# What motivates political anti-intellectualism, what counteracts it **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 27, 2009, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093 "2009-11-27T03:40:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2009, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/41 "2009-11-27T22:57:46Z")
I’m an atheist but nobody sent me the club newsletter informing me that most college professors and scientist were part of the club. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/42 "2009-11-28T00:26:33Z")
I think part of the reason for anti-intellectualism is that science is apolitical. A good scientist will come up with the same results regardless of whether the rulers want him to come up with. So, for instance, if the administration wants to deny that global warming is occurring, they’ll have to oppose the scientists who say it is occurring. Granted, the administration will also agree with the scientists on a great many points, but those don’t garner the same attention, and a single point of disagreement can be enough to produce the image of “the intellectuals are wrong/unpatriotic/dangerous”. ---
**Author:** ![Dorothea\_Book](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/da6949/32.png) [@Dorothea\_Book](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dorothea_Book)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/43 "2009-11-28T01:03:03Z")
> [@Argent\_Towers](#): > > An educated person is not necessarily an intellectual. Having an advanced degree does _not_ make someone an intellectual. It does not make them articulate, it does not make them creative, all it means is that they were good at studying one thing and were capable of memorizing and understanding that one thing. We live in a society where the college system is basically a glorified trade school, and that is true at the highest levels as well as the lowest ones. You go there to get the degree to “open the doors.” At the Ivy Leage level it’s an elite club for making connections and getting to know the right people. I actually agree with a lot of what you’ve said **Argent Towers** but want to add that you won’t be able to get most advanced degrees (if what you mean is a doctorate or even a masters degree very often) simply by studying and memorizing. In most fields a doctorate requires the writing of a dissertation with some element of originality. That doesn’t necessarily establish the holder of the PhD as an “intellectual.” But it does give a clearer sense of what doctoral candidates are expected to do. ---
**Author:** ![Dorothea\_Book](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/da6949/32.png) [@Dorothea\_Book](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dorothea_Book)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/44 "2009-11-28T01:08:22Z")
**Wesley Clark** > [@](#): > > From the wikipedia article it said there were basically 3 motives for anti-intellectualism. Populism, authoritarian politics and religion. > > …Things like that make no sense to me. I can understand populist sentiment and efforts to play on people’s sense of group cohesion (the liberal democrats, which I am a member of, use it all the time on economic issues). However how does populism reach the point where you don’t even care about competence? Sarah Palin is a good example of this. She claims to be a populist (running against the gotcha media, liberal elites, etc). Which is fine and good, but on top of that she is dangerously incompetent. I’d be tempted to add intense partisanship to the three motives. And I’m glad that you wrote that Palin _claims_ to be a populist. The policies she favors empower a relatively small group of people who are already quite powerful. The (faux) populist note comes from fomenting dislike for “elites” and unpopular minorities–not from any genuine plan to democratize anything. ---
**Author:** ![Dorothea\_Book](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/da6949/32.png) [@Dorothea\_Book](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dorothea_Book)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/45 "2009-11-28T01:14:00Z")
> [@Beware\_of\_Doug](#): > > Let’s look again at how **Wes** put it: Yes, **Beware of Doug** , but the inclusion of China in the OP is somewhat confusing. I’m not sure that the Soviet Union was much different from present-day China with regard to intellectuals: coddling those whose work and public views supported the regime and repressing those whose didn’t. ---
**Author:** ![sl.124](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bbce88/32.png) [@sl.124](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sl.124)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/46 "2009-11-28T01:18:41Z")
I cannot speak any more than for personal experience, but it appears to me that the popular idea of intellectualism includes a mandate for questioning/justifying one’s own beliefs. Many people would prefer not to think about or attempt to justify their own beliefs and given that someone’s beliefs are perhaps their most personal things, the very idea of having them laid bare and examined is unappealing to say the least. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/47 "2009-11-28T01:48:45Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > I’m an atheist but nobody sent me the club newsletter informing me that most college professors and scientist were part of the club. You must’ve forgot to include the self addressed, stamped envelope. ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/48 "2009-11-28T01:50:14Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I think part of the reason for anti-intellectualism is that science is apolitical. A good scientist will come up with the same results regardless of whether the rulers want him to come up with. So, for instance, if the administration wants to deny that global warming is occurring, they’ll have to oppose the scientists who say it is occurring. Granted, the administration will also agree with the scientists on a great many points, but those don’t garner the same attention, and a single point of disagreement can be enough to produce the image of “the intellectuals are wrong/unpatriotic/dangerous”. You may have a point, but you seem to be limiting it to “hard” scientists, who aren’t the kind of intellectuals the anti’s worry about most. They’re much more worried about _social_ scientists, whose results aren’t often uniform and sometimes aren’t even quantifiable. > [@athelas](#): > > athelas It is a mistake to believe that intellectuals are inherently anticonformist. Within their fields this may be true, but they are just as prone to tribalism as anyone else, and this manifests in conformity to particular social doctrines. (Even within their fields there are tribal cliques - just look at the Climategate emails.) Thus outside their fields of study it is wrong to give weight to intellectuals as “driven by curiosity, not irrational tribal beliefs or self-interest.” How much of this might be due to our tendency to force academics to professionalize, and stick to one field? Not too many people today get respect from participating in varied discourse communities - it bespeaks dilettantism to have a wide-ranging mind. But you might have a shot at escaping the impetus toward groupthink. ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 2:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/49 "2009-11-28T02:51:20Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > **William F Buckley: I would rather be governed by the first 2000 names in the Boston phone book than by the 2000 members of the faculty of Harvard University** > > Things like that make no sense to me. Well then I’ve got some good news for you. Buckley [wrote a book](http://www.amazon.com/God-Man-At-Yale-Anniversary/dp/089526692X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1259376359&sr=1-1) explaining his distrust of the academic world, so an intellectual like you can order it and get to reading right away. > [@Odesio](#): > > I’m an atheist but nobody sent me the club newsletter informing me that most college professors and scientist were part of the club. It was posted on Wikipedia and is therefore true. And by the way, there’s nothing ironic about **Wesley Clark** complaining about anti-intellectualism and treating Wikipedia as a reliable source in the same post. Nothing. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/50 "2009-11-28T03:25:33Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > Well then I’ve got some good news for you. Buckley [wrote a book](http://www.amazon.com/God-Man-At-Yale-Anniversary/dp/089526692X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1259376359&sr=1-1) explaining his distrust of the academic world, so an intellectual like you can order it and get to reading right away. > > It was posted on Wikipedia and is therefore true. And by the way, there’s nothing ironic about **Wesley Clark** complaining about anti-intellectualism and treating Wikipedia as a reliable source in the same post. Nothing. Its possible to respond to posts without being an asshole. You should try it sometime. ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/51 "2009-11-28T03:58:54Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > Its possible to respond to posts without being an asshole. You should try it sometime. Assholicity in the defense of anti-intellectualism is no vice. ---
**Author:** ![athelas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@athelas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/athelas)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/52 "2009-11-28T05:04:29Z")
> [@Beware\_of\_Doug](#): > > How much of this might be due to our tendency to force academics to professionalize, and stick to one field? Not too many people today get respect from participating in varied discourse communities - it bespeaks dilettantism to have a wide-ranging mind. But you might have a shot at escaping the impetus toward groupthink. I’m not sure it’s possible to reverse this trend. To become really expert in many fields it is necessary to specialize, and as knowledge advances this trend will continue rather than reverse. More to the point, what we’re really talking about is _status_: who gets to promulgate the mainstream view and how much weight being “in the mainstream” carries. And I doubt that amateur “dilettantes” will have much success in bringing contrarian views into an area when faced with people who’ve spent their careers in it. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 5:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/53 "2009-11-28T05:07:06Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > Well then I’ve got some good news for you. Buckley [wrote a book](http://www.amazon.com/God-Man-At-Yale-Anniversary/dp/089526692X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1259376359&sr=1-1) explaining his distrust of the academic world, so an intellectual like you can order it and get to reading right away. Have you read that book? I have. WFB wrote it just after graduating from Yale, pissed that his professors were insufficiently religious (and check the date of the original.) It is definitely ironic to your point since he would certainly qualify as an intellectual in anyone’s book. I wonder how much of the Harvard crack came not from distrusting professors but from distrusting **Harvard** professors. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 5:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/54 "2009-11-28T05:11:22Z")
> [@sl.124](#): > > I cannot speak any more than for personal experience, but it appears to me that the popular idea of intellectualism includes a mandate for questioning/justifying one’s own beliefs. Many people would prefer not to think about or attempt to justify their own beliefs and given that someone’s beliefs are perhaps their most personal things, the very idea of having them laid bare and examined is unappealing to say the least. It is not so much wanting to challenge your beliefs but rather to be in an environment where they will get challenged as a matter of course. Peer review, when done well, does exactly this. Grad students who are polite and quiet are unlikely to get considered as top rate students, no matter how smart they are. Intellectuals are no more immune to thinking themselves right as anyone else. ---
**Author:** ![sl.124](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bbce88/32.png) [@sl.124](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sl.124)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/55 "2009-11-28T06:31:10Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > It is not so much wanting to challenge your beliefs but rather to be in an environment where they will get challenged as a matter of course. Peer review, when done well, does exactly this. Grad students who are polite and quiet are unlikely to get considered as top rate students, no matter how smart they are. Intellectuals are no more immune to thinking themselves right as anyone else. I was referring to the popular idea of intellectualism, and how intellectuals come across to most people. As for your last point, I did not wish to imply that intellectuals were perfect in that respect but rather a large part of anti-intellectualism seems to stem from this unwillingness to challenge one’s own beliefs. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 8:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/56 "2009-11-28T08:39:58Z")
> [@sl.124](#): > > I was referring to the popular idea of intellectualism, and how intellectuals come across to most people. > > As for your last point, I did not wish to imply that intellectuals were perfect in that respect but rather a large part of anti-intellectualism seems to stem from this unwillingness to challenge one’s own beliefs. Well, I think a lot of the popular view of intellectuals are that they are a bunch of eggheads who just blather about junk, can hardly tie their own shoelaces, and look down on the good old average American who is actually a lot smarter. Nothing new about that = the Republicans used this on Stevenson in 1952 and 1956. I don’t think it gets nearly as subtle as you say. ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/57 "2009-11-28T22:11:29Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > Its possible to respond to posts without being an asshole. You should try it sometime. I’ve done so three times in this thread. Perhaps you should note that it’s actually possible to respond to the content of posts and try _that_ sometime. > [@Voyager](#): > > Have you read that book? I have. WFB wrote it just after graduating from Yale, pissed that his professors were insufficiently religious (and check the date of the original.) It is definitely ironic to your point since he would certainly qualify as an intellectual in anyone’s book. I know the date; is quoting books written before last week now “anti-intellectual”? Or is reading all books “anti-intellectual”? **Wesley Clark** said that he didn’t understand a certain statement made by Bill Buckley. I responded by the logical suggestion that he read a book by Bill Buckley. Now you say that this is “ironic to my argument”. What argument? What on earth are you talking about? ---
**Author:** ![independentminded](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/ed8c4c/32.png) [@independentminded](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/independentminded)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/58 "2009-11-28T23:15:17Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > Well, I think a lot of the popular view of intellectuals are that they are a bunch of eggheads who just blather about junk, can hardly tie their own shoelaces, and look down on the good old average American who is actually a lot smarter. Nothing new about that = the Republicans used this on Stevenson in 1952 and 1956. I don’t think it gets nearly as subtle as you say. Anti-intellectualism in America, as well as in Europe, has other roots as well; Anti-Semitism. ---
**Author:** ![Dorothea\_Book](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/da6949/32.png) [@Dorothea\_Book](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dorothea_Book)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/59 "2009-11-28T23:25:39Z")
FWIW, **ITRChampion** , I appreciated your comments on evolutionary psychology. But I’m pretty sure I’ve seen you post the same stuff about postmodernism in academia and the Sokal hoax before–in a thread on academic peer review well over a year ago. Am I remembering rightly? I know that I spent some time in posts in that thread which you may have read (I don’t recall whether you replied to them or not) providing a somewhat different perspective on academia, esp. since the influence of postmodernism has long been on the wane (with the Sokal hoax you cited having taken place in the early 90s and the book you linked to published 12 years ago). You’re right that **Wesley Clark** ’s OP implied a great deal of overlap between academics and intellectuals and I agree with you entirely that not all academics are intellectuals and, of course, not all intellectuals are academics. OTOH, I don’t think that the influence of postmodernism–or any other trend in academia right now–explains the various strains of anti-intellectualism described in the OP. American culture has never been strongly intellectual overall; and US politicians have seldom come from any kind of intellectual class. (In this respect Obama stands out as being a rare exception.) I think that if the every academic institution in the US fired every last card-carrying postmodernist tomorrow the impact on overall respect for intellectual work that doesn’t have an obvious market value would be entirely unchanged. Apologies that it’s taken me so long to respond… ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2009, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093/60 "2009-11-29T00:53:06Z")
> [@Dorothea\_Book](#): > > You’re right that **Wesley Clark** ’s OP implied a great deal of overlap between academics and intellectuals and I agree with you entirely that not all academics are intellectuals and, of course, not all intellectuals are academics. There can be opposition to both from what I have seen though. In the USSR geneticists were oppressed. College professors are devalued by the right as indoctrinators, hence my statement on Buckley. So it isn’t just intellectuals, but academics who sometimes get it. They can be written off as elitists, indoctrinators and clueless interlopers too. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-motivates-political-anti-intellectualism-what-counteracts-it/519093.md?page=4)