RE: Anti-Intellectualism and the Willingly Worn Bonds of Self-Oppression
I would really recommend to you the book The Righteous Mind, which talks about moral reasoning (socio/political/etc) - that basically decision making is as follows: intuitive/gut feeling --> judgement/decision --> post hoc reasoning. It is very atypical for people to put deep consideration into the choices or ideas they make/hold. Most people's world view is coloured by the tribe/community they associate with. Intellectual honesty and the pursuit of knowledge/truth is a very narrow in the sense that most people will only educate themselves in a way that justifies their preconceived ideas that are in line with their associated tribe(ie. confirmation bias). This is not insurmountable nor am I trying to be nihilistic, I just find it an interesting psychological understanding of how people work. It just means that reason and truth alone is not a strong enough pull for most people. And more to the point of your article, it helps explain why some will choose to only pursue certain kinds of education/knowledge.
I'll be checking that book out, thanks!
I agree with the overall reality that many people have a high likelihood that they will remain in a certain hivemind. I do, however, hope that the acknowledging that misinformation is all around us in modern society, can give rise to a renewed locus of responsibility within individuals and less willingness to sacrifice a personal view to belong to a group.
I'll have to check that out.
Here I didn't touch on the internal side of this issue very much but that would be worth covering because it does play a role. What sent me off writing this were some old episodes of a podcast that would cover crazy people's videos as material to pick apart. On that show, they played some clips from the 700 club where people were essentally told that they should burn this book or that book and that one should beat their kid if they ask this question or that question.