The thing about Haidt that sticks in the craw of the intelligentsia is that he argues that Western liberal thought is the outlier, not the norm. I have personally found that if I approach conservatives from the standpoint of "my holy tenets are blasphemy to them" I have an easier time making a convincing argument. Importantly, Haidt doesn't make any value judgements other than to point out that if you are dependent on rationality to win an emotional argument you will not only lose, you will deserve to.

The "transformation of society" canard goes back to Bowling Alone, the Silent Spring of online anxiety. Worthy of note, Bowling Alone was written before Friendster so it misses a lot of the specifics but nails the generals.

University are so much rosier when we forget about the arms race of tuition and student loans and credentialism.

I dunno, man. On the one hand, there's a lot of bullshit associated with college these days. On the other hand, it's caused college students to double down on their bullshit. My two recent quarters were fucking grim from a quality-of-life standpoint - active shooter signs and food banks while paying fuckin' $3k a quarter for community college? Yeah that's some bullshit. On the other hand all the bullshit accomodations every student was stacking and the combative bitchy student life orgs? Fuck I can't make it to the Flat Earth Society because my Quiddich team is meeting and then we're going to pajama night!

I think both sides have a legitimate beef and I think it's caused entirely by what a rapacious scam college has become.