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Academic Stupidity And Brainwashing
Townhall ^ | Walter E. Williams Walter E. Williams | Posted: Sep 11, 2019 12:01 AM

Posted on 09/11/2019 10:19:09 AM PDT by Red Badger

Just when we thought colleges could not spout loonier ideas, we have a new one from American University. They hired a professor to teach other professors to grade students based on their "labor" rather than their writing ability. The professor that American University hired to teach that nonsense is Asao B. Inoue, who is a professor at the University of Washington in Tacoma in interdisciplinary arts and sciences. He is also the director of the university's writing center. Inoue believes that a person's writing ability should not be assessed, in order to promote "anti-racist" objectives. Inoue taught American University's faculty members that their previous practices of grading writing promoted white language supremacy. Inoue thinks that students should be graded on the effort they put into a project.

The idea to bring such a professor to American University, where parents and students fork over $48,459 a year in tuition charges, could not have been something thought up by saner members of its academic community. Instead, it was probably the result of deep thinking by the university's diversity and campus life officials. Inoue's views are not simply extreme but possibly hostile to the academic mission of most universities. Forgiving and ignoring a students' writing ability would mostly affect black students. White students' speaking and writing would be judged against the King's English, defined as standard, pure or correct English grammar. CARTOONS | Michael Ramirez View Cartoon

Professor Noam Chomsky, called the father of modern linguistics, formulated the generative theory of language. According to his theory, the most basic form of language is a set of syntactic rules that is universal for all humans and that underlies the grammar of all human languages. We analyze and interpret our environment with words and sentences in a structured language. Oral and written language provides a set of rules that enables us to organize thoughts and construct logical meaning with our thoughts.

Not holding students accountable to proper grammar does a disservice to those students who overall show poor writing abilities. When or if these students graduate from college, they are not going to be evaluated in their careers by Inoue's tailored standards. They will be judged according to their objective abilities, and it probably follows that if they fail to meet those objective standards, the standards themselves will be labeled as racist.

There's another very dangerous bit of academic nonsense happening, this time at the K-12 level of education. One America News Network anchor interviewed Mary Clare Amselem, education specialist at the Heritage Foundation, about the California Department of Education's proposed ethnic studies curriculum. The proposed ethnic studies curriculum would teach children that capitalism and father figures are racist.

The Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum also includes gross anti-Israel bias and teaches about a Palestinian-led anti-Israel initiative called Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions. The curriculum also has students study issues of police brutality and asks teachers to find incidents of bias by police in their own communities. According to an article by Shelby Talcott in The Stream, California's proposed curriculum called for students to study lawmakers such as Democratic Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar and Democratic Michigan Rep. Rashida Tlaib, both of whom have supported the BDS movement and have been accused of anti-Semitic rhetoric. Recommended Wow: Speaker at 9/11 Ceremony in New York Calls Out Ilhan Omar Cortney O'Brien

The proposed ethnic studies proposal has been removed from the California Department of Education website. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., said, "While I am relieved that California made the obvious decision to revisit this wholly misguided proposal, we need to know why and how a blatantly anti-Semitic, anti-Israel, factually inaccurate curriculum made its way through the ranks of California's Department of Education." He added, "This was not simply an oversight -- the California Department of Education's attempt to institutionalize anti-Semitism is not only discriminatory and intolerant, it's dangerous."

Brainwashing our youngsters is a serious matter. The people responsible for the California Department of Education's proposal ought to be summarily fired.

Walter E. Williams is a professor of economics at George Mason University.

Walter E. Williams's Latest Book American Contempt for Liberty is available on Amazon


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; Government; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: education
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1 posted on 09/11/2019 10:19:09 AM PDT by Red Badger
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To: Red Badger

American University, being at the center of the great progressive empire in Washington DC, is one of the least intellectual, most ridiculous leftist puppy-mills in the nation.


2 posted on 09/11/2019 10:25:59 AM PDT by PGR88
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To: Red Badger

Bookmark


3 posted on 09/11/2019 10:28:20 AM PDT by aquila48 (Do not let them make you care!)
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To: Red Badger
Image result for Asao B. Inoue
Dr. Asao B. Inoue

Asao B. Inoue is professor of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences, director of university writing and the writing center at the University of Washington Tacoma.

4 posted on 09/11/2019 10:29:00 AM PDT by Robert DeLong
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To: Red Badger

Labor theory of value. Pure Marxism.


5 posted on 09/11/2019 10:31:19 AM PDT by djpg
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To: Red Badger

[[Just when we thought colleges could not spout loonier ideas,]]

Nope- I never thought that- nothing surprises me anymore- these liberal colleges are stuck on crazy-


6 posted on 09/11/2019 10:34:34 AM PDT by Bob434
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To: Red Badger

“The proposed ethnic studies curriculum would teach children that capitalism and father figures are racist.”

Michelle started this during the 2012 campaign when she said Barack has a lot of work to do to change our history and tradition. From Orwell’s 1984: “He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past.”


7 posted on 09/11/2019 10:34:37 AM PDT by antidemoncrat
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To: Red Badger

Asao the Ass-ho.


8 posted on 09/11/2019 10:44:46 AM PDT by Alas Babylon! (The media is after us. Trump's just in the way.)
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To: Red Badger

I d’tno ese eht gbi elda otuba ligpelsn ogdo. Tihs okot a tlo fo tofefr!


9 posted on 09/11/2019 10:45:21 AM PDT by polymuser (It's discouraging to think how many people are shocked by honesty and how few by deceit. Noel Coward)
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To: Red Badger
They will be judged according to their objective abilities, and it probably follows that if they fail to meet those objective standards, the standards themselves will be labeled as racist.

Not to worry. In the coming leftard communist utopia, it will be from each according to his ability. If a worker has low ability he can still get what he needs without having to put much effort into it. It's all good.

10 posted on 09/11/2019 10:53:58 AM PDT by mjp ((pro-{God, reality, reason, egoism, individualism, natural rights, limited government, capitalism}))
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To: Robert DeLong
Asao B. Inoue is professor of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences, director of university writing and the writing center at the University of Washington Tacoma.

IOW, an academic.

ACADEMIC (ac-a-DEM-ic): An individual educated beyond his intelligence who is unable or unwilling to create or provide goods or services of value to others, who hides out in a college or university, pontificates and expects to be paid for it, usually from public funds.

11 posted on 09/11/2019 10:58:43 AM PDT by JimRed ( TERM LIMITS, NOW! Build the Wall Faster! TRUTH is the new HATE SPEECH.)
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To: JimRed

Yes. 8>)


12 posted on 09/11/2019 11:05:53 AM PDT by Robert DeLong
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To: Red Badger

“Inoue believes that a person’s writing ability should not be assessed, in order to promote “anti-racist” objectives.”

The key takeaway of the article. Can’t have the affirmative action students falling behind.

Here in the People’s Republic of California they are trying to pass a bill to pay student athletes. As if free tuition at a UC, lower academic entrance requirements, and priority in scheduling classes weren’t enough perks! If student athletes choose to use their golden opportunity to get a degree in underwater basket weaving, as opposed to something that will help them after they’re too old to play ball, that’s on them.

Proponents of the bill claim student athletes deserve to be compensated for use of their image and likeness to promote the university. I definitely recall my image and likeness popping up quite a few times in my high school yearbook. When can I expect my check?

(Rant off).


13 posted on 09/11/2019 11:18:12 AM PDT by FormerFRLurker (Keep calm and vote your conscience.)
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To: Red Badger

Our colleges are controlled and operated by the Intellectual Yet Idiots, who have been controlling our lives for decades.

Nassim Taleb Exposes The World’s “Intellectual-Yet-Idiot” Class!

What we have been seeing worldwide, from India to the UK to the US, is the rebellion against the inner circle of no-skin-in-the-game policymaking “clerks” and journalists-insiders, that class of paternalistic semi-intellectual experts with some Ivy league, Oxford-Cambridge, or similar label-driven education who are telling the rest of us 1) what to do, 2) what to eat, 3) how to speak, 4) how to think… and 5) who to vote for.

But the problem is the one-eyed following the blind: these self-described members of the “intelligenzia” can’t find a coconut in Coconut Island, meaning they aren’t intelligent enough to define intelligence and fall into circularities?—?, but their main skills is ability to pass exams written by people like them.

With psychology papers replicating less than 40%, dietary advice reversing after 30 years of fatphobia, macroeconomic analysis working worse than astrology, the appointment of Bernanke who was less than clueless of the risks, and pharmaceutical trials replicating at best only 1/3th of the time, people are perfectly entitled to rely on their own ancestral instinct and listen to their grandmothers (or Montaigne and such filtered classical knowledge) with a better track record than these policymaking goons.

What we have been seeing worldwide, from India to the UK to the US, is the rebellion against the inner circle of no-skin-in-the-game policymaking “clerks” and journalists-insiders, that class of paternalistic semi-intellectual experts with some Ivy league, Oxford-Cambridge, or similar label-driven education who are telling the rest of us 1) what to do, 2) what to eat, 3) how to speak, 4) how to think… and 5) who to vote for.

But the problem is the one-eyed following the blind: these self-described members of the “intelligenzia” can’t find a coconut in Coconut Island, meaning they aren’t intelligent enough to define intelligence and fall into circularities?—?but their main skills is capacity to pass exams written by people like them.

With psychology papers replicating less than 40%, dietary advice reversing after 30 years of fatphobia, macroeconomic analysis working worse than astrology, the appointment of Bernanke who was less than clueless of the risks, and pharmaceutical trials replicating at best only 1/3th of the time, people are perfectly entitled to rely on their own ancestral instinct and listen to their grandmothers (or Montaigne and such filtered classical knowledge) with a better track record than these policymaking goons.

Indeed one can see that these academico-bureaucrats wanting to run our lives aren’t even rigorous, whether in medical statistics or policymaking. They can’t tell science from scientism?—?in fact in their eyes scientism looks more scientific than real science. (For instance it is trivial to show the following: much of what the Cass-Sunstein-Richard Thaler types?—?those who want to “nudge” us into some behavior?—?much of what they call “rational” or “irrational” comes from their misunderstanding of probability theory and cosmetic use of first-order models.) They are prone to mistake the ensemble for the linear aggregation of its components as we saw in the chapter extending the minority rule.

The Intellectual Yet Idiot is a production of modernity hence has been accelerating since the mid twentieth century, to reach its local premium today, along with the broad category of people without skin-in-the-game who have been invading many walks of life. Why? Simply, in many countries, the government’s role is ten times what it was a century ago (expressed in percentage of GDP).

The IYI seems ubiquitous in our lives but is still a small minority and rarely seen outside specialized outlets, social media, and or the IYI.

Beware the semi-erudite who thinks he is an erudite.

The IYI pathologizes others for doing things he doesn’t understand without ever realizing it is his understanding that may be limited. He thinks people should act according to their best interests and he knows their interests, particularly if they are “red necks” or English non-crisp-vowel class who voted for Brexit. When Plebeians do something that makes sense to them, but not to him, the IYI uses the term “uneducated”.

What we generally call participation in the political process, he calls by two distinct designations: “democracy” when it fits the IYI, and “populism” when the plebeians dare voting in a way that contradicts his preferences. While rich people believe in one tax dollar one vote, more humanistic ones in one man one vote, Monsanto in one lobbyist one vote, the IYI believes in one Ivy League degree one-vote, with some equivalence for foreign elite schools, and PhDs as these are needed in the club.

More socially, the IYI subscribes to The New Yorker. He never curses on twitter. He speaks of “equality of races” and “economic equality” but never went out drinking with a minority cab driver.

Those in the U.K. have been taken for a ride by Tony Blair.

The modern IYI has attended more than one TEDx talks in person or watched more than two TED talks on Youtube. Not only will he vote for Hillary Monsanto-Malmaison because she seems electable and some other such circular reasoning, but holds that anyone who doesn’t do so is mentally ill.

The IYI has a copy of the first hardback edition of The Black Swan on his shelves, but mistakes absence of evidence for evidence of absence. He believes that GMOs are “science”, that the “technology” is not different from conventional breeding as a result of his readiness to confuse science with scientism.

Typically, the IYI get the first order logic right, but not second-order (or higher) effects making him totally incompetent in complex domains. In the comfort of his suburban home with 2-car garage, he advocated the “removal” of Gadhafi because he was “a dictator”, not realizing that removals have consequences (recall that he has no skin in the game and doesn’t pay for results).

The IYI is member of a club to get traveling privileges; if social scientist he uses statistics without knowing how they are derived (like Steven Pinker and psycholophasters in general); when in the UK, he goes to literary festivals; he drinks red wine with steak (never white); he used to believe that fat was harmful and has now completely reversed; he takes statins because his doctor told him so; he fails to understand ergodicity and when explained to him, he forgets about it soon later; he doesn’t use Yiddish words even when talking business; he studies grammar before speaking a language; he has a cousin who worked with someone who knows the Queen; he has never read Frederic Dard, Libanius Antiochus, Michael Oakeshot, John Gray, Amianus Marcellinus, Ibn Battuta, Saadiah Gaon, or Joseph De Maistre; he has never gotten drunk with Russians; he never drank to the point when one starts breaking glasses (or, preferably, chairs); he doesn’t know the difference between Hecate and Hecuba; he doesn’t know that there is no difference between “pseudointellectual” and “intellectual” in the absence of skin in the game; has mentioned quantum mechanics at least twice in the past 5 years in conversations that had nothing to do with physics; he knows at any point in time what his words or actions are doing to his reputation.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-09-16/nassim-taleb-exposes-worlds-intellectual-yet-idiot-class


14 posted on 09/11/2019 11:49:06 AM PDT by Grampa Dave ( The line that separates satire and Democrats and Stupidity has vanished. (thanks to jonascord)!)
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To: Grampa Dave
What you are witnessing is the effect of a compulsion--as against reason--driven need to pretend that we are all creatures whose characteristics are controlled by our social environment. It is a lie which permeates Leftwing thought.

Compulsion For Uniformity

Lies Of Socialism

15 posted on 09/11/2019 12:08:04 PM PDT by Ohioan
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To: antidemoncrat
“. . . we need to know why and how a blatantly anti-Semitic, anti-Israel, factually inaccurate curriculum made its way through the ranks of California's Department of Education.”

A good place to start is with the faceless bureaucrats who came up with this idea. My guess is that delving into their social media history will reveal some very unsettling comments about the topics covered by the proposed curriculum.
16 posted on 09/11/2019 12:15:06 PM PDT by JGPhila
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To: Red Badger

The left has destroyed education and they’re really proud of that.


17 posted on 09/11/2019 12:15:11 PM PDT by Bullish (My tagline ran off with another man.)
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To: FormerFRLurker

Inoue’s idea sounds like it came from Richard Carranza, the NYC Chancellor of Education, who wants to eliminate all testing for admission to what, up until now, have been schools for the intellectually gifted. The Left, outside of the designated elites, does not want independent thinkers who tend to look behind the curtain to see the wizard pulling the strings to control other people. When the wizard is exposed, the Left loses its appeal.


18 posted on 09/11/2019 12:21:19 PM PDT by JGPhila
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To: Red Badger
The students who major in ethnic studies, global warming, and other such nonsense will be the self-condemned servants of those who made wise decisions.

The cream rises to the top.

Natural selection is still at work.

19 posted on 09/11/2019 12:23:45 PM PDT by Savage Beast (Was the election of Donald Trump to the Presidency liberty's last gasp? Big Brother is watching you.)
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To: Red Badger

So, faculty are going to read students’ minds to determine the factual level of effort each student expended toward any writing assignment? Or are they guessing? Or do they just ask students, because NO student would ever lie about that, right? Maybe they’ll rate on privilege. White student? Must have excess privilege, so not much effort. Favored minority student? No privilege, so tons of effort.


20 posted on 09/11/2019 12:27:58 PM PDT by Hoffer Rand (God be greater than the worries in my life, be stronger than the weakness in my mind, be magnified.)
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