She cited fashion, tradition and various other examples as reasons why she thought that. She was from a big Northern city and her parents were of the leftist persuasion, and that background, she admitted, influenced her perception. Another friend, when asked if the University is conservative, disagreed.
Political labels are relative.
Each person looks through his own looking glass at the world, and that looking glass can color political perceptions. No better reminder is needed than the past decades here in Charlottesville. In comparison to many Northern schools in the sixties, with their intense student activism and anti-war rhetoric, the University, the Southern gentlemen's club, was not the hotbed of liberalism. Course selection, activism and complete openness about issues your grandparents never even considered discussing, among other things, contrast those educational institutions with ours. On the other hand, labeling the University as liberal spawns an argument worth considering.