Everyone is familiar with \u201cpeer-pressure.\u201d<\/p>\n
Adults like to convince themselves that peer-pressure is a juvenile phenomenon, something to which only children and, especially, teenagers are subjected.\u00a0 Grown-ups, we assure ourselves, are sufficiently tough-minded and strong-willed.\u00a0 Unlike weaker, immature kids, we are individuals with the courage to go our own way\u2014regardless of who thinks what.<\/p>\n
This way of thinking is especially self-delusional in the case of contemporary academics, just those who, presumably, are sufficiently discerning to recognize that the ethos of their peers is far from a self-evident Truth.<\/p>\n
Yet ideological conformity, or Groupthink, is more entrenched in academia than it is almost anywhere.<\/p>\n
Academics tend to constitute what the Polish-Jewish philosopher of science Ludwik Fleck called a \u201cthought collective.\u201d\u00a0 A thought collective is a community the members of which largely endorse the same ideas and share common manners of thinking and perceiving.\u00a0 \u201cThinking is a collective activity,\u201d Fleck wrote back in the 1930\u2019s.\u00a0 \u201cIts product is a certain picture, which is visible only to anybody who takes part in this social activity, or a thought which is also clear to the members of the collective only.\u201d<\/p>\n
In short: \u201cWhat we do think and how we do see depends on the thought-collective to which we belong.\u201d<\/p>\n
Every thought-collective has a \u201ccollective mood\u201d and a \u201cthought style.\u201d The former produces the latter.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe force which maintains the collective and unites its members,\u201d Fleck explains, \u201cis derived from the community of the collective mood. <\/em>This mood produces the readiness for an identically directed<\/em> perception, evaluation and use of what is perceived<\/em>, i.e. a common thought-style\u201d (emphasis added).<\/p>\n In other words, the collective mood of a thought-collective binds its members by demanding of them the affirmation of common values and the thinking of common thoughts. \u00a0Even the technical terminology of the \u201cesoteric\u201d circle of the thought-collective\u2014its elite, the specialists, those who have achieved a greater degree of fluency in the discourse of the collective\u2014have anything but the cold, value-neutral accuracy that they are supposed to possess.\u00a0 Quite the contrary: These terms have \u201ca specific thought-charm,\u201d \u201ca certain specific power,\u201d for they are \u201cnot only a name but a slogan.\u201d<\/p>\n That this is the case, Fleck says, is borne out readily enough by the widespread sense on the part of new members of an esoteric circle that joining it has \u201cthe value of the sacrament of initiation.\u201d<\/p>\n The \u201cidentically directed perception, evaluation and use of what is perceived\u201d required for the solidarity among the members of a thought-collective is achieved through emotion-laden terms or \u201cthought-charms.\u201d \u00a0It as well obtained by way of the neglect and marginalization of those outside the collective.<\/p>\n Focusing on the contemporary state of the liberal arts and humanities, it doesn\u2019t take a stretch of the imagination to apply Fleck\u2019s theory of the thought-collective to academia.\u00a0 This thought-collective is marked by a distinctive manner of conceiving reality, what is commonly recognized by both its members as well as non-members as an ideologically leftist<\/em> or \u201cPolitically Correct\u201d orientation.<\/p>\n The dominant thought-collective of academics in the liberal arts (including the \u201csocial\u201d sciences) is facilitated by way of a specialized idiom that reinforces conformity among its members while devaluing non-members. Here are some examples:<\/p>\n Social Justice: <\/em><\/strong>Academics tirelessly proclaim their commitment to \u201csocial <\/em>justice\u201d\u2014never plain, traditional justice. <\/em><\/p>\n Equality\/Inequality: <\/em><\/strong>There is no topic over which academics obsess more than this one. In fact, the fight for \u201csocial justice\u201d is <\/em>the fight against \u201cinequalities\u201d and\/or for Equality.\u00a0 But by Equality, what the members of this thought-collective have in mind is a centrally-directed distribution of material and economic resources that comports with the ideal distribution of their imaginings.<\/p>\n Racism: <\/em><\/strong>For as much as this term is used by everyone these days, no one really knows what, if anything, it even means. While your average person is ready to equate it with a hatred for or a willingness to do bad to the members of another race, this is decidedly not <\/em>what contemporary academics mean by this term.<\/p>\n \u201cRacism\u201d is used by the thought-collective of academics to denote a subconscious<\/em> phenomenon limited (almost entirely) to white people<\/em>.\u00a0 It is said to saturate the very institutions or \u201cstructures\u201d (another thought-charm) of European or Western civilization.\u00a0 Thus, by this definition, even the most benevolent, well-meaning of whites is affected by \u201cracism.\u201d<\/p>\n White Privilege: <\/em><\/strong>This is another weasel word that is all the rage among academics these days. \u201cWhite privilege\u201d denotes nothing.\u00a0 However, it is meant to reinforce the unsubstantiated, verifiably false charge that non-white peoples remain the targets of relentless \u201cracism.\u201d<\/p>\n Whether an individual is rich or poor, successful or unsuccessful, virtuous or vicious, if he or she is white, then he or she enjoys an existence more \u201cprivileged\u201d than any experienced by any other nonwhite person\u2014however wealthy, powerful, famous, healthy, and even happy this nonwhite person may be.<\/p>\n Do you see how this works?\u00a0 Whites are always guilty because of their unmerited \u201cprivilege\u201d while nonwhites are always at a \u201cdisadvantage\u201d that is just as unmerited.<\/p>\n And this brings us to our next thought-charmer.<\/p>\n The Disadvantaged: <\/em><\/strong>This abstraction refers to no one, though it is devised to imply that those, primarily nonwhites, who by any social index fare worse than whites do so because they are at a \u201cdisadvantage.\u201d\u00a0 This <\/em>in turn is meant to suggest that their disadvantage has been imposed upon them by\u2014who else?\u2014the larger white society.<\/p>\n Sexism\/Homophobia\/Islamophobia\/Transphobia\/Xenophobia, etc.: <\/em><\/strong>Space constraints preclude a more thorough analysis here, but the bottom line is this: The thought-collective comprised of academics has created whole departments invested exclusively in promoting the fiction that the entirety of Western (European) civilization is responsible for the mistreatment of women, gays, Muslims, the trans-gendered, and, well, everyone other than white Christian men.<\/p>\n And while these \u201cisms\u201d and \u201cphobias\u201d have no denotation<\/em>, this matters not, for the members of the thought-collective care only that they connote<\/em> something really bad.\u00a0 As with \u201cracism\u201d and \u201cwhite privilege,\u201d \u201csexism,\u201d \u201chomophobia,\u201d and the like are said to reside within the very institutions and assumptions of Western societies.<\/p>\n This list of these \u201cslogans\u201d with their \u201cthought charm\u201d could be expanded indefinitely.\u00a0 For now, though, it should be clear that (most of) today\u2019s academics, far from being deep, curious thinkers, are in reality joint-members of a thought-collective.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Everyone is familiar with \u201cpeer-pressure.\u201d Adults like to convince themselves that peer-pressure is a juvenile phenomenon, something to which only children and, especially, teenagers are subjected.\u00a0 Grown-ups, we assure ourselves, are sufficiently tough-minded and strong-willed.\u00a0 Unlike weaker, immature kids, we are individuals with the courage to go our own way\u2014regardless of who thinks what. This…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":399,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1768","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n