Help: My College Art Class Became a Political Ambush

Abigail Vendt

Society,

How did this happen? 

One afternoon during my sophomore year at the University of Virginia, I had to attend a presentation from the college’s residential artist for an art class that I was taking.

As I sat down in the auditorium, I listened intently to the artist, hoping to gain some insight into his creativity.

Instead, the situation quickly became political.

The artist asked any “secret conservatives” in the room to raise their hands. Not simply “conservatives,” mind you. He simply assumed that any conservative sitting there would be ashamed of their beliefs, hence the word “secret.”

I had nothing to hide about my conservative views, so I put up my hand up and claimed my beliefs. I thought I would then learn something relevant to the class about art.

Instead, I got an earful about the failures of conservatives, ranging from immigration to our “homophobic” president and why traditional values were wrong. 

When I left the room, I was angry. All I could think about was the impossible situation he had just put me in.

I wasn’t “secretly” conservative, but in raising my hand, I was allowing him to suggest otherwise. The way he framed the question suggested that to be a conservative, I had to be secretive about it, as if it were shameful.

On the other hand, not raising my hand at all would have communicated that I was a liberal. I would have been tacitly condoning beliefs that went against my conscience.

The binary choice the artist gave me was a false and unfair one.

As a conservative on campus, every day served as a reminder that not everyone agrees with my beliefs. That’s to be expected in a free country.

But we ought to assume the best about each other rather than the worst. We ought to treat each other’s views with the same fairness we would want for ourselves.

Unfortunately, this incident forced me and other conservatives into a box, one that was defined by the artist’s preconceived narrative. There was no way I could win. I was expected to be ashamed of my beliefs and pressured to hide them.

If we want to have a productive political dialogue, we need to let other people speak their opinions on their own terms, without forcing them into our own preconceived narratives.