Yay, College!
What Do We Mean?
In Epsilon Theory lingo, yay-something in quotation marks and with an exclamation mark is a Narrative that has been said so loudly and for so long by the Nudging State or the Nudging Oligarchy that it has become Common Knowledge – something that we all know that we all know – and as a result is not just accepted but embraced by we-the-people. The something in the yay-something is always a good thing in its non-capitalized, non-sloganeered form, like patriotism or capitalism or going to college, but in its yay-form it becomes narrative cover for the Nudging State or the Nudging Oligarchy to gather up more of what they can’t get enough – power and money. Yay, College!
The Whole Collection
The Intellectual Rot of the Industrially Necessary University
The intellectual rot of the modern University perverts and diminishes the works of its faculty and administrators, no matter how smart they are, no matter how well-intentioned they are. It is a rot that requires plagiarism and promotes antisemitism.
We require a new Reformation, and here are its theses.
“Yay, College!”
Every once in a very great while, the direct beneficiaries of a yay-something narrative construction overplay their hand so egregiously, embarrass themselves so publicly, reveal their mediocrity so clearly, that the common knowledge propping up the yay-something narrative collapses.
This is the breaking of “Yay, College!”.
“Yay, College!” Part 1: The Smiley-Face Super-Villainy of American Higher Education
The modern American system of higher education – especially its most prominent public and private universities – is less our Superman than our Homelander, a smiley-faced faux superhero who does The Man’s dirty work in exchange for wealth, privilege and … our cheers.
Before You Fly The Nest: Advice for kids heading to college
ET contributor Brent Donnelly went out and asked some people he respects what advice they would give kids heading off to college. Here’s what he found.
Starry Eyes and Starry Skies
The student loan crisis is a Big Deal. And it is only a part of a Bigger Deal: the Myth of College.
This issue will be front-and-center in the upcoming elections. We will all be handed our very own ‘Yay, College’ signs to raise high. More often than not, we will be asked to raise them in service of market-distorting policies which will make our problems worse.
The Ministry of Rites and the Compassionate Man
“Oh, little Jimmy is going to 20-Years-Ago-This-Was-A-Second-Rate-University? I hear really good things about that school. Congratulations!”
“Thanks! We’re all very pleased. Everyone except my bank account, that is. Hahaha!”
It’s true, everyone is VERY pleased by the current system. Prestige university credentialing is a steam valve … \whispers\ just like elections.
Oh, hell, Martha, go ahead and burn yourself if you want to.
I can’t advise you on the Answers. I won’t advise you on the Answers. But I will advise you on the Process. Because that’s what we do for our fellow pack members.
Pecking Order
The pecking order is a social system designed to preserve economic inequality: inequality of food for chickens, inequality of wealth for humans. We are trained and told by Team Elite that the pecking order is not a real and brutal thing in the human species, but this is a lie. It is an intentional lie, formed by two powerful Narratives: trickle-down monetary policy and massive student debt financing. Part 8 of the Notes from the Field series.