re: #532 elizajane

It’s the city of Berkeley that’s liberal. The University is just another academic institution with the usual mix of people: well-intentioned, poorly socialized, badly dressed, sometimes pretentious, sometimes absolutely brilliant, terrible at administration. I’ve been around in the academic world and Berkeley felt pretty much like everyplace else (though much less snooty than Harvard) until I had kids and became part of the larger community. That was definitely different from anyplace else I had lived.

Same for Stanford, which is so busy trying to be Harvard some times I have trouble taking Stanford snootiness very seriously. I really like Cal. Have worked there, and have known a lottttt of people from there. A couple clients of mine happen to be above The Alameda, but it’s cool. One is UCOP-affiliated. Now there’s an entrenched institution. Not even in the worst of ways. It is what it is.