Oh, the Irony
It’s only been two months and yet the irony of —-’s class is already starting to smart. Mr. —-’s almost extremist liberal rants, coupled with his in-depth analysis, have created an interesting phenomenon where his class actually exemplifies perfectly the evil and perverse ideas that he’s denounced. Don’t get me wrong, Mr. —- is a great guy and a pretty interesting teacher, but sometimes you just have to wonder if he realizes the full extent of what he’s saying and doing.
Let’s start off with dichotomized thinking. We get introduced to this in The Joy Luck Club through the terms of shou and ni. —- quickly makes clear just how dangerous and flawed such a way of thinking is with his discussions on how An-Mei is torn by this dilemma and how this paradigm encourages sexism and oppression. This, of course, makes perfect sense. Complete generalization and stereotyping of groups is a horrible thing that leads to racism at the least and genocide at the worst. It’s a great concept for any teacher to teach- until they themselves turn out to be perpetuators of said concept. As the course goes on, it becomes crystal clear that —- regards everything corporate-related as bad. Big companies, standardization, GMOs, cheap food, anything manufactured or created en masse is practically regarded as spawn of the devil. Anything rural, natural, and un-industrialized is great (“We should be burning cow patties for fuel!”) Is the bitter irony starting to show through yet? —- accurately stated the deadliness and fallacy of dichotomized thinking- only to fall into it himself.
Another interesting concept we were taught during the Joy Luck Club unit is the idea of internalization, or rather, brainwashing by forcing individuals into an environment where the accepted truth is repeated and demonstrated over and over until the individual accepts it and where the individual is forced by the new environment to conform to such views. This was, once again, one of —-’s big “no-no’s”, one of the Big Bad Things That Society is Using to Oppressing Us. It’s then hilarious when you realize that it’s exactly what —- is doing, lecturing on and making us write about concepts until we “understand” them to be “true”. Of course, you can speak out against these views like you can in any society- if you can bear to suffer lower grades. Thus, —-’s class turns out to be an almost perfect example of the idea of internalization, down to the idea of ostracization, humiliation, and punishment for failing to conform to popular beliefs.
Sure, you can argue that he probably won’t mark you down for disagreeing with his views. This is when things get interesting. Remember the Panopticon, the prison where inmates were kept docile due to the uncertainty of whether or not they were being watched? Rath explained this in the terms of “one becoming his/her own jailer”, where our paranoia of whether or not we are being watched forces us to act as if we are always watched and thus follow the paths that society has laid down for us. Apply this to grading in his class, and voila! Everything is clear. You, like every other student in the class, will absolutely conform to his views because you are afraid of the uncertainty that he may mark you down, even though the chances of that happening are probably infinitesimal. —- has effectively made you your own jailer.
Alas, it’s a bittersweet course of events. —- is in all probability well-meaning at the core. It’s unfortunate that he has become the frog in his own beloved metaphor- unaware of the situation due to the slow yet steady rise in temperature of the water. Although he is well-educated and informed, he is still trapped in his own golden cage, as Songlian was in Raise the Red Lantern. He thinks sees the trappings of the prison he is in, but in the end, it is another illusion, generated by a prison far more grand and impervious than the one he imagined. It’s a sad state, but don’t worry, there is an alternate explanation: Mr. —- may just be the world’s greatest troll ever.
*Guys, don’t give Mr. —- any trouble over this. He’s a great guy and everyone has their own fallacies. I already feel guilty enough about posting this. Don’t make it any worse.
I’m just going to link you here.
http://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/12/the-smart-sincere-syndrome.html
Have fun.
So, what’s it’s saying is that smart people tend to support extreme causes (no matter how far-fetched) in order to prove their own intelligence and lucidity of thought. Hm. Personally, I believe that the truth is most always near the average of both extremes, but I agree that it’s fun to support extreme and controversial sides just for the sake of argument, trolling, and chasing away ennui sometimes. They’re also saying that smart and sincere people constantly try to to link all parts of the world into a coherent bundle because they resent hypocrisy and thus create some pretty extreme ideologies.
Oh, wait. I get it. It says “smart sincerely people rationalize in order to make sense of the world and thus create weirdo ideologies.” WIN.
I see many, many debate references. 8D
I actually did not consciously put in any debate references. Heh.
It’s a pity you quit Debate. Also, I’m happy I’m in Geers.
Also: I can’t believe I read your blog.
When Rath told us to be cynical I don’t think he thought we might take it this far. Anyways, I like free debating better, although I guess I’d make an okay lawyer- with proper training of course. I can’t believe you don’t read my blog before. T.T
Good job. Rath has taught you well. WAIT WHAT
I’m probably going to commit a baker’s dozen of fallacies here, but let’s see how it goes:
Sometimes teaching through ‘drill-and-kill,’ whether it be the hiddeous workings of English spelling or indoctrinating children with religion (sorry, I had to include this. It’s DaK over a longer period of time.) is the only way to do things. It does seem to be, in the long run.
As to black and white thinking (Antigone, woot Ms. Geers), it’s very easy to fall into, especially if one wishes to completely disassociate themselves (damn English, get a genderless third person pronoun already) from a certain thing. For example, for a month after I read Fast Food Nation, I didn’t go to any fast food restaurants and begun talking about how bad the fast food industry is.
In the case of Mr. Rath, he may have been inspired by Ambrose Bierce: “Corporation, noun. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility,” and then extrapolated. Mr. Rath’s stance equates humans as naughty little creatures that will most often act selfishly. (Laissez-faire, anyone?)
Forgive my use of weasle words, but some people just cannot distinguish the difference between two people in the same group. For an easy comparison, let’s use Islam. On one hand, you have Islamic extremists that want to enforce sharia law on a global scale, and on the other, you have Muslims that are what we would consider normal lives, nonviolently carrying out their jihads. Mr. Rath may fit in this ‘qualityblind’ category, although everyone is involved in it in some way.
Lastly, good job, you’ve recognized, or at least perceived, a flaw in a teaching method. Bad job, however, that you refuse to tell him. You should ask him about it. Or I suppose I could, but not being in his class anymore (English 9A, good times), it would be strange. As for the perceived flaw in his paradigm, that might be an interesting conversation.
Censorship is thought genocide. Don’t do it!
(About your grades, however, if that’s more important to you that free expression of your opinions, that’s your problem.)
Well, as to censorship, I believe in winning in the long term. My grades are most important right now as they directly affect my future.
Oh, and I apologize for the trollish amount of misspellings in my previous comment. My inner troll had momentarily convinced me that the cake existed.