The Left University (How it was born; how it grew; how to overcome it.)

The Weekly Standard ^ | October 3, 2005 issue | James Piereson

[hombre_sincero]

How did the left take over schools?

Those who CAN - DO!
Those who CANNOT - Teach!

disclaimer:

That is a general rule and NOT to be taken for all teachers, etc etc etc..... (for the lawyers and their MASTERS in black robes)

[TheForceOfOne]

That is a possibility with the ever increasing advancement in technology. A good friend of mine has a daughter, he and his wife have chosen the option of home schooling and she is performing quite well at it.

He told me that the major colleges frown on home schooling as some type of negative which will work against her when she applies for acceptance.

It's all politics in my opinion.

[highlymotivated]

EXACTLY!

I STILL do that in my MA studies! Haha. One textbook I just sold back, I nailed whiny statements throughout the text and HIGHLIGHTED them! I hope that I provoke thinking for someone in those indoctrination sites!

[middie]

The university's mission is not to be a vocational school teaching the student how to ''do'' something that will earn him/her a living. The supervening mission is to allow students to think analytically and critically; to question conventional wisdom and to challenge the ''true rule.'' Indoctrination of any direction or ideology is not what universities do. Those among us who express disdain for higher learning as nothing more than a political greenhouse in which ideological robots are created simply either don't have a clue or, alternatively, have an agenda that they wish were the norm.

[apackof2]

I hope that I provoke thinking for someone in those indoctrination sites!

Ditto, that's the mission!

[wbill]

I went to college as a moderate-to-liberal 18 year old.

By the time I ended my first year, I was rabidly conservative (even more so than now - age has a way of moderating views).

Why? Because I realized that the liberal kooks on campus stood for nothing. They lied outrageously and were never questioned about it. They did far more harm than good, and promoted ridiculous double standards.

My freshman 'indoctrination' had the ridiculous statistic (promoted by campus feminists) that '1 in 4 women on campus are raped every year'. It was a four year school.....do the math. I think that was the eye-opener for me, but there were plenty of other stories to come.

In general, I think that most college kids, given a good upbringing, will 'see the light'. Others will 'find it', when they get hit in the face with the reality of fulltime employment and confiscatory taxes. Most of the rest will stay safely ensconced in academia, and the newsroom of the NY Times.

[.cnI redruM]

Eventually, society will recognize and understand what a poor caliber of individual the modern college education produces. At that point, university tuitions will be considered a waste of money. That occurs when corporations and government agencies recognize the fact that they are better off training their own personnel rather than accepting university degrees as a vouchsafe for the competence of the individual. It's a few years off, but it will eventually happen.

[DeweyCA]

Indoctrination of any direction or ideology is not what universities do.

Sir, I respectfully disagree. That may be what you do, and it is a great ideal, but many people have experienced the direct opposite. Just look at the first-hand posts on this thread and many other threads. I also can speak from experience that there is much outright liberal indoctrination happening on college campuses.

[truthpls]

"Liberals only tolerate Liberals, conservatives are shouted down and excluded from their false reality of what is normal and mainstream."
Did anyone watch the socalled "debate" Sunday on CSpan 2?
I almost cried at the cheering for Galloway and the hissing at Hitchens. The moderator could be type cast for a movie about the 30's communists cells; complete loathing for this country. People should be very careful where they send their kids to school.

[wbill]

Good point....I think that this is happening already, particularly in the technical fields.

I'm in IT, and I can count the number of people I know in the field that have an IT degree on one hand. (Mine is in Electrical Engineering). I think that employers - when it comes to technical people, at least - look at a college degree to see if a person is 'educatable'. Then, they're taught what they need to know.

Another recurring theme that I've seen in the IT industry is hiring former military. They're stable, trainable, and have a can-do attitude to resolve problems. I've seen it with employers time and time again.

[goodnesswins]

This weekend the radio was tuned to Dr. Dean Edell.....he was talking about a Starbucks somewhere in the NE I think, who was printing some GAY GUYS thoughts on its cups - and I guess it was at a University.....anyway, people were up in arms, and his thoughts (spoken) were....."Well, I thought this was what Universities were for.....to be exposed to everything." (or something like that). ME...I thought Universities were places of LEARNING, not EXPOSURE....

[PajamaTruthMafia]

With the rise of the university, political theories and programs were increasingly devised by academics... who operated outside the arena of electoral politics and whose experience was of a far different kind. The reliance on experts introduced into liberal ranks a permanent ambivalence regarding representative government and the common man--for while the experts purported to act in the name of the people, they also understood that it was a grave risk actually to seek their consent or approval.

This elitism is readily apparent. They don't even try to hide their disdain for anyone with an opposing view.

It's as if academic (intellectual) elites are at war with the other sources of power and influence in society, namely, business and religious leaders. For their power bases, these elites join forces with Union leaders, artists, entertainers and people in the lower classes (who they can easily control).

[Travis McGee]

Spend a hundred grand to give your kids a college education, and at the end, you will likely have a little bisexual communist eco-nut who hates "Amerika" and your guts.

Sheesh. How did we get to this point?

[TheForceOfOne]

Liberal indoctrination happens on campus every day as sure as all outlets of liberal ideology force their political agenda on the majority. Activist liberal judges, the ACLU, the MSM, the newspapers, and it would be naive to think they do not. These liberals claim to speak for all Americans in order to appear popular and right to the ignorant and ill informed.

I doubt you will ever hear a liberal speak the truth and say "I speak for the minority of the population that doesn't reflect to the true opinion of the overwhelming majority who find our ideas vile and unAmerican and they're right!"

I take that back partially, former liberals/Democrats would admit as much having seen the light. :)

[.cnI redruM]

>>>>I'm in IT, and I can count the number of people I know in the field that have an IT degree on one hand.


I have degrees in a few things (Lots of night school), but only use the Math and Economics. None of which is advanced enough so that I couldn't have been trained in situ to do my current job.

[dbehsman]

"The university's mission is not to be a vocational school teaching the student how to ''do'' something that will earn him/her a living."

That's not quite correct. The law school department in a university is expected to train prospective lawyers how to be a lawyer. The same goes for medical school and some of the nonpolitical sciences (physics, chemistry, etc.). What on earth good is a lawyer who never heard of the Miranda decision, but has studied a bunch of multicultural crap?

"The supervening mission is to allow students to think analytically and critically; to question conventional wisdom and to challenge the ''true rule.'' "

Do you mean to tell me that it takes a human being on average four to five years in college just to learn to think critically and not to take everything at face value? Every human being already does that, it's just that the people without a degree don't get any credit for it. I've actually had college graduates not even give any of my ideas or arguments a chance simply because the thoughts disagreed with theirs and I did not have a degree. Talk about closed minded!

"Indoctrination of any direction or ideology is not what universities do."

With all due respect, I invite you to check out the University of Minnesota-Duluth.

"Those among us who express disdain for higher learning as nothing more than a political greenhouse in which ideological robots are created simply either don't have a clue or, alternatively, have an agenda that they wish were the norm."

Come on. If Ward Churchill did not exist, the leftist university would have to invent him.

[The Spirit Of Allegiance]

"The Frankfurt School, Marxists hiding as Democrats and the NEA are the primary culprits in this decades-old power ploy."


There is only a small amount of info on Gramsci and Frankfurt here on FR. Do you have any additional links?

[GladesGuru]

Take a walk on the wild side - -

Walk yourself through almost any of America's colleges/universities and then see if you still believe this line from your post:

Indoctrination of any direction or ideology is not what universities do.

It is happening right now at a college/university near you.

[polymuser]

Googling the terms should get you enough links for many nights of reading. The Frankfurt School appears, IMO, to be a highly under-reported factor in today's Liberal landscape. I understand that it produced techniques like concensus building and sensitivity training, along with the concept of using our pubic schools to indoctinate a future nation of voters (to pull the D(L) lever on que).