I heard that on a MEN's discussion the other day. Some female psychologist was flaunting her degrees and several of the men pointed out that her field of study amounted to little more than nonsense repeated endlessly. Several of the men observed that a university education has become irrelevant to a man's place in the world. They suggested that millions of young men are getting educated elsewhere and the result of their turning aside is showing up in declining male enrollment at universities.
The notion of universities becoming irrelevant intrigued me. If they are irrelevant, were they relevant previously? What does it mean for universities to be relevant or irrelevant?
Universities that we now know are pretty much a creature of the 20th century. Most of them were created as small schools in the late 19th century and became large and prosperous in the 20th. Sure there have always been centers of learning and teachers. Socrates held discussion classes for a group of students. Throughout the middle ages monks held classes and led discussions in letters. Oxford University is several centuries old, but until recently it was small and consisted largely of a few students getting together with some professor to discuss a particular topic. Harvard was founded in the 17th century as a seminary for Puritan ministers, and indeed most of the colleges of that day were primarily seminaries for religious studies. The great universities we know today began with the late 19th century ideas about universal education and blossomed into huge institutions in the 20th century. We who grew up in the late 20th century are tempted to believe that a university is the only way to get an education, but that is not the case.
Prior to the invention of universities people still got educated and conducted their affairs quite well. For example, in the early 19th century, Abraham Lincoln became a lawyer by apprenticing with a senior lawyer. My own grandfather had a long and successful career as a lawyer and judge after taking an undergraduate legal education at the University of Michigan. A century ago three years of "law school" following a 4 year university degree was virtually unheard of. Over the past two centuries, universities have been marketing their services by continually stretching out the number of years you have to devote before you are able to practice most "professions." But it was not always so, as Abraham Lincoln ought to teach us. In fact, universities have made their requirements so onerous that it's almost impossible to succeed, and so costly that many graduates are saddled with huge debts. Enough already!
During the men's discussion mentioned above it was pointed out that psychobabble degrees offer almost no useful information. None of theories and "knowledge" has any more factual basis than someone's opinion, which, if you track it down, is based on someone else's opinion in an endless circle. Many other university departments consist of "scholarship" which is nothing more than being able to cite other opinions who in turn cited someone else. If you follow the chain they have no actual knowledge or facts other than a closed group citing each other and calling that "research."
The bimbo flaunting her psychology degree displayed a complete lack of knowledge of the feelings or emotions of the men with whom she was discussing. That brings up another aspect of "relevant," it works both ways. For the entire history of formalized psychology the focus of their "research" has been on females. Almost all of Freud's customers were women, and today over 95% of psychology customers are female. They cater to their customers, females, and have NEVER investigated, understood, or cared about the psychology of men. Men, to the practice and teaching of psychology, are a side issue, not their focus, not in their database, irrelevant.
The English Department teaches literary theories. Among various literary theories is "feminist theory" but not "masculist theory." Several courses in the English Department are cross code listed with the Women's Studies department, but none cross code listed with the Men's Studies department. When English Department professors go to scholarly conference such as the Modern Language Association's annual conference, there are many papers presented on women and women's issues, but NONE on men and men's issues. They write doctoral dissertations on medieval women's rhetoric, but do you see any on men's medieval rhetoric? Sure, they still have some men studying English literature, but the Department, and the whole field of study has turned it's back on men. Men, men's issues, men's theories, men's needs, men's feelings, and about everything else, it seems, are irrelevant.
Of course English Department professors would deny that they have branded men irrelevant, after all they still have lots of men taking classes (a diminishing number that gets smaller every year). A man can still enroll, and get an English degree along with a Women's Studies like poor Jeff. He has several degrees, including Women's Studies, but really struggles trying to fit in when he's out with MEN building a home.
An then there are the speech codes, sexual harassment training, and Office of Men are Bad. They all have a "Women's Center" or equal, but not one has a "Men's Center." And their "Diversity Office" practices racist, sexist employment and only hires black women. Men are irrelevant at the Diversity Office, and men's feelings and needs are irrelevant to the administration.
If men are so irrelevant to be below the management radar at universities, how are men supposed to feel about spending 4 to 10 years of our lives and umpteen thousand dollars, going into massive debt, purchasing what they are selling? Is a university degree the only way for a MAN to become educated? Is a degree in Women's Studies an education at all for a MAN? Or the psychology of women? Or feminized filtered history?
We might also ask why people sacrifice years and a small fortune to get that degree? Half a century ago we were told that a university degree was the key to a good job and a successful career. Since then we have seen that promise turn to dust. Many companies now hire only women in many of the office jobs where college educated men once worked. My own former employer hadn't hired a man in an entry level position in 20 years, nor promoted a man from within. The few old men who still did most of the actual work were dying off or retiring. Can a university promise a good job to MEN when graduates face flagrant sexist discrimination in the after graduation job market? Not really, and the false promise shows that men have become irrelevant.
There are many ways for a man to get educated, and many kinds of knowledge that constitute education. The university monopoly would like us to believe that they have a monopoly and control the keys to education, but that really isn't so. The Internet, for example, has made knowledge universally and widely available. On-line chat rooms and discussions of all kinds can replace the discussion groups that have been part of universities for centuries.
A century ago feminism looked out and saw that many successful men were getting college education, and began trying to take over "education." Without knowing what it was about the college experience that made men successful, feminists wanted it for themselves. More yet, they wanted to change university education to feminize it. Over the past century the feminists have pretty much taken over the university. From the lowest professor to the halls of the President's office the university is all about catering to feminist females. Men, in the management or teaching have become -- irrelevant.
But, MEN are never going to go away and vanish. MEN will still be the ones who do all the real work of the society. MEN who don't graduate from college often still dominate industries. Bill Gates is an often mentioned example. In fact, a college education often only restricts a man to a modest level bureaucratic job of mediocrity and mundane plodding. Huge numbers of young men have learned that the university itself is the one that is becoming irrelevant. Huge numbers of men are voting with their feet and letting the university administrators know that they may be selling their feminized crapola, but we aren't buying. Enrollments by men are way below 50% and are rapidly declining as more and more men tell them to take their "education" and stuff it.
Does any man need to learn "feminist theory"? Does any man need female psychobabble? Does any man need the Women's Center and Women's Studies Department promoting anti-men hate? Are any of those relevant to the future of a young man?
For a century women have worked hard to take what men had in universities, and to take it away from men. They have succeeded, but in taking it away and turning it into something that is irrelevant to men's success. It's an empty accomplishment. It won't make their lives happier, nor make them successful. In the end, it isn't the circular citations that were the basis for a good education at universities several decades ago. It was the MEN who came and shared together that made it all relevant. MEN will always be the ones who make the society work, who create the homes, the food, the fun electronics, and all the good things of life. It will always be the MEN who are the center of relevance of a society. When men are cast aside and turned away, the institution itself becomes irrelevant, a shell of its former greatness. In the 21st century universities will decline, are already declining, as they have become irrelevant.
Bob
Labels: Colleges, Disinfect schools, Duke, Education, Misandry, school shootings, Universities
