19 thoughts on “The American Sociological Association”

  1. Whenever I see the world “sociology” I mentally substitute the world “evil,” and things make more sense. All sociologists are amoral antisocial Stalinists, and would cheerfully send even each other to the death camps, if necessary for the advance of the Party. Orwell’s 1984, in addition to being a pathetic love story, is essentially an exposition on the thoughts of sociologists.

    Glenn Reynolds thinks they are held in “low respect,” that is, that their fellow academics think they’re laughable. But that’s just denial. In fact other academics are afraid of them, and for the same excellent reasons they fear swarming wasps.

  3. I took a sociology class many moons ago. The instructor was a dyed in the wool feminista. I can’t quite remember the details but she was so proud of her masters thesis was about poverty rates in correlation to spousal abuse. Of course, the spousal abuse meaning, toothless hillbillies beating on their pregnant wives. In fact if I recall her study encompassed the greater Gulf states region. She went on and one about her study only to kinda mumble out in the very end that the statics didn’t quite match up with her hypothesis.

    Then, there was some video that she made us all watch about the secret subliminal messages that are embedded in advertising that basically program men to subjugate, rape, and strangle women. “The Chronos precision timekeeper will tell you the time in 24 countries so you know exactly when school lets out to snatch little children at all your favorite hillbilly destinations.”

  4. toothless hillbillies beating on their pregnant wives. In fact if I recall her study encompassed the greater Gulf states region.

    I’m sure you are correct in the characterization, but the interesting thing is the lack of hills in those states.

  5. I took a sociology class way back in college (it was a distribution requirement). The teacher, a grad student, was going on and on about socially constructed reality. I, a brash young physics major, would have none of that. I started her off on a half-hour argument, which ended with my suggestion of a simple experiment that we could perform to see which one of us was right. She’d walk off a cliff, expecting that nothing would happen, and I’d stand below the cliff, expecting precisely the opposite…

  6. There’s a difference between criticizing a sociologist’s studies, and resisting a revolutionary’s insurrection. The slight of hand here is ignoring that her academic studies were mere cover for her revolutionary efforts. Beck is focusing on her social sabotage, but is taking flak for lacking the credentials to critiquing her “science”. Of course the magicians are unhappy with him shattering the mirror and fanning away the smoke.

  7. Alabama has some mighty tall speed bumps, one of which extends across northwest Georgia into Tennessee and gave its name to a Civil War battle whose nickname was “The Battle Above the Clouds.”

  8. Glenn Beck is a character, which is to say, along with providing information he tries to have an entertaining show (what a concept?) The drawback to that is it gives the left something to mock.

    The content of his show is informative. There is nothing hateful in it, yet the left describes it as hate speech. Hating what is bad is one of those Christian principles the left has abandoned.

    Glenn is a big boy and can defend himself, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t (speaking figuratively now although adult don’t need this disclaimer) hunt down and destroy all those that would try to silence such a decent man.

  9. “I’m sure you are correct in the characterization, but the interesting thing is the lack of hills in those states.”

    U better watch that purty mouth of yours before some redneck hillbilly smacks you ’round till all ‘dim smart words don’t fit in ur head no mo. We got us some hills all right, some we even dare to call mountains.

  10. She’d walk off a cliff, expecting that nothing would happen, and I’d stand below the cliff, expecting precisely the opposite…

    There’s an interesting scene in 1984 when Winston, in the cellars of the Ministry of Love, tells his torturer The Party can’t defy the laws of physics. His torturer responds that, on the contrary, if he wished, he could that minute float off the ground like a soap bubble, in defiance of the law of gravity.

    Only later — after he has been broken by unending pain and humiliation — does Winston understand him. He means that, if he (the torturer) says he is floating off the ground, and Winston, the only observer, believes that he has seen it happen — then who is to argue? If all records and all human memory say it happened, is that not the same thing as it having actually happened?

    I think human beings divide into two: those who are convinced by this argument, sociologists among them, and those of us who mutter eppur si muove and shake our heads incredulously.

  11. Off topic, but here is an interesting and sober article by Ron Bailey about the fact that the current FDA approval process for drugs is killing us, in which fact some transterrestrials were interested when I made it in another thread a little while ago.

  12. Still, if Beck seriously believes that Piven is one of the world’s “nine most dangerous people” he needs to pay more attention. I doubt that she makes the top thirty.

  14. It is not always clear what constitutes dangerous. The millions that died under communism and fascism probably didn’t see much harm in people spreading their ideas around. If the people of those countries had been educated and warned of the danger, they might have avoided it.

  15. Ken,

    If that’s true the millions that died under Communism never read the source material. Communism has as one of its central tenets the elimination of private commerce. You cannot accomplish such a goal peacefully. Especially in countries that don’t have a long history of peaceful political change – which describes the countries where Communism tool hold…

    Fascist doctrine (outside of Nazism) has always been somewhat nebulous, so its threat is unclear. Genocide seems to be unique to the Nazi brand – but it’s a tradition that goes back to the earliest empires. (Is technology the only practical difference between the Nazis and the Mughals?)

  16. Whether she is one the most dangerous people remains to be seen. Only the future will tell.

    But what I don’t get is how she can openly call for riots and destruction and no one with a badge seemingly cares.

  18. What other fascist movements engaged in genocide? “Whopper” insinuates that there’s some fairly obvious example, but considering that the only well-known fascist regimes were in Italy and Spain (Sid Vicious might add one other example), that doesn’t jive.

    Were you counting the Ottomans and/or Imperial Japanese as fascists?

Comments are closed.