Hole in your logic, hombre. That is, children of the economic 1%. Old money. The economic 1% =/= the educational 1%. Yes, higher education aims at mediocrity. But these people "who did just enough in high school to get into a reputable college and is now doing just enough to get the degree that will get them the job they're after, but who lacks any concept of intellectual curiosity"? That's 99% of the economic elite too. But as for why, you're right on. It's structural. Which is why I said: please stop pressuring these people to come to college. I don't want to spend all my time with other German studies majors. That'd be horribly boring. I want to spend my time with other people who understand the importance of their own education enough to give a shit.you're surrounded by the children of the 1%
The problem with higher ed is that it aims at mediocrity, by definition not the 1%
There is definitely not a hole in my logic. First off, there aren't enough children of the 1% to make a difference to anyone. Second, "old money" 1% is a far smaller part of the population than the 1% generally. Third, you clearly don't spend a lot of time with a diverse mix of rich people. I do (even though I am not one of them). The "economic 1%", as you term it, are on average far smarter than the average for the rest of the country. Your sense of superiority is misplaced. I'm the last person to argue for "meritocracy" as conceived by certain rich people, but those people are not the ones who are dumbing down your classes.
All I'm saying: you claimed that the economic 1% are "by definition" not intellectually mediocre. That's straight-up false. I've met plenty of rich kids-- old and new money, thanks--who are just as intellectually vacuous as your stereotypical ASU student. As for the kids of the 1% being too few to make a difference? First of all, they're influential by virtue of their socioeconomic position, not by virtue of raw numbers. And second of all, my only claim was that they're indicative of a wider societal pressure, which you also identified and criticized.
You're trying to turn an education problem into a class war problem. Not everything is a class war, even though that's en vogue in certain circles right now. You are reading what you wanted to believe I wrote, and not what I actually wrote. 1% by definition are a small segment of the population.
You're projecting. I never claimed that the 1% are the problem. I claimed that at my university, the children of the 1% exemplify a problem that runs through our entire society. I don't read class war anywhere in that claim. What you actually wrote: If my understanding of English syntax is correct, your relative sentence "by definition not the 1%" refers back to the antecedent, "mediocrity."it aims at mediocrity, by definition not the 1%