Performative virtue-signaling has become a threat to higher ed

[IwantToRetire]

..... To test the gap between expression and belief, we used gender discourse — a contentious topic both highly visible and ideologically loaded. In public, students echoed expected progressive narratives. In private, however, their views were more complex. Eighty-seven percent identified as exclusively heterosexual and supported a binary model of gender. Nine percent expressed partial openness to gender fluidity. Just seven percent embraced the idea of gender as a broad spectrum, and most of these belonged to activist circles.

Perhaps most telling: 77 percent said they disagreed with the idea that gender identity should override biological sex in such domains as sports, healthcare, or public data — but would never voice that disagreement aloud. Thirty-eight percent described themselves as “morally confused,” uncertain whether honesty was still ethical if it meant exclusion.

Authenticity, once considered a psychological good, has become a social liability. And this fragmentation doesn’t end at the classroom door. Seventy-three percent of students reported mistrust in conversations about these values with close friends. Nearly half said they routinely conceal beliefs in intimate relationships for fear of ideological fallout. This is not simply peer pressure — it is identity regulation at scale, and it is being institutionalized.

Universities often justify these dynamics in the name of inclusion. But inclusion that demands dishonesty is not ensuring psychological safety — it is sanctioning self-abandonment. In attempting to engineer moral unity, higher education has mistaken consensus for growth and compliance for care.

Students know something is wrong. When given permission to speak freely, many described the experience of participating in our survey not as liberating, but as clarifying. They weren’t escaping responsibility — they were reclaiming it. For students trained to perform, the act of telling the truth felt radical. ...

https://thehill.com/opinion/education/5446702-performative-virtue-signaling-has-become-a-threat-to-higher-ed/amp/

Oh this is a really interesting read. I’d love to see the actual study - it seems like they’ve maybe done some serious social research.

I cant find the actual study, but came across this!

https://quillette.com/2025/07/24/the-rise-and-fall-of-gender-affirming-therapeutic-care/

I long for the day this utter nonsense collapses once and for all.

I’d have liked to have read the study but this doesn’t seem to be published anywhere. The authors are variously described as researchers or graduate researchers. I couldn’t find a research profile at their university just various news articles. Unfortunately this piece has been picked up by several conservative online ‘news’ outlets. I wouldn’t disagree with their findings that instinctively feel reasonable but it’s a shame that It hasn’t been peer reviewed and published somewhere first.

Have you considered the following possibilities?

A The authors would quite like to have jobs in the future and are afraid that if the research is published under their names, they will have no chance of employment in captured academia.

And/or

B. Anyone approached to provide a peer review would refuse to do so, either because they are ideologically captured or they are afraid of the consequences as above.

And/or

C. No outlet would publish the research for the reasons noted in B.

Hi @Chersfrozenface the researchers are the named authors of the opinion piece so don’t seem to be worried about being identified. Their university is named too. I’ve looked and both seem legimately affiliated with the university. They written other opinion pieces. These days in the US I’m fairly sure they’d find both peer reviewers and a publisher. I’m not having a dig at them, just prefer to read the whole study so ‘it’s a shame it’s not’ is a genuine concern. It sounds like an interesting study.

I think what is strange is that they are clear which university they are at, and have got quite a bit of publicity with this article, but the University doesn't list the research on their news page. And yet they do for others.

I’ve searched google scholar for these authors and can’t find the paper. That probably means it isn’t published yet so we can’t evaluate whether the research is any good.

Why dont you email them. Their email addresses are easy to find.

I thought the same.

Absolutely fascinating. I think they’ve hit the nail on the head. I’m also encouraged to see how many students are sane on this issue - I knew the majority of the population was, but feared that far more students were captured. Fingers crossed their survey is as good as their analysis and gets published somewhere decent.

Nothing unusual about the publication process here.

The data runs up to 2025, so it’s probably only just been written up.

Both authors are students, suggesting their research may be required for a degree. Many research degree programmes still have rules (though these are changing) restricting prior publication of your dissertation research before submission of your dissertation. A summary in a magazine or blog isn’t caught by these rules, but a preprint could be.

University PR teams very rarely publicise work done by students and don’t usually pick up research before scholarly publication. Even afterwards they only run stories that fit the institutional brand. Northwestern is a major research university with a liberal reputation and plenty of outstanding research to publicise so the PR team probably won’t be running this even when it is published. The university newspaper (independent from university comms) has already got a lot of pushback for giving column space to one of these researchers.

All that said, if these two were my students I would advise them to put this research on a preprint server and try to figure out a way around any admin hurdles. What they’ve done as I said isn’t unusual, but their claims are so strong and of such public interest that readers will have a reasonable expectation to see the evidence in more detail.

Interesting. thanks.