Category: ivy league

Dumbing Down Harvard, Again – And How They Went Woke

I wrote about the decline of the education you get there a while back and thought it would improve. I guessed wrong.

You can read about it in the link above, but the old boys club is wearing off. Their most recently famous alums actually were drop outs. They also did the best in life.

Now to the rest of the story.

Of course, there is the Covid madness. The supposedly smartest students have had to go to class online again because of……you guessed it:

“In recent days, we’ve seen a steady rise in breakthrough infections among our student population, despite high vaccination rates and frequent testing”

These idiots have bought into the false narrative, despite the growing evidence (Israel, UK and the opposite in Sweden) that the inoculation (if it were a vaccine it would have worked) is the panacea.

Harvard University states on its website that 95% of students and 96% of employees are vaccinated, and notes that “COVID-19 testing requirements remain in place for every member of the community who is authorized to be on campus this fall, including those who come to campus infrequently. The Dashboard data is relative to individuals, living both on and off campus, authorized to participate in Harvard’s COVID-19 screening.”

From the same article linked above:

Data from Israel reportedly showed earlier this month that “’fully vaccinated’” people are 27 times more likely to be infected and develop COVID-19 symptoms than unvaccinated people with natural immunity,” and “‘fully vaccinated’ people are 8 times more likely to be hospitalized from a ‘breakthrough’ infection.”

WHY THIS MATTERS

Building relationships to take into the business world is the big benefit of going to one of these antiquated halls of ignorance. Harvard creates the biggest “Old Boys Club (including girls)” because of their interaction in group projects and going out together.

This just nixed the big benefit other than bragging that you paid too much to say that you went there.

We already knew in the real business world that outside of NY and Massachusetts, anyone coming in with a degree from Harvard meant that they were going to be a drag on productivity. Some finally came around to what real life teaches you, but we still had to put up with their nonsense until they either left or realized how the world actually works.

CANCEL CULTURE

The students have shown an inability to understand sarcasm from one of their own, a Law Professor with some actually creditable certifications:

Adrian Vermeule, Harvard Law School Professor And Intellectual Iconoclast:

This story of cancel culture would be laughable were it not for the fact that it is so serious. It involves an attempt by four Harvard Law School student groups to interfere in the employment of, and damage the career of, Professor Adrian Vermeule.

This reflects an ongoing attempt by l******g students to purge academia of viewpoints that do not perfectly align with the social justice and Black Lives Matter orthodoxy. Much like during Mao’s Cultural Revolution, students lead the way in belittling and trying to damage dissident professors, with public shaming and institutional ritualized denunciations preferred methods of intimidation.

Here was his crime, tweeting this:

For example, as unsubstantiated allegations of widespread voter fraud spread following the election, Prof. Vermeule tweeted “ Lol the election isn’t over until Team Joe fixes up your ballot for you ” and “Kids, not sure if you knew this, but missing ballots have magical properties that make them visible only between midnight and 6am .” His post-election retweets included statements such as “ Even a Saddam Hussein had to make some pretence of not getting 100% of the vote in an Iraqi election … ‘Baghdad on the Delaware .’” And these examples only scratch the surface. Prof. Vermeule may try to play off his statements as a joke, but they amount to a pattern of promoting demonstrably false conspiracy theories. His statements are harmful to democracy and unbelievably divisive. To work at Harvard Law School is to be granted a platform and a level of legitimacy. Prof. Vermeule is abusing this platform in order to undermine democracy and delegitimize the results of the election.

Are you kidding me? This stuff is funny, and even if it’s not funny to some Harvard Law students.

The whole story is here, courtesy of Legal Insurrection, but in quick summary it shows how quick they are to jump to conclusions against their indoctrination and one sided beliefs.

WHY THIS MATTERS

An intelligent mind can entertain both sides of an argument without taking sides to fully understand the context. Whether or not they choose to side with one or the other would result from critical thinking and the ability to judge based on facts and history.

This current group of woke automatons rushes to judgement before the facts are known and worse, believe they are right because of where they are studying rather than being smart.

ENTRANCE EXAM DISCRIMINATION AGAINST MINORITIES

This takes two different paths. They reduce the entrance standards for some minorities who then can’t keep up. They are then stuck with a huge amount of debt and no benefit. They are having to take remedial courses and drop out of STEM studies.

Conversely, Harvard discriminates against those with the ability to qualify, but don’t have the proper heritage.

Here is what I’m referring to:

Adam Mortara, another attorney representing Students for Fair Admissions, accused Harvard of giving Asian-Americans significantly lower ratings for certain personal qualities, such as leadership and compassion, than other races, according to the Washington Post.

“Harvard has engaged in, and continues to engage in, intentional discrimination against Asian-Americans,” Mortara said.

A Harvard University dean testified that the school has different SAT score standards for prospective students based on factors such as race and sex — but insisted that the practice isn’t discriminatory, as a trial alleging racism against Asian-American applicants began this week.

The Ivy League school was sued in 2014 by the group Students for Fair Admissions, which claims that Asian-American students, despite top-notch academic records, had the lowest admission rate among any race.

He said Harvard sends recruitment letters to African-American, Native American and Hispanic high schoolers with mid-range SAT scores, around 1100 on math and verbal combined out of a possible 1600, CNN reported.

Asian-Americans only receive a recruitment letter if they score at least 250 points higher — 1350 for women, and 1380 for men.

This discrimination has now reached the Supreme Court.

Exerpt:

Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, now at the Supreme Court, has the potential to reshape the course of affirmative action in the United States — for the better.

The case positions a group of highly qualified Asian-American college applicants against the university to which they seek admission, Harvard. These applicants allege that Harvard has practiced longstanding admissions discrimination against them in favor of less-qualified minorities.

GOING WOKE

Being woke is a crime of idiocy. You shouldn’t expect that of an institution heralded (not anymore) for their intelligence and education. Harvard has managed to pull it off spectacularly.

Now, at the beginning of the third decade of the 21st century, ‘political correctness’ on campus is taken for granted. But what I experienced then was less the direct coercive tyranny of leftism than a pervasive culture of capitulation and pusillanimity, with everyone from administrators to deans and professors to students and even the campus police looking over his or her shoulder in fear of censure by others. The fear was only justified on the part of those being silenced: at one Harvard event, Ayaan Hirsi Ali required stricter security arrangements than did many heads of state.

The affirmative action that Harvard implemented required lying. Departments looking for the ‘best’ person to fill a position were obliged to demonstrate, not that they had conducted a fair and open search, but rather that they had interviewed an appropriate percentage of women and other ‘minorities’. Since individual merit and group diversity are contradictory goals, the entire process was corrupt irrespective of outcome. At one departmental meeting, when the chair asked us to supply arguments for a member’s candidacy for promotion, someone at the table hooted, ‘Why bother with all this? He’s Hispanic!’ I was the only one who laughed at this eruption of suppressed truth.

There is more at the link above, but political correctness claims another victim.

IN CONCLUSION BUT PROBABLY NOT

Those of us who have been in the real world know that real world experience trumps a diploma. Sure, it will get you in the door, but those with the ability to adapt, lead and have the above stated ability of critical thinking are the ones you want to keep.

If they keep up this idiocy, those outside of the Northeast (OK, California, Portland and Washington – both of them are just as woke and dumb) won’t want them if they intend on surviving.

Save your money unless you have a Wall Street connection ready. Everyone thinking alike and acting with the same wokeness is of little benefit to the concept of an ongoing concern of a business, a FASB standard.

The Truth About Woke

I’ve been tired of this since it started. I’ll bet I’m not alone.

These self-entitled ‘tards have ruined enough. I’m not going to stand for it anymore.

I’m torn between ignoring them because it is so stupid and stopping their push to ruin everyone’s life with their nonsense. It’s hard to believe they think they are right and it matters.

I realize there is no telling someone that won’t live in reality anything. They’ll have to wake up one day to realize how wrong they are about life.

Please stop ruining mine and take it somewhere else, anywhere but the USA.

Update On The Gates Divorce – Windows Now A Victim

I’ve not had a Windows PC for a long time now. I got tired of a crappy operating system.

As you read in About Me, I’ve worked with Bill Gates. As a person he was ok to me, rather bland. His products never worked well after DOS. I couldn’t wait to get rid of both.

Microsoft was the hardest company to work with to try and get something done. It was like working with the SS or the KGB. You know you could never trust them and they kept giving me reasons why not to.

What Is Happening Now Was Predicted By JFK Decades Ago

Easy money, sudden fortunes, increasingly powerful political machines and blatant corruption transformed much of the nation; and the Senate, as befits a democratic legislative body, accurately represented the nation. - John F. Kennedy

Our morally vacuous Congress and other leaders no longer seem to have our best interest in mind. It seems that keeping power is more important than the will of the people. Spending $4400 per person to give them maybe $1400 is not a great deal for those who have to pay for it.

Why are they wasting time on anything not devoted to helping us medically, economically and protectively? They want to consolidate power and ensure re-election. This is not new it seems. Every politician seems to succumb to this unless he has a greater calling, few do.

I’m not taking sides because I believe politicians to mostly be on one side, theirs. Vote themselves a raise. Buy stock in a company 2 weeks before you are about to approve their product.

I shake my head at how we let this group of elitists in. They crept in over the years and I doubt their intentions are good, rather mostly self-interest.

The money flows easily in Washington. Lobbyists, tech companies and their oligarchs (the richest) and who can forget the celebtards who pretty much take the morally wrong position whenever possible.

There, did I offend enough people? I said nothing about race, religion, gender, or belief. I am talking about greed and power.

Advertisers Bailing On The Superbowl Not Wanting To Offend Anyone

The cancel culture has come to a stalemate. Michael Jordan said a long time ago that republicans by sneakers also and wouldn’t take sides. If others were only that smart.

In the effort not to piss off half the country, the corporations are now cowards, afraid to take a stance for fear of SJW and the cancel culture. I noted that it works both ways though. The country is divided. We were last united on 9/11, but shortly after that it’s gone to hell.

“A growing number of big-name advertisers, including Coke and Hyundai, are skipping the Super Bowl this year for fear of not striking the right tone amid America’s contentious political landscape.
“Several companies have decided not to buy Super Bowl time, some for the first time in over a decade.
“The reason? According to the New York Post, the talk from insiders is that members of multiple boardrooms are finally coming to realize that they’re going to infuriate half the country no matter what they do.
“In recent years, advertisers were thrilled to push the Black Lives Matter and Antifa ideologies or to push transgenderism and the #MeToo movement. But this year, not so much.” Offending half the country is OK, except in this case, they offended the half that actually buys their products.

I point out trends and patterns. This surely is one. A Superbowl commercial is top dollar and the networks will hurt from this. Their newsrooms are where the flames of this cancel culture got stoked. I point the finger at them.

Hopefully it will be a good game. A good football game with no politics or social statements made. It’s a child’s game, not a national election.

This advertisement was brought to you by those seeking to disrupt normal relations in the USA by violence, force and dissembling statements. Stop it. We are tired of it and want to get back to our lives.

Indicator That Harvard Might Not Be A Good Place To Study For Intellectuals

This post was supposed to fall in the intellectual category for people to decide if Harvard has the qualities that high IQ people still desire (such as being able to see/argue multiple sides of an issue).  They have managed to ruin any hope of defending both sides of an issue given the updates as you read them below.  I’ll leave it for those who may be on the fence, and wish them the best in their decision.

Original Post Begins Here

If you look at the previous post, you will see some of the traits you might have indicating a high intellect.

One of them is the ability to see and argue from multiple perspectives.  To have this trait, you have to shut out ideological thinking or persuasiveness of others before developing a hypothesis.  Many have preconceived thoughts on a subject, political stance or values influenced by others rather than examining all aspects of a subject.  In other words, they read one side of a subject on the Internet and believe what they want to.  Everyone has a bias, but one needs to come to problems with an open mind and use facts and history to evaluate the solution otherwise you run at least a 50% chance of being wrong.

Harvard has released their list of Fake News sites.  This is a popular subject given the 2016 Presidential election.  If you look at the coverage and predictions of the various news sites, you can come to a conclusion which ones were actually wrong (based on forecasts, coverage and predictions) and if their coverage was biased or indeed “Fake News”.  You have to make up your own mind where you stand on this.  I am not saying their position is necessarily wrong, rather questioning their intelligence.

The list is decidedly one-sided, showing a bias.  This is unfortunate.  Again, readers have to decide if this is correct or not.  No one or news institution is right or wrong 100% of the time.

In fair disclosure, one trait may indicate nothing, or it may be the bread crumb down the trail of truth if they are the institution they claim to be.  Once more, each must reach his or her own conclusion.  I show later in the post how I came to my decision about the title based more on empirical evidence.

Given the perceived prestige that comes with a Harvard degree (note: I did not say education), one would hope that the inflated price for such would be well spent money.  It would appear that their logic in such a one-sided position on what is “Fake News” doesn’t indicate that they show this intellectual trait.  You take a chance where to get an education or where you send your kids.  One just hopes that it is the right decision.  Since almost every decision is a cost/benefit analysis in your mind, one now must question if it is worth it.  Maybe your kid isn’t really an intellectual so the point might be moot.

I realize that you can develop relationships with power people at college that can advance a successful career.  It is not the point of this discussion.  I am merely observing a perceived status and whether it is justified or not.

Worst Update: Harvard is one of the top 10 suppressors of free speech, a further indicator that they are pushing away one of the attributes of intellectuals

Update: Harvard now supports segregation.  MLK would not have wanted this.

Update: Harvard Grad students have organized themselves to start a resistance school.

Update: Students don’t understand the danger of ISIS.

Update: You can now submit a rap album as a senior thesis instead of actual academic work.

Update: Harvard discriminates, avoids meritocracy and endorses legacy of the privileged

Update 2: Apparently, they have now abandoned diversity and have become racist, albeit not in the traditional way.

The grad students, who consider themselves a progressive version of “Dumbledore’s Army,” have enlisted former Obama staffers to teach the class sessions. The syllabus includes readings on “Black-Palestinian Queer Reciprocal Solidarity.”

They have decidedly taken a position of only viewing issues from one side.  One should greatly question the concept of critical thinking ability being taught there.  For those of us who can balance multiple views of the same subject, it is clear that these snowflakes will be under-educated and might be damaged goods in the marketplace of talent.

I formed my own opinion having worked for decades with Ivy League educated employees, albeit somewhat weighted towards Harvard and Columbia.  It was made exceedingly clear by a PR flak who after having worked with a number of Harvard MBA’s stated that they had obviously wasted their money on their education.  We were working for a prestigious company that attracts genius level talent.  She showed remarkable intuition that caused me to further observe the Ivy’s. The majority didn’t last as they had a piece of paper saying that they should be smart, but lacked an education in people or the understanding that life is a series of challenges and hurdles.

Some of the most successful executives and workers I’ve encountered didn’t rely on their degree in school, rather what they learned in life and how they applied it to the next problem.

While history reveals that many leaders and intelligent people came from Harvard, the direction they are heading and the principles that they now uphold should add some cost to the side of the cost/benefit decision making process.  I hope it’s worth it if you choose it as your place for an education.  You will apparently get an institution that has a bias.