I'm A Black Sheep

During my University years it was often suggested to me that I consider some academic, research (or writing) path.

As you can see and tell, I didn't exactly heed the call.

I often wondered why I made certain decisions and in the case of the scholarly life it all came down to one thing: culture. The rest can be neatly put into a classic Steve Earle song: I ain't ever satisfied.

By culture I mean I would never fit in. Or at least, that's the perception I had. There were many reasons for this - one of which being I needed to explore the self-employment world and other more "pragmatic" avenues - but the one that stood out was ideological. Except for one of two professors, the majority of professors (and students) were leftists.

Not that I'm saying I'm the opposite. I'm not. I just want to hear and absorb ideas.

The vibrancy of the debates were weak and the premises of the arguments presented lame. Whenever someone dared question or challenge the stagnant prevailing and accepted ethos of the class, they were summarily dismissed. The term "right-wing" didn't hold the same vile image it does today so it was rarely - if ever - uttered.

It was these voices of dissent (very much a relative term) I enjoyed most. Personally, I rarely spoke in class except to side with such a person or when the level of stupidity was too much for me to digest. And I mean that literally - I liked to eat in class.

The best professors of course objectively TAUGHT. They did not clutter their lessons with their own personal views. Now whether teaching can be truly objective is another matter altogether. Is all teaching "political?"

Along the path of learning I guess a defense mechanism was built within me somewhere that determined I was not made for the gig of being a professor.

My friend made it to foreign affairs - after getting his Masters - and for a brief period was impossible to be around. Locked-jawed and all he would ruminate about the great ideas some of his (he was a TA) had "great" ideas.

The first thing that went through my head was, "Oh , shut up." The next thing was, "what life experiences did you have to know what constitutes being a "great" political science idea, and the third was, well, I forget what it was but I'm sure there was one. He was just annoying. All he was missing was a tweed jacket and a glass of brandy.

I don't know what got into him because he was conservative and a rare bird in academic circles. Whenever his faculty would meet to discuss possibly going on strike - which was, like, always - he'd be the only to vote "no." He was chastised for it and called "le riche" among his wanna-be Bolshevik colleagues. None of whom, I would assume, would ever fight for a socialist cause by laying their lives on the line.

Like I said, not for me. Besides, I can't grade papers. Nor would I be interested in reading poorly thought out and written papers. And to put up with some pain in the ass student filled with a sense of self-entitlement demanding a higher grade? Bah.

I've often heard the debate about whether the leaders in institutions of higher education were liberal or conservative. Only a fence-sitter or delusional person would deny that the former prevails. There have been too many surveys and studies (including examining religion in school) over the years that confirm this. Read one here.

It doesn't surprise me that professors would hunk down behind their desks allowing their own personal views to cloud objective teaching. The idea that the exchange of ideas at Colleges and Universities exists is naive. It doesn't. Just look at students like Gillary Massa and the power radical student bodies have.

It's obviously all a power game.

And if I'm going to fight I may as well do it outside the walls of academia. It would be too much for me to accept if I watched freedom of thought and ideas whither before my eyes.