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Friday, December 1st, 2017

‘Elitists, crybabies and junk degrees’

Author:     Kevin Sullivan, Mary Jordan
Source:     The Washington Post
Publication Date:     26 November 2017
 Link: ‘Elitists, crybabies and junk degrees’
Stephan:   A large part of my social network is made up of academics, scientists, physicians, and philosophers whose lives and careers are entwined formally with colleges and universities. Beginning several years ago they began to talk to me about rightwing pressures they and their universities were feeling, and these pressures they report are growing more and more intense. Mostly they tell me that these attempts are anti-science, anti-open inquiry, and more and more attempts to influence research outcomes and to present as fact things which are actually no more than political and social fantasies. In addition to the pressures there is also a nationwide push to cutback funding so certain subjects can't be taught at all. This piece gives some flavor of the correspondence and these conversations I have been having. I see this as part of the Willful Ignorance Trend.

Palm trees line a pedestrian path at Arizona State University in Tempe, Ariz. The state has cut spending to all public higher education drastically over the past decade.
Credit: Bonnie Jo Mount

Frank Antenori shot the head off a rattlesnake at his back door last summer — a deadeye pistol blast from 20 feet. No college professor taught him that. The U.S. Army trained him, as a marksman and a medic, on the “two-way rifle range” of Afghanistan and Iraq.

Useful skills. Smart return on taxpayers’ investment. Not like the waste he sees at too many colleges and universities, where he says liberal professors teach “ridiculous” classes and indoctrinate students “who hang out and protest all day long and cry on our dime.”

“Why does a kid go to a major university these days?” said Antenori, 51, a former Green Beret who served in the Arizona state legislature. “A lot of Republicans would say they go there to get brainwashed and learn how to become activists and basically go out in the world and cause trouble.”

Antenori is […]

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1 Comment

  1. Rev. Dean on Friday, December 1, 2017 at 7:42 am

    All schools should teach students to become autodidactic (so they can continue to learn for themselves). I have learned much more from reading books than I have from my college education, although the college education is what lead me to want to learn more. I was fortunate to have a good library where I could find all the books necessary to become an autodidact, which gave me the motto:
    ignorance is it’s own punishment
    Wisdom is it’s own reward.