The aim of education is to make the pupil like and dislike what he ought. – C.S. Lewis paraphrasing Aristotle
In contrast, the aim of much modern education is to make the pupil dislike the idea that one “ought” to like or dislike any particular thing at all. And a pox on the haters who tell them otherwise!
Bleh.
This is at the heart of “diversity training”.
Lewis goes on:
We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst.
-The Abolition of Man, p.35
Just this morning, in a cafe, I overheard a man raise his voice to a yelling rant while speaking with some friends. He was very angry that another man had recently broken a promise to him related to a job offer. The thing is, this man (the one doing the ranting) is a militant atheist. Yet here he is demanding that others treat him with high morals so that he may trust their word. You can’t have it both ways. If no God is keeping anyone accountable, than what is wrong with the man lying to him? But he knew, plain as day that it was wrong, in spite of his theology (or lack of).
This underlying idea that there is no objective value, no real right and wrong can really only thrive in a culture with multiple successive generations of relative peace and wealth. Only when the population is sufficiently removed from either starvation or someone trying to kill them can this sort of nonsense survive.
This same day, in the afternoon, I was speaking to a guy I went to music school with. He was lamenting (just as I have) that there were virtually no jobs in his field, yet so many graduates! My comment was that you can only have thousands of art and music graduates a year when there is no war. He has learned to cope by paying the bills working hard in other ways. His classical rep has also slipped dramatically, though not as badly as mine.
It will be seen that comfort and security, as known to a suburban street in peace-time, are the ultimate values: those things which can alone produce or spiritualize comfort and security are mocked. Man lives by bread alone, and the ultimate source of bread is the baker’s van: peace matters more than honour and can be preserved by jeering at colonels and reading newspapers.
-C.S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man, footnote, p.41
In a culture without hard, distinct values, this suburban comfort becomes the ultimate goal. Eating a nice meal from the deli at Whole Foods and “jeering at colonels” is the way to preserve peace. I’m not here to defend the colonels, but let me tell you, complaining from your armchair never accomplished a single thing in all of history. For a potent example, if you can stomach it, the comment thread on pretty much any Huffington Post article is exhibit A.
But I guess I jeer some as well. I recently was compelled to post a pretty negative comment on the Signal Versus Noise blog that I usually enjoy very much. Their recent (surprisingly positive!) post on internet motivational guru and snake-oil salesman Tim Ferriss was very out of character. Along these lines, another disgruntled user stated:
Mr. Ferris keeps referring to the New Rich. Despite all his attempts at creating a new paradigm, it appears that the only difference between the New Rich and the Old Rich is that the old rich are capitalists that actually produce things that society needs, such as railroads and software, while the new rich sell things like unregulated nutritional supplements.
It comes back to the same stuff. What has real value? Do you know what real value is when you see it? A farmer growing food is producing real value. A real estate broker, loan officer, or internet AdSense king… maybe not. Love whoever you want = good right? Ideas like gender differences are old-fashioned nonsense. Let’s abolish all boundaries. Build roads not fences! What could possibly go wrong? Nobody ought to like or dislike anything in particular. It’s so hateful. Oh, wait, I just used the word “ought” in that sentence.
The Abolition of Man is a short book by Lewis. It was written over 50 years ago. It doesn’t sound like’s it’s grown outdated one bit. In fact, the only thing that has changed is that the philosophy was criticizing has grown more mainstream. It was still largely locked in the ivory tower in his day.
Does this post have a point? Not really. It’s just drawing together three anecdotal experiences I had this very day along with some quotes I highlighted in a book last week. Whoopie. Writing it down though, it all seems more related than I realized at first.