teach the language of virtue, which probably at least better tells you what the 'right' answer on wisdom tests is, whether you live that answer or not.]

[oculusthrift]

liberals and academics have tended to pretend values or virtue don't really exist while following the principles themselves. they tend to heavily participate in their communities, get married, and have kids later and don't commit much crime. However, they absolutely refuse to acknowledge that these behaviors are virtues or that anyone else should behave that way. the only way they really enforce their concept of virtue is forcing people to accept certain things about sex and gender.

[dragonwriter]

> liberals and academics have tended to pretend values or virtue don't really exist

No, we liberals (academic or not) jusr disagree with conservatives (who tend to share values, again, whether academic or not) on some details of what good values are (and, equivalently, what constitutes virtue.)

Disagreeing with your values is not the same as pretending values don't exist.

> However, they absolutely refuse to acknowledge that these behaviors are virtues

I know of no liberals who would disagree with the idea that community involvement and not committing crime (provided just definitions of crime) are virtues.

Marriage is a different story, but then even many strands of socially conservative Christianity (such as traditional Catholic doctrine) don't view marriage as a general virtue, but rather as a virtue specifically for those with a vocation for it, a vocation which is no more inherently virtuous than that for either religious life, priesthood, or committed (lay) single life. It's true that liberals often see additional lifestyle choices as no less virtuous than these.

[pnathan]

hi, academic liberal here.

I don't think I've never pretended virtue doesn't exist. And, to be frank, most of the liberal types I know, regardless of their (a)religion, believe there are virtues.