glad i stumbled across your post! it’s become a bit of concern for me as well but i’m chalking it up to the more vocal students that are always online and are thus more opinionated.
i actually brought this post up with my friend who got into smith (and is also in the groupchat), as well as the rest of our lunch group today. “look what the gc got angry about today” was a bit of a joke with us for a few weeks, because… oh man. we’re all very liberal, queer women, and talking it out we agreed our unease and annoyance at the chat was because it was just a bit too high strung for us, sort of culminating in a competition as to who was the most “woke”. we’re all born and raised southern californian, and having spoken with people who have moved here from other places around the country and world they all describe the vibe here as incredibly relaxed compared to their old homes. we don’t argue political points much because quite frankly, in the end, almost everyone around us agrees on similar principals. definitely a culture shock to see people arguing when they had the same concrete ideas in common, but working themselves into a tizzy over the minutia.
looking at the other comments, i think in the end we’ll all be fine. i’m not worrying too much now that i’ve seen this post and some replies, and as a bit of a reassurance, i’ll always be there to hang out with if it gets too much (and it seems like some other people here) (ps: love your username ;;))