> We asked: Have you ever pretended to hold more progressive views than you truly endorse to succeed socially or academically? An astounding 88 percent said yes.

    > These students were not cynical, but adaptive. In a campus environment where grades, leadership, and peer belonging often hinge on fluency in performative morality, young adults quickly learn to rehearse what is safe.

    > This dissonance shows up everywhere. Seventy-eight percent of students told us they self-censor on their beliefs surrounding gender identity; 72 percent on politics; 68 percent on family values. More than 80 percent said they had submitted classwork that misrepresented their views in order to align with professors. For many, this has become second nature — an instinct for academic and professional self-preservation.

Note they only asked if participants pretended to have more progressive views, not views different from their own. Nor did they ask how frequently or how extreme the views were different from the participants' own. They chose to narrowly look at a particular politically charged social issue. They present no data at all showing that this is in any way damaging.

Note, you are supposed to have more nuanced views in private than you express to people who are only a wrung up from strangers. Even more so, it is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without holding it as your own. There should be people in your life to the left and right of you, and both should describe you as someone who "gets where I'm coming from."