1. The celebrated liberal historian, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., wrote about the civil rights movement, and how it reflected America's founding ideals. But he noted the disastrous by-product of the civil rights struggle, multiculturalism, a philosophy that teaches, as Schlesinger put it, "that America is not a nation of individuals at all but a nation of groups."
2. For two centuries, Americans had been held together by a shared sense of national identity , a belief in individual liberty, and a vision of full equality- even though that vision may not have been fully realized. No sooner had that vision seemed to be within our grasp, the idea of a shared identity was challenged, condemned, dismantled, and replaced with a new conception, not based on individual rights and liberties, but on the claims of group identity and culture.
a. Earlier American presidents, Republicans and Democrats alike, agreed on two basic goals: teach the newcomers English and make them Americans. The clear aim was to strengthen our national identity--to reinforce the unum in e pluribus unum--by assimilating the new arrivals into American civilization.
Anti-Americanization - Society and Culture - AEI
3. Schlesinger recognized this as a betrayal of true liberalism, and a rejection of the idea of a sensible center, and a danger to the sense of unity that had made America uniquely strong, prosperous, and free.
4. Just as campuses were in a stir over the rise of multiculturalism and identity studies, Schlesinger wrote "The Disuniting of America : Reflections on a Multicultural Society," (1991). In it he warned fellow liberals that the looming cult of victimhood, seemingly a liberal crusade, was actually an anti-liberal virus that threatened to destroy the very foundations of American democracy. In fact, what this academic groupthink represented was a closing of the liberal mind.
5. Armed with the new sense of mission and moral superiority, academic elites balkanized and politicized the study of society and culture, and wrapped their Gramcian Marxist critiques in an impenetrable jargon that only they could understand.
From "The Victim's Revolution," Bruce Bawer.
a.Dr. Phyllis Chesler, writes, similarly in "The Death of Feminism": "Academic feminists who received tenure, promotion, and funding, tended to be pro-abortion, pro-pornography (anti-censorship), pro-prostitution (pro-sex workers), pro-surrogacy, and anti-colonialist, anti-imperialist, and anti-American proponents of simplistic gender-neutrality (women and men are exactly the same) or essentialist: men and women are completely different, and women are better. They are loyal to their careers and their cliques, not to the truth. [In their writing, they] have pretended that brilliance and originality can best be conveyed in a secret, Mandarin language that absolutely no one, including themselves, can possibly understand and this obfuscation of language has been employed to hide a considerable lack of brilliance and originality and to avoid the consequences of making oneself clear."
6. Schlesinger understood the role of traditional liberal education in communicating, preserving, and building upon the sensible, centrist American values that he cherished. He made a great point of the fact that primary and secondary schools, by instilling civic values in young people, were a critical element in the perpetuation of a shared national identity.
a.Instead: " Public high school students in the nations capital may soon be able to graduate without taking a single U.S. government course. The D.C. State Board of Education proposed changes to the graduation requirements in December that would require students to take more physical education, art and music courses instead." DC schools may nix high school government class as a requirement - U.S. News
The ruling class is not endowed with American values, Schlesinger's liberalism....but a desire to end the American identity, the American experience.
And, they are winning.
2. For two centuries, Americans had been held together by a shared sense of national identity , a belief in individual liberty, and a vision of full equality- even though that vision may not have been fully realized. No sooner had that vision seemed to be within our grasp, the idea of a shared identity was challenged, condemned, dismantled, and replaced with a new conception, not based on individual rights and liberties, but on the claims of group identity and culture.
a. Earlier American presidents, Republicans and Democrats alike, agreed on two basic goals: teach the newcomers English and make them Americans. The clear aim was to strengthen our national identity--to reinforce the unum in e pluribus unum--by assimilating the new arrivals into American civilization.
Anti-Americanization - Society and Culture - AEI
3. Schlesinger recognized this as a betrayal of true liberalism, and a rejection of the idea of a sensible center, and a danger to the sense of unity that had made America uniquely strong, prosperous, and free.
4. Just as campuses were in a stir over the rise of multiculturalism and identity studies, Schlesinger wrote "The Disuniting of America : Reflections on a Multicultural Society," (1991). In it he warned fellow liberals that the looming cult of victimhood, seemingly a liberal crusade, was actually an anti-liberal virus that threatened to destroy the very foundations of American democracy. In fact, what this academic groupthink represented was a closing of the liberal mind.
5. Armed with the new sense of mission and moral superiority, academic elites balkanized and politicized the study of society and culture, and wrapped their Gramcian Marxist critiques in an impenetrable jargon that only they could understand.
From "The Victim's Revolution," Bruce Bawer.
a.Dr. Phyllis Chesler, writes, similarly in "The Death of Feminism": "Academic feminists who received tenure, promotion, and funding, tended to be pro-abortion, pro-pornography (anti-censorship), pro-prostitution (pro-sex workers), pro-surrogacy, and anti-colonialist, anti-imperialist, and anti-American proponents of simplistic gender-neutrality (women and men are exactly the same) or essentialist: men and women are completely different, and women are better. They are loyal to their careers and their cliques, not to the truth. [In their writing, they] have pretended that brilliance and originality can best be conveyed in a secret, Mandarin language that absolutely no one, including themselves, can possibly understand and this obfuscation of language has been employed to hide a considerable lack of brilliance and originality and to avoid the consequences of making oneself clear."
6. Schlesinger understood the role of traditional liberal education in communicating, preserving, and building upon the sensible, centrist American values that he cherished. He made a great point of the fact that primary and secondary schools, by instilling civic values in young people, were a critical element in the perpetuation of a shared national identity.
a.Instead: " Public high school students in the nations capital may soon be able to graduate without taking a single U.S. government course. The D.C. State Board of Education proposed changes to the graduation requirements in December that would require students to take more physical education, art and music courses instead." DC schools may nix high school government class as a requirement - U.S. News
The ruling class is not endowed with American values, Schlesinger's liberalism....but a desire to end the American identity, the American experience.
And, they are winning.
