- Capitalism and Alternatives -

That's what you said.

Posted by: Samuel Day Fassbinder ( Citizens for Mustard Greens, USA ) on September 16, 1999 at 16:08:09:

In Reply to: whoring! ridiculous. posted by Gee on September 16, 1999 at 13:24:47:

: : SDF: As a possessor of more than one degree, I really don't see why one's education must necessarily start with the act of sucking up to the job market. Once upon a time, people used to claim that they wanted to study things because they wanted to know about them. I guess it doesn't surprise me that procapitalists take the stand that it is necessary for knowledge to go whoring after money.

: An arrogent misreading, common among the scholars in lands of plenty.

SDF: It's not, and we can learn this by quoting once more your statement which you've omitted:

: This makes it more realisticially a matter of choice for the prospective student, to gather knowledge about what happens post study, and which skills are likely to result in which jobs / salaries. Then we can observe the student not as valient but doomed rebel against capitlaism, but merely as someone who chose from a menu what to study.

So the "matter of choice" for you, as you'd impose it upon college students, is "gathering knowledge" NOT about the world itself in general, but about "which skills are likely to result in which jobs / salaries". This is the real "menu what to study" in your eyes. There are far too many undergraduates who think as you do, and college life is much less than it could be for the sake of their attitudes and their obtuse idiocy. They, and you, think: college is for a better job, not to make you into anyone who wants to learn something for the satisfaction of knowing it, and the knowledge it contains is to continually go whoring after money.

: There is a relationship between what you choose to study and what kinds of jobs you get afterwards. My post wasnt career advice. if you want to study 'whatever'

SDF: Nobody studies "whatever," people study subjects according to whether the subjects themselves are intellectually interesting. People don't study "Bolivian poetry" unless there's something to be known there.

: then ofcourse, given that you can offer something in return to have the time and effort of a university to supply the course, you may go ahead.

SDF: Thanks for your permission Mr. Provost.

: But dont complain that any subsequent employment doesnt pay enough, or that there isnt enough demand for your set of knowledge.

SDF: No, I'm complaining that y'all have this mentality that the only rational purpose of knowledge is money-making.

: learning is not an activity that is seperate from your environment, nor is it aloof to whichever requirements exist to pursue your own life,

SDF: Don't tell me how to pursue my life!

: nor does 'being educated' become a claim upon others.

SDF: This is itself a claim upon me.

: In a commune skills in farming and building are still more useful than Bolivian poetry in gaining food and shelter, for the Amish an ability to make and use tools, to farm and maintain equipment and to study a spiritual religious set of beliefs are considered important. Are they 'whoring'? For the !Kung san people following tracks was the paramount skill, the better one was the more catches, were they 'whoring'?

SDF: Those people don't found liberal-arts universities right and left, nor are the jobs they perform done "for money," nor do such jobs typically require a pre-employment interview nor the possession of a bachelor's degree. The above illustration is irrelevant to this thread.


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