Experts in autocracies have pointed out that it is, unfortunately, easy to slip into normalizing the tyrant, hence it is important to hang on to outrage. These incidents which seem to call for the efforts of the Greek Furies (Erinyes) to come and deal with them will, I hope, help with that. As a reminder, though no one really knows how many there were supposed to be, the three names we have are Alecto, Megaera, and Tisiphone. These roughly translate as “unceasing,” “grudging,” and “vengeful destruction.”
When I read articles reporting incidents of Trump voters – Republicans – doing something not very bright, and then read the comments, I often see riffs on the idea “Donald Trump says he loves the uneducated.” But, you know, that’s not exactly what he said. He said, “I love the poorly educated.” I understood that to mean, in essence, that not knowing anything is not quite good enough for Trump. He loves people who know things that aren’t true.
But it’s also true that Democrats tend to have more education that Republicans, even without regard to the quality. Let’s take this statistic: today, roughly 54% of college graduates identify Democratic or leaning to the Democrats, whereas only 39% identify Republican or leaning Republican.
It wasn’t always like this. As recently as 1994, the numbers went exactly the other way. (Hence my insistence on the distinction between “un-” and “poorly.” What were those colleges teaching, “The Works and Philosopy of Ayn Rand”?)
But that isn’t all. That was people with four-year degrees. When it comes to people with degrees above the four-year level, today, 63% are or lean Democratic, with only 31% going to the dark side. But back in the mid-1990’s, the split was more like 45% Republican, 47% Democratic. All these figures are from Pew Research Center.
The Republican advantage among people with a high school diploma or less is even more stark if one looks just at white people (no surprise, of course). There the divide today is roughly 47% Republican to 45% Democratic. That too is a shift from the 1990’s, when the numbers were not quite the other way.
This of course is no surprise to anyone who as lived as long as most of us here. Republicans have been bashing both education and intelligence verbally since, to my personal recollection, 1952, when Nixon called Stevenson an “egghead.” And I was only 7. That remark may have slipped by some, because it was also applicable to the fact that Adlai was balding. But it didn’t slip by my family. We knew it was anti-intellectual.
Then there was William F Buckley in 1963 claiming that he
should sooner live in a society governed by the first two thousand names in the Boston telephone directory than in a society governed by the two thousand faculty members of Harvard University.
Reagan and Bush the younger also said some too-stupid-to-be-believed things. And we have for some tome seen that the hostility is not just to people who have good educations, but to the colleges and universities themselves. In 2017, Pew found that
a majority of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents (58 percent) now say that colleges and universities have a negative effect on the country, up from 45 percent last year.
This is the road to Betsy DeVos. The only surprise should be that it didn’t happen faster. In a way, it’s too bad it didn’t. We might have taken better counter-measures sooner if it had.
And we also have here a true example of Republican hypocrisy. I have contended, and stand by, the fact that some of what looks like hypocrisy in Republicans isn’t – it’s just that they are going by a different moral standard from ours (in my opinion a decidedly IMmoral standard, but they apply it consistently.) But I really cannot call this anything but hypocrisy:
As a rule, in every Congress including this majority-Republican body, nearly every member has a four-year degree, and the number of House and Senate legislators who possess postgraduate educations is far higher than in the general population. If nothing else that proves the elite GOP lawmakers actually do value education, at least when they’re thinking about themselves and their children. It’s only their voters they want to keep disinterested in learning, convinced that knowing less is somehow better.
Alecto, Megaera, Tisiphone – you come to us from the cradle of learning on the non-Abrahamic side of our culture. But on the Abrahamic side, our heritage is also pride in that we are “People of the Book.” I’m not sure how – but I hope you can help us recover our pride in knowledge and learning, as well as intelligence.
The Furies and I will be back.
Cross posted to Care2 HERE.
17 Responses to “Everyday Erinyes #117”
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Uneducated and poorly educated people are easier to control. Children should be taught about critical thinking from the get-go, and receive this education from parents and schools alike.
Amen!
Critical thinkers don’t join political parties or send their children to school.
Uneducated and poorly educated people are also easier to scare and fear is a major motivator. Fear is used constantly by those on the right; Fear of others, fear of the unknown, fear of change.
Amen!
That’s a very interesting piece, JD.
Ignorant and poorly educated people are easier to fool too.
Most Americans are not politically active and derive their party loyalties by tradition rather than issue awareness. In the 1990’s many educated people habitually thought of Republicans as moderate. They needed to have their nosed rubbed in InsaniTEA by the Bush Reich to learn the truth.
Also, some very educated people are educated in how to steal from the poor and give to the rich!
All of that is so. Thanks.
YVW!
I find these remarks to be true.
I think that normalizing the motivation(s) of this WH, is frightening. I believe that the fear factor is high on the scale here, as Richard & Freya mentioned in their comment, and folks are easier to manipulate, while being poor, and yes, it is indeed immoral. Those that know, don’t help, those less fortunate, in their hearts, DO. imho.
Oops…I forgot to put this in my comment. I can relate to Eddiebcomedy: re: Education
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyN0cOk7YYc
Thank you, Joanne for post. Happy Easter, Y’all xo
LOL!
While this quote by Betsy DeVos is from “The New Yorker” …
The sad truth it is NOT a column by Andy. Those are HER words.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/betsy-devos-trumps-big-donor-education-secretary
A good quote to repeat over and over. Lest we forget.
AlterNet has an article, Republicans Are Becoming Less Educated, which has additional information and graphs.
I agree with Freya and Richard. Keeping the populace poorly educated is a recipe for the growth of fascism. Why think when another will relieve you of that burden.
I am currently reading a little book, “On Tyranny” by Timothy Snyder. It is twenty lessons on tyranny from the 20th century. Each lesson is about 6 pages in length but provides valuable insight and opportunity for thought.
Yeah, I chose not to include the graphs on account of their size and scale. The book sounds most interesting. I looked it up, and it’s very reasonable on Kindle … I have a credit that is more than it costs, so I’ll be reading it. Thanks.
The deliberate dumbing down of America has been discussed in a number of books and articles and referred to here on PP a number of times in the past years. People like Noam Chomski have had a lot to say on the topic and they all agree with you:
Personally I think some people just aren’t interested in books and learning and take little or no pride in knowledge for knowledge-sake, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. People who are ‘good with their hands’ as we say, are just as valuable to society as people who are ‘good with their head’. But everyone needs to know what is happening in the world to some degree and not let that specific knowledge be replaced by fake truth and lies. The Furies have a hell of a job to do on that front.
I also don’t think that more people have become less interested, or have less pride, in knowledge and learning, but many fail to see the relationship between a good basic education and the way a country develops both politically and economically. Like healthcare, education should be free and available to all who need/want it. But that would turn a country in a socialist state so feared by the Right. Because, unlike their base, leading Republicans are well educated and, with the exception of a few, smart enough to see that well educated people tend to be left-wing orientated, even if their income is in the higher brackets unless the development of their morality has not kept pace with their education. So to remain in power the right-wing base needs to remain uneducated and it needs to extend this uneducated base as much as possible. It seems they have succeeded so far, but by doing so they have also woken many up to their intentions. The Furies would do well to update the following article and spread it around as much as possible. It might open a lot more eyes to reality.
https://wakeup-world.com/2016/10/24/the-deliberate-dumbing-down-of-america-7-ways-the-ruling-elite-are-making-us-dumber/
Somebody needs to define “education”. Mind control is not “education”.
“In all countries, in all centuries, the primary reason for government to set up schools is to undermine the politically weak by convincing their children that the leaders are good and their policies are wise.” ~ Marshall Fritz
“And what is a good citizen? Simply one who never says, does or thinks anything that is unusual. Schools are maintained in order to bring this uniformity up to the highest possible point. A school is a hopper into which children are heaved while they are still young and tender; therein they are pressed into certain standard shapes and covered from head to heels with official rubber-stamps.” ~ H.L. Mencken
“Governments have ever been known to hold a high hand over the education of the people. They know, better than anyone else, that their power is based almost entirely on the school. Hence, they monopolize it more and more.” ~ Francisco Ferrer
“Wherever is found what is called a paternal government, there is found state education. It has been discovered that the best way to insure implicit obedience is to commence tyranny in the nursery.” ~ Benjamin Disraeli
The Marjory Stoneman Douglas students demonstrate that critical thinking can indeed be learned in schools.