Why Are Intellectuals So Unwise

 

One of the most perplexing—and sneakily vital—questions of our time is: Why are so many so-called “intellectuals” so astoundingly ignorant and unwise? This is a question that must be honestly addressed if the West has any chance of pulling out of the downward spiral in which it now finds itself.

This is the case because, since these pseudo-intellectuals tend to be impressed with themselves and believe they know best how to run everybody else’s lives, they have a strong proclivity towards tyranny. Many disdain patriotism, believing that an enlightened mind should endlessly search for the good in societies other than their own. Many like to appear smart and as if they care about the “big picture” (globalism, etc.), but really don’t give a rat’s ass about anything outside of their own insular, safe, homogenous communities. And their own station and power. If virtue-signaling was an Olympic sport, wealthy progressive Americans would own the medal count in perpetuity. Nearly all of those the media brands as “intellectuals” or “experts” are leftists, and the vast majority favor big government and lean towards socialism or even Marxism. The notion that economies—or anything else-- could work better without their active intervention and planning is anathema to them.

Many intellectuals have spent nearly all their lives in the ivory towers of academia and are almost completely devoid of real-world experience…and therefore common sense. A keen observer once noted that an intellectual is someone who so prefers theory over experience that he would sit down on a red-hot stove, twice.

The many decades of radical indoctrination at America’s colleges and universities, with radical leftists “teaching” their progressive-leaning students, has led to a near total lack of diversity of thought, opinion, and independence amongst the elites that eventually matriculate from these citadels of higher education into corporate boardrooms, mainstream media outlets, and government offices. Those that don’t themselves become “educators” that is.

Tragically, this has produced an inbred mindset just as damaged and deformed as is often the case with the physical result of incest. The same elites that are so focused on the benefits of diversity of gender and kink, so PROUD! of every “alternative lifestyle,” and so welcoming and tolerant of other culture’s traditions, quirks and nuances, from paganism to female genital mutilation, lack the courage to challenge—or even discuss-- the Orwellian groupthink that has overtaken them. Virtually none of them would risk being seen as “different” in this regard, as there are too many repercussions to come out of this closet.

“Thanks” to our “intellectuals,” we are reaching Orwellian levels of groupthink and newspeak. We are heading into Third Reich, Soviet Union, North Korea, and People’s Republic of ____________________ (fill in the blank) territory.

Charles Bukowski once stated, “The problem with the world is that the intelligent people are full of doubts while the stupid ones are full of confidence.” I would suggest that the truly intelligent people realize how little they know, unlike “the intelligentsia,” while the stupid ones are often arrogant. In fact, there is an almost perfectly inverse relationship between how smart one believes oneself to be and the non-trivial knowledge or wisdom one possesses.

William Butler Yeats once stated what amounts to a corollary to Bukowski’s assertion: “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.” (See also RINOs versus AOC, Ilhan Omar, Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, et. al.)

That seems to me to be the most accurate way to explain what has recently transpired in the United States…and several other Western nations.

Too many of our so-called intellectuals are full of passionate intensity. And too many of our so-called Republicans or conservatives appear—when push comes to shove—to lack all conviction.