Sunday, February 18, 2018

What Did You Learn at the Revolution, Daddy?


TRIGGER WARNING:  In which I suggest there are important lessons to learn from the "Occupy Movement".

For John, BLUFThe "Occupy Movement" of just a short while ago should have educated college age people of the dangers of revolution, especially ones not backed by the Bourgeois.  Nothing to see here; just move along.




Conservatives are wrong to deride college courses on the anti-Wall Street protests. Here's a lesson plan and possible reading list.

From The Wall Street Journal (currently behind a paywall), by Law Professor Glenn Harlan Reynolds, 17 Feb 2018.

Here is the lede:

Schools from New York's Columbia to Chicago's Roosevelt University are offering courses on the "Occupy" movement.  This has inspired some derision from the right, but I think that derision is misplaced.  There is much that a course on the Occupy movement might profitably cover.  Here are some possible lessons:
And here are the six possible lessons, all great:
1) The Higher Education Bubble and Debt Slavery Throughout History.

2) Bourgeois vs. Non-Bourgeois Revolutions.

3) Class struggles and the New Class.

4) Scapegoating and anti-Semitism in mass economic-protest movements.

5) The Fragility of Public Health.

6) Class Differences Within Economic Protest Movements.

Here are the suggested points for item 6:
While the Occupy movement's proletariat were sleeping under canvas, many of its leaders were staying in five-star hotels.  Six-figure sums of money were collected, but their disbursement was cloudy. Does every movement, however egalitarian in doctrine, inevitably produce its own overclass?  Are "egalitarian" movements more prone to such outcomes?  Readings:  George Orwell's "Animal Farm," Li Zhi-Sui's "The Private Life of Chairman Mao."
And here is the final paragraph:
It is likely, of course, that the Occupy courses offered will partake of none of the above, and will instead be tedious, dated mashups of Fanon, Marcuse and Frances Fox Piven. But if students are offered no better than that, it will be the fault of their instructors, not of the subject matter.
Hat tip to Twitter for forwarding.

Regards  —  Cliff

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