Thoughts Become Acts, Choose The Right Ones

The College Trend: "Dumbing-Down"

By Bernard Dozier

Too many colleges are bowing to students' demand to be

ignorant of, and hostile to, the thinking of "old white men"

whose struggles against ignorance produced civilization.

 

I still believe that college should develop critical thinking,

expand knowledge, promote receptivity to fertile ideas--re-

gardless of their exponents' age, sex, or pigmentation--and

encourage flexibility in considering diverse viewpoints.

 

There seem to be three "perversities" going on at universities. 

There's something perverse about letting the "unlearned                                  determine curriculum--which makes no more sense than doctors                                           letting patients diagnose and prescribe for themselves.  There's                                               also something perverse about colleges charging ever-higher                                                   tuition for a watered-down product.  But the worst odor of all                                                 rises from professors who, instead of sharpening young minds                                               into incisive instruments, indoctrinate, propagandize, and                                                         robotize them while dulling their appreciation of and tolerance                                             for creative ideas.

Institutions that betray "higher education's" devotion to ex-

cellence by "Dumbing-down" their students are a disgrace. 

Parents who foot the bills should smell academic fraud once

the Alma Mater changes t0 something like: 

 

                           No more Goethe, no more Plato,

                           No Dante, Shakespeare or Galileo.

                           No more thought or asking why,

                           Here my mind just came to die."

 

We have to fear for a society and its institutions that allow

a bullying "political correctness," to negate and overrule the 

wisdom that guided humanity out of the Stone Age, and that

allow bias, rigidity, and prejudicial ignorance to suppress a

free-minded, truth-speaking citizenry.

 

Thankfully, though, I encourage the realization that the

Internet is a gigantic "University."  A universe of know-

ledge is there., and if it's excellence we seek, all we have to

is go to the Search Bar, and after typing in, "The Greatest,"

follow with categories such as: Philosophers; Scientists;

Non-fiction books; Writers; Poets; Novelists; Thinkers;

Inventors; Educators; Entrepreneurs; Statesmen; Physic-

ans; Explorers; Physicists; Astronomers, etc.

 

Suppose we click on one of them and read for ten minutes

every a day for four or five years.  Association with the

world's greatest minds can develop more discrimination, va-

lues, inspiration, empowerment, and initiative--plus a broad-

er, deeper. fuller, education than students get at some colleges. 

You may not end up with a diploma by doing this, but you'll

have a well-rounded, creative mind...and no student debt.

 

Remember-Thoughts become things...choose the good ones!