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Is Harvard still worth it anymore?(self)

25 points24 points27 points submitted by ForbiddenKnowledge

Nonbinaryandroid 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun 1 month ago

You'll either be forced to give land acknowledgements or faith acknowledgements.

If you're creative about it you can get out of both. I've refused to give land acknowledgements because I believe they are highly offensive to natives and immoral. Basically imagine I punched and knocked out the disabled student took their waller and then later thanked them for paying for lunch. You going to give the land back? Nope. Then shut up. History happened and you don't need to keep rubbing it into the natives every time about how your race conquered them.

Same with public prayer. Some Christians tried to force me to do it once at some event and basically I just pulled out that verse where Jesus says "Don't pray in public like the pharisees, go pray in your closet."

They are forced to either accept that I have my own beliefs on the matter and tolerate it as I tolerate their nonsense or else they can attempt to punish me for my sincerely held beliefs and draw more attention to my position.

ForbiddenKnowledge[S] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun 1 month ago

What is involved in a land acknowledgement anyway? I haven't been to college... yet.

I watched youtube and it seems to be some pathetic essay written than somehow says "you were here first..."

Is there more involved than that?

Nonbinaryandroid 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun 1 month ago

Essentially it's just sticking a preface onto papers or speeches that says "We acknowledge we are on the stolen land of the xyz tribe". The original idea was to increase awareness of the historical plight of the natives (which is a good goal) but I think the way they go about it is entirely countereffective to that. Especially since the counter argument is the land was "conquered" not stolen. People don't like being told constantly they are terrible for stealing the Indians land because of their race, when nobody alive today was around then and many of them were born on the land that they supposedly "stole".

It's essentially generational guilt which is a concept i wholly reject as barbaric. I think it creates more white supremacists than it stops.

In practice though in universities it's little more than a "mandatory prayer" that you'll see religious institutions impose. You want to give a talk about the mating habits of seagulls or some other totally unrelated thing but you need to acknowledge that it wouldn't be possible for you to give your talk without the help of Jesus, or the stolen land of the natives, or else you risk attracting the ire of someone in the institution for subordination of their policy and jeopardizing your career. As a result , just like in most religious institutions, many people don't actually care about, agree with, or even believe the acknowledgements but do them anyway. And many ambitious and amoral types have no issue using these sorts of things as a way to either advance in the institution or to eliminate rivals so things can become quite ridiculous if there is a lack of competent leadership to quash such people. At the end of it all land acknowledgements are just a silly power game. Nothing more. They have already largely fallen out of favor and new power games rise to take their place. And as you'll see with the changing of the political tides just as how many companies and universities were quick to adopt DEI and other such policies as a way to gain funding they'll be just as quick to drop them to gain funding.

Land acknowledgements therefore have nothing to do with actually acknowledging the land you are on, they are about acknowledging the authority of the institution and how you, much like a dancing bear at the circus, need to perform in order to get fed.

ForbiddenKnowledge[S] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun 1 month ago

I figured out a way to get around it.

"I, Jim Bob, hereby acknowledge that european colonialists: people I never met, used their superior strength to steal land from the kawabungabunga tribe in the exact same way that they stole it from the massamukaka tribe which stole it from the jimkuga tribe."

Would that work?

Also, how do you know so much about the power structures of these places? I feel like you're peeling back the layers of reality and telling me how it REALLY works and it's nothing like the prestigious picture they paint on it.

How do I learn what you know?

Nonbinaryandroid 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun 1 month ago

Won't work. Basically obviously trollish behavior while funny does mean you are playing the power game but poorly, and since the power game is stupid and you don't get to make the rules, you'll lose.

The winning move is not to play. Social outrage and the mob are like sharks and they come when they smell blood. But you can't get blood from a stone. But also choose your battles wisely. Don't pick pointless fights or play stupid power games with authority, but don't kiss ass and do stuff you feel is wrong either and look out for your own interests. And don't make bluffs you aren't willing to follow through on.

One example from college. They had a policy that I had to be in the on campus dorms for freshmen year for some bullshit reason of promoting community or something. Problem, on campus dorms were expensive, they were crappy, and I didn't want to be around a bunch of drunk freshmen when I was trying to study.

University said it was a policy that was necessary and I had no choice. I told them that from my position it seemed like they wanted to monopolize the living situation and maximize their profit by forcing me into the dorms. I would not live in the dorms and if they made it a requirement I would simply find a different university that didn't have that requirement and they would get zero tuition money from me.

An exception to their policy was then magically found and I wasn't required to be in the dorms. But I wasn't bluffing and was ready to walk as there were many universities out there and if the university rigs the game with rules I don't like that harm me personally, I can choose not to play.

Just choose your battles wisely. Don't seek out trouble but if it finds you don't compromise your beliefs but always engage in good faith.

Most people are reasonable, even the LGBTQ+ types, it's a minority of hopelessly online people who are problematic. But everyone has their own topics they can't really discuss logically without getting emotionally distressed, and it's worse these days with the internet riling it up. You don't want to force anyone to engage with topics they can't handle, but most people know to just leave and avoid the topic, the minority that can't stand anyone talking about it and try to shut down the conversation need to be dealt with.

This also applies to insane nonsense like feminist queer theory. They have a right to develop and discuss their theories even if they are nonsense. I have a right to express my opinion about how it's nonsense and ludicrous. I don't have a right to derail their discussions. I will argue that if they are unwilling to have discussions with people who don't agree with them then their theories won't stand up to scrutiny but in a lot of cases crazy people gravitate to each other and don't engage in good faith and usually it's best to avoid them and let them fight amongst themselves rather than stick your head into the fray and get beat up.

As they say you can't win an argument with an idiot as they will drag you down to their level and beat you with experience. Just don't bother. It's not smart. Much like a barfight. If you're cornered with no choice you sometimes have to fight but always the best way to go about is deescalation and remove yourself from the situation entirely if that isn't an option.

It's very difficult to resist the urge to relentlessly troll the idiots that you'll find out there and the trolling is extremely funny but IRL trolling doesn't accomplish anything except make the idiots stronger and make them feel justified in their idiocy. Back in uni we had some crazy religious bloke who had an offensive sign that did it's best to insult everyone regardless of race gender or creed, dumb fucks kept trying to argue with him, it was funny, but everytime someone got angry and yelled at him this guy thought "they got angry because my sign put the fear of God in their heart! I must continue!" And it just gave him more motivation to be there. Had everyone ignored him he'd have gone somewhere else instead.

There was also this annoying quiddich for muggles group which was super annoying and dumb, filled with idiots. Got my blood boiling interacting with those cunts. Just play fucking soccer. You'll get more girls. No I don't take your club seriously. But they're allowed to make a club and do as they wish. I ignore them. They're funny as fuck to troll as they respond ridiculously but it's not worth the time or effort. Let them do their own dumb shit, focus on your own shit. Ultimately once Rowling fell from grace they self destructed anyway so you really don't have to do anything. Just sit back and enjoy the drama from a safe distance without getting involved yourself. Much like a zoo the idea is to watch the monkeys but you don't want to get in their enclosure or they'll throw poop at you.