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What was it that one learned through a great books curriculum? Certainly not "conservatism" in any contemporary American sense of the term. We were not taught to become American patriots, or religious pietists, or to worship what Rudyard Kipling called "the Gods of the Market Place." We were not instructed in the evils of Marxism, or the glories of capitalism, or even the superiority of Western civilization.
As I think about it, I'm not sure we were taught anything at all. What we did was read books that raised serious questions about the human condition, and which invited us to attempt to ask serious questions of our own. Education, in this sense, wasn't a "teaching" with any fixed lesson. It was an exercise in interrogation.
To listen and understand; to question and disagree; to treat no proposition as sacred and no objection as impious; to be willing to entertain unpopular ideas and cultivate the habits of an open mind — this is what I was encouraged to do by my teachers at the University of Chicago.
It's what used to be called a liberal education.
The University of Chicago showed us something else: that every great idea is really just a spectacular disagreement with some other great idea.
Bret Stephens's speech warrants a full read. It makes valuable points that we all need to hear, even on SN.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday September 27 2017, @12:56PM (6 children)
I don't really disagree with anything in your post but I would revise and extend some remarks on the above.
The quote above is a "know your enemy". I don't want to debate the gay marriage thing here, because forest for the trees and all that. But the modern-young-genx-gen-zyklon-alt right has differing outlook from ancient-neocon-religious-boomer-legacy right. You may have noticed that someone like Trump doesn't get along terribly well with congressman Paul Ryan. Its just classic sales technique, pitch your product to match the demographics of the recipient. Or if we must discuss this tree instead of the forest or forestry science in general, I'm just saying you can't sell gay marriage the same way to both boomers and older vs genx and younger, it just doesn't work because of modern viewpoints.
(Score: 3, Disagree) by c0lo on Wednesday September 27 2017, @01:41PM (3 children)
We certainly know the enemy, we've met them... and they are us.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 3, Disagree) by choose another one on Wednesday September 27 2017, @04:16PM (2 children)
NO they are not, they are them, they are nothing like us, they are wrong, totalitarian, immoral, warmongers, evil, in fact everything we are not.
(Score: 3, Disagree) by c0lo on Wednesday September 27 2017, @04:27PM (1 child)
You like trespassing into Poe's jurisdiction or what?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 27 2017, @10:56PM
Poets have no jurisdiction, and story tellers are weak liberal arts failures!
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday September 27 2017, @02:35PM (1 child)
"ancient-neocon-religious-boomer-legacy"
I have to ask why you would associate neocon with any of the other words in that tangled mess? Neoconservatism was never "widely accepted" by even the Republican party. It was an aberrant thing, that was ushered in with GWB and Dick Cheney, and pretty much packed up and sent to Texas when GWB left the White House. I personally found everything about neoconservatism to be repugnant. I really dislike Obama, and I really dislike Bill Clinton - but there was a lot more reason to dislike Bush's neoconservatism than either of those liberal fools.
Neoconservatism has nothing to do with religion, unless you happen to worship the Almighty Dollar. Nothing to do with boomers. It's not ancient, or legacy. It's just an aberration.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Thursday September 28 2017, @01:32AM
uuhh may want to check out the coincidences there... from the point of view of the average gen-x gen-y kid the neocons are all "old times".
I would agree the neocons sucked horribly. But I wouldn't say there was no peculiar religious commonality...