In the year 2012, I was a wide-eyed, 15-year-old who was so eager to discuss the presidential race. I was encouraged to get involved in politics in my civics class, and I learned how to debate and share my opinions in a professional, productive manner. During those months leading up to November, my love for politics and debate grew, I became informed, and I loved sharing my findings and my views with my classmates. Adults who saw my passion told me I should be excited for college — that's where the real sharing and the real learning happens. I have been told that once upon a time, college campuses were places full of free thought and informed discussion with minimal repercussions or judgment. Today, I’m in my junior year of college and saddened to say that since the race for the White House begun, I have been surrounded by hostility, and I have become scared to share my opinions with my classmates and professors.

Nope. I am terrified. My love for discussing politics and forming opinions has dwindled an incredible amount in the past few months, and it is not because of any particular party, but it is because of what the nature of both the parties have become. They have become polarized. This idea of "no compromise" has been perpetuated by candidates, other politicians and commentators on both sides of the aisle as they continue to insist on bringing out personal attacks regarding the opposite party, not only on the candidates, but on the supporters as well.

Words like evil, witch, stupid and coward never had and have no place in politics. Based on attacking words alone, people will get emotionally involved and angry. Now, I pour my heart into my opinions, but I have always welcomed disagreement and genuinely enjoyed it. However, recently I find myself becoming more angry because the debate in general, on a wide variety of issues, has become personal, which means the attacks have become personal too.

It is my opinion that in no way should one be called anything along the lines of a “bad person” simply based on the candidate they prefer. Once that happens, conversation stops, your opinion becomes irrelevant to the other person, and no compromise can be reached. These important topics become useless to discuss.

This year, a good amount of my professors have made it overly clear what their opinions are and that is OK. But when it come time to discuss our thoughts, I hesitate, and I sense hesitation around me. What we fear is hostile reaction from our classmates and professors; we fear that polarization of the two major parties will polarize us from the class. That is not what I pictured college to be like at all.

I have a theory that technology and social media totally perpetuate uninformed disdain towards anyone who doesn’t agree with you. Depending on what we follow, we are constantly exposed to the bad of each candidate rather than to what is similar and can be made into a compromise. There is an issue with common ground being displayed depending on where we get our news. Also, there is a notion being promoted that people who support each candidate think that person is perfect, and that is simply, completely false. In this race, it has come down to the “lesser of two evils” for a lot people, and people are still figuring it out. A lot of people have even chosen not to choose because they are afraid of the social repercussions of picking a side.

My point is, even though this race has been ugly and probably will get uglier, that doesn't mean we as college students have to. It is a dream, I know, but social groups and personal attacks shouldn't have to be associated with voting Republican or Democratic, debates shouldn’t turn into fights, and people shouldn't be afraid of their opinions; they should embrace them. At the end of the day, we are all just fundamentally different in what we find important and that doesn’t make anyone less than anyone else; in fact, it makes us as a country stronger.

It is my hope that we can bring our campuses back to a focus on honoring opinions and creating an environment where we can learn from each other and no longer be ashamed or scared for what we believe.