Student takeover at Evergreen State College

[Acken]

How the hell these people cope with the world after school is beyond my understanding.

 

[Farm Boy]

The bolded is the key really and its the hard part, because we are all so vain, so self righteous, so self assured and in love with the idea of our own flawless, faultless, virtue, that we struggle with the idea that people are not perfect and can not be perfect. It doesn't come naturally at all... the idea of giving people a break... especially not people we disagree with, or aren't friends/allies with.

I can't do it with the Italian mobster wise guys in The Godfather, I can't imagine it's any easier if you have really good reason not to like them for real reals.

How the hell these people cope with the world after school is beyond my understanding.

Given that they're actually in advanced education, the correct answer has to be, "Better than most."

 

[Acken]

Given that they're actually in advanced education, the correct answer has to be, "Better than most."

Which makes me doubt there is any value in a sociology based on race rather than class.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

Yeah, everything I've looked up so far says the CIA knew about the drug trafficking, but turned a blind eye to it because those cartels were helping the CIA. However, there's nothing to suggest that the CIA deliberately introduced crack into black neighborhoods specifically for the purpose of harming black people. It seems it was really more of a case of them just not caring that the crack was ending up in black neighborhoods.

Well, I think it was more than them "tolerating" it. First, let me agree on two things in your post. First off, I agree that the CIA never had the malicious intent of destroying black families. Second I agree that they did not directly introduce crack into black neighborhoods so to speak. Let me also say that I appreciate you going through my sources rather than just calling me crazy.

But their role was not the passive one you describe. If you look at the HuffPost article (I know, they have a lot of bad journalism, but this piece is pretty good imo) you get a more clearer picture. The CIA was essentially a mediator. Cocaine was not popular in most poor neighborhoods in the US. It simply cannot sell, too expensive and doesn't really "do it" for people addicted to opiates.

So essentially, by helping American druglords out with their "connections", they helped establish the crack trade. They didn't sell it, or distribute it, it was a rather elegant solution if you want to call it that. Two parties were "lead together".

A lot of the American druglords in that time did not have the connects to Latin America, simply because the stuff they were selling (heroin and other opiates, weed, everything that goes well in poor neighborhoods) mostly is not produced at all in Latin America. They had no reason to import from Latin America when you can buy poppy seeds from the ME for an insanely low price, turn it into a load of heroin that is worth thousands of times more and then stretch said heroin and you're looking at tens of thousand times your original investment.

Crack however meant that you could cut out a lot of middle men, import the raw materials straight from Latin America and have "disposable" personnel cook it, because cooking crack is almost as easy as doing a hardboiled egg. Turning poppy seeds into heroin isn't. Crack is highly addictive, just like heroin, but arguably even more destructive. It is just as easy to get hooked on. And perhaps more profitable. The crack epidemic was definitely forseeable for all parties involved. It wasn't anyones intention, but I'm sure it was a consequence they were aware of.

So yes, of course CIA agents weren't clockin' street corners handing out free Crack to poor blacks. Of course they weren't cooking it up themselves in secret laboratories. But they were an essential agent to make it happen. One could even argue that without the CIA involvement, the Crack epidemic would have never happened. I'm not knowledgeable enough to do so, but maybe someone else is

 

[Hygro]

The bolded is the key really and its the hard part, because we are all so vain, so self righteous, so self assured and in love with the idea of our own flawless, faultless, virtue, that we struggle with the idea that people are not perfect and can not be perfect. It doesn't come naturally at all... the idea of giving people a break... especially not people we disagree with, or aren't friends/allies with.

When you are too deep in your head, you imagine perfect play out of other people, but don't most of us most of the time default to cutting people breaks if we can? Aren't most of us aware of our flaws and the flaws of others, and even too often overfocused on them? Is not our media mostly about antiheroes, made relatable?

 

[Sommerswerd]

When you are too deep in your head, you imagine perfect play out of other people, but don't most of us most of the time default to cutting people breaks if we can? Aren't most of us aware of our flaws and the flaws of others, and even too often overfocused on them? Is not our media mostly about antiheroes, made relatable?

No. No, Yes, Yes. Maybe... there are alot more complex Antiheros now then when I was a kid... but I think that the sheer volume of choices in entertainment cancels that out. In 1950, an antihero on a major network would instantly become the ideal, the paradigm... Nowadays we can just say "I don't like that kind of antihero" and change to one of the myriad other channels/sites that show us what we want to see glorified and lionized. In that way, the embrace of the antihero... the idea that people are complex... is stunted.

 

[Smellincoffee]

This is why I'm rooting for global warming. Bring deliverance, O oceans, from the politics of hysteria.

 

[Azem.Ocram]

Here is an update on the Evergreen State College fiasco:

Enrollment dropped ~20%, causing a loss of $6 million.
http://www.theolympian.com/news/local/education/article210893889.html

Students sue the college for $1 million for discrimination
http://www.theolympian.com/news/local/education/article180025166.html

Professor harrassed and threatened for protesting "Day of Presence" receives a settlement of $500k
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattl...-of-protests-resigns-college-will-pay-500000/

6 professors resigned in total, all getting the severance pay
https://crosscut.com/2017/12/evergreen-state-college-racial-protests-professor-resigns-olympia

Former chief of Evergreen State College's police sues over discrimination, hostile work environment
http://www.cooperpointjournal.com/2...m-of-discrimination-based-on-race-and-gender/

I, for one, am overjoyed at seeing Evergreen's SJWs reap the repercussions of their misdeeds.

 

[Kaitzilla]

$6 million ouch
USA's 2014 most Liberal Campus is having a tough time!

This “Mizzou Effect” is a known factor among college leaders, and the official said Evergreen has been in contact with University of Missouri to learn from their experience.

But is the Mizzou Effect a real thing?
http://www.slate.com/articles/healt...y_go_down_when_students_protest_en_masse.html

 

[warpus]

Hahahaha

Is this really happening? Some people are nuts. Ah well, universities were a silly idea anyway

 

[Commodore]

Ah well, universities were a silly idea anyway

They really were. So many people wasting their time in universities when they could have gone to trade schools and actually learned something useful.

 

[Sommerswerd]

Hahahaha

Is this really happening? Some people are nuts. Ah well, universities were a silly idea anyway

To paraphrase Monty Python and the Holy Grail:

"Let's not go to University... It's a silly place."

 

[warpus]

Yeah, but if everyone goes to trade schools then that's a problem too.

Universities are supposed to be places of learning, not a career launchpads for 20 year olds. But anyway, that is a bit off topic

 

[Commodore]

Yeah, but if everyone goes to trade schools then that's a problem too

Not right now it wouldn't. Just about every skilled trade is going to suffer a shortage of labor in the coming years because no one wants to do them anymore and the people that do them now are getting old.

But as you said, that's a discussion for another thread.

 

[Farm Boy]

It's not particularly a discussion for another thread, really. We can't train enough nurses because we aren't investing enough in paying people to teach over practice. Not enough nurses, more than enough applications at institutions to teach them, not enough instructors. Nursing is pseudo-trade/pseudo-university, but getting more and more of the university angle as we offload more previously-MD-reserved duties to them, requiring more advanced nursing degrees.

But really, we offloaded a lot of the entry-level trades to young men, then didn't mainstream them and threw them away when their knees gave out in their 40s. Or we automated their lines. Or made fixing the stuff they worked on proprietary. Of course people haven't been chomping at the bit to be the refuse of the dream. There's more than enough damned work to do, but who dreams of being the Connors? Oh yeah, we're catching them and punting them out.

 

[metalhead]

Dan Conner's problem was that he was only trained to do factory work. When his factory went away and he was pushing 40, his handiness with bikes and cars wasn't developed enough to turn into a permanent gig. And there probably wasn't enough of a local market in his town to justify anyone employing him anyways.

Also, all this talk of "trade schools" is always so ridiculous. Most people don't have what it takes to make a go of a career in the building trades. Telling them to "go to trade school" as if that's a realistic job path for anyone who wants to do it is just as silly as telling them they need to go to college.

I think if a kid is interested and capable it's a wonderful career path. Part of the problem I see is that places where people grow up more amenable to working with their hands, aren't the places where construction is booming and skilled plumbers and electricians and all the rest are in high demand. The problem isn't necessarily shortages of people willing to do those jobs as much as it's a shortage of people willing to do them in places where they're in demand.

 

[rah]

I'll be the first to admit that the trades aren't for everyone. But neither is college. But I'm sure that there were many that were more suited to the trades but then failed at college.


Is it really that much difference then all the farmboys that migrated(escaped) to the city for different employment.
Sometimes you have to go with the flow. And yes, I know it's not always possible, but it's probably more possible than many believe.

 

[Farm Boy]

Funny that when it comes to work, it's all "gotta move to the crush" and when it comes to housing, it's all "nobody can afford it." What are we gunning for, the San Fransisco model of work/life/location?

 

[metalhead]

I think a discussion about urban housing really would derail the thread

But it's not exactly a radical idea, as rah points out. The kids who grow up in a dying small town get out by going to college, the ones who can. Some maybe take the military route. They move away somewhere that offers more opportunity. No reason the erstwhile factory workers oughtn't do the same when the factories all disappear.

You can find idyllic suburbs anywhere. You can also find inexpensive suburbs, though what you can't escape is traffic. And noise. And people you don't know or even recognize. And a life which is uncomfortably dissimilar from what one is used to. But how much is a stable career in a trade worth? Is there any real reason one can't adapt?

 

[Arakhor]

This thread is a year old as it is, so feel free to have potentially interesting conversations in a different thread.