One of the most enduring, and in some ways quite endearing, characteristics of the British left is their propensity to take themselves so deadly seriously. It is precisely this characteristic that lies behind their customarily ludicrous, nay comical, aggrandisements.
There is not, I submit, a single Trot journal or website that does not periodically feature a 48-point headline declaring that “The Revolution Has Begun” in response to an afternoon of industrial action by a group of clerical workers at a Job Centre in West Bromwich.
For these people, the steps of the Winter Palace are always on the verge of being stormed and they appear entirely unable to grasp the fact that, the more earnest and po-faced they are, the more pant-wettingly hilarious they become.
The latest recruits to this mythical army of restless proletarians are American sociologists who are about to cast off their chains:
More than 5,000 American sociologists, plus a few foreign scholars, held their largest and, many said, most vibrant annual convention for years.
Bush and Kerry were campaigning through nearby states. Their soundbites were rarely mentioned, but the lack of serious debate is one reason for US sociology’s new political engagement after decades of quiet since the 60s.
Be on notice you nattering nabobs of neo-liberalism! The sociologists are waking from their slumbers and soon the entire civilised world will quake to vibration of their sensible shoes on the warpath.
The profession’s centre of gravity is moving left.
No kidding!!??
There is a drive to inject ethical standards into the analysis of what most agree is a US society becoming increasingly polarised beneath its veneer of shared consumerism.
Er, if the consumerism is ‘shared’ then who, exactly, is ‘polarised’ here?
Words like “empire” and “inequality” popped up frequently at this conference after their post-Vietnam war dormancy. New phrases like “the corporate state” and “global apartheid” appeared.
Any context at all? Or does one delegate simply sidle up to another delegate, whisper the word ‘inequality’ and shuffle off again with an enigmatic look on their face?
Half the world’s PhDs in sociology are taken at American universities. The US has 13,000 career sociologists, a potential for extraordinary intellectual hegemony.
Not to mention an extraordinary waste of wood pulp. And one would think that this British author would appreciate that here in Blighty the word ‘sociologist’ has rather negative connotations. ‘Career sociologist’ is usually a euphamism for a middle-aged beardy-weirdy with no job.
Without rigorous scholarly standards no public sociology will be taken seriously.
Just ignore the first four words of that sentence, please.
The South Africans and east Europeans present were ex-dissidents who described how the advent of democratic and legitimate governments in their countries had brought new problems. Debate narrowed, intellectuals were less in demand and disappointment with rising social inequality and the new governments’ economic policies was leading to public apathy.
So the useless, boring wankers of yesteryear are still, useless boring wankers only without a state stipend. Tragic!
Jacklyn Cock, author of a path-breaking exposure of the plight of domestic workers in South Africa, called on sociologists to stand in solidarity with the new social movements.
See, this is precisely the kind of thing I was talking about. See above.
Four days in California are not going to change the world. But it was hard not to feel that something big is stirring in US academic life.
Yes, a very large pot of tea.
The foreign subjects of America’s global empire have been restless for years. Now some of the sharpest minds are raising questions. Even if John Kerry wins control of the White House, the rebellion is unlikely to stop.
Did you hear that, all you bourgeois lackies of the capitalist running dog? Do you imagine that your flimsy paper empire can possibly halt the march of truth, progress and historic inevitability? The sociologists people are angry and they are rising up in solidarity against the forces of Reagonomic reaction. The revolution is at hand!
I know, I know. This is the Guardian and I really should learn to pick on someone my own size. But when I come across comedic treasures like this, I simply cannot resist the urge to share them with the world. Just call me an altruist.
Thank you for adding “beardy-weirdy” to my vocabulary. I’ll find ample use for it here in Austin, Texas. Hilarious!
Yes, this article is full of juice bon mots that I intend to steal 🙂
I’d be much more comfortable dismissing such articles, if we weren’t inexorably moving toward greater Statism, not in one big revolutionary jump, but by small steps. The State has taken over retirements (public and semi-private, there is little or no private savings anymore), and by and large education (from the cradle to MBA) including manufacturing these ‘intellectuals’. Taxation, borrowing, and regulation have all but blown away our liberty as is, and they are still fighting for more.
They make it sound like they were defeated in the 60’s and 70’s. They weren’t. Statism has moved on apace. The battles are protracted to be sure, but concessions were made and now they are mobilizing for more. The drones manufactured through Statist means (are they not evidence of the previous successes that they even exist?) are back for another attack.
Considering I pay nearly 50% of my earnings in taxes in some form or another and regulated up the wahzoo with whatever is left over, I certianly don’t feel that I/we won anything in the past, but slowly lost. Now they’re pressing again for even more control. We can laugh at them and marginalize them, but they’ll win eventually. They’ll have a vast majority of the soft media on their side, a goodly portion of the hard media, a majority of the education industry (the State conditioning of children to be entitled and dependent is sickening), and eventually most of the elected officials, who, for expediency, will cave into this vocal minority (it’s easier to buy their short term silence with other peoples’ property).
They may be over confident to some degree. They may give the impression that they will have sweeping successes and invoke a new order (what else would you expect at a convention?), which they won’t, but the are winning the protracted war all the same. If they get even just a tenth of their agenda, they still win.
I think this is the best line: “The foreign subjects of America’s global empire have been restless for years. Now some of the sharpest minds are raising questions. Even if John Kerry wins control of the White House, the rebellion is unlikely to stop.”
I’ve just finished reading an article on Heckler and Koch’s participation in designing and testing the new assault rifle for the U.S. Army (the XM8–very nifty from all accounts). So after two years of increasingly bitter relations between Germany and the U.S., at the “lowest point in relations” between the U.S. and Europe…. they’re about to help us better arm ourselves.
So much for rebelling against our “global hegemony.”
Maybe they meant Hugo Chavez… yea, he’s doing real well right now.
“The US has 13,000 career sociologists, a potential for extraordinary intellectual hegemony.”
Umm, I thought “hegemony” was something the Left was always complaining about. I guess it’s good if it’s a hegemony of the Left.
I think it’s clear here that these people think of themselves as Leftist who happen to be sociologist. Their political identity and the moral and intellectuals obligations it imposes trumps any obligation they have as researchers.
These sociologist don’t view themselves as researchers who try to create predictive models of society and then let the political chips fall where they may. Instead they believe themselves to political who use sociology to advance their preselected agenda.
This is the main reason why sociology has fallen off it’s pedestal. Everything they produce is contaminated by politics. This contamination has rendered their analysis, never very predictive in the first place, nearly useless.
Hey! I have a degree in sociology.
…and I have recovered quite well thank you very much…
The Guardian, the BBC, and other leftist-controlled European press are always publishing this sort of story. The US is always alleged to be on the verge of some Great Awakening about something or other, that will lead us to renounce our Evil Kapitalist Ways and embrace Euro-style tranziness and socialism.
Never happens. When the tranzis conquered the mainstream news media, the Evil Kapitalists just went to talk radio, cable TV and then, later on, the Internet. When tranzis took over our school system, we started homeschooling our kids or putting them in private schools. When tranzis took over the higher education system, we fought back by establishing new universities and colleges, and think tanks to house the few normal academics fleeing the moral morass of established higher education. The tranzis try and try, but in the long run, Americans stubbornly insist on remaining Americans. Note to al-Guardian: Our backward, primitive ways are simply unreformable. You would save a lot of dead trees (or solar-powered cyber-space) by acknowledging that fact and leaving us to our wicked, wicked ways.
He has decided to touch the earth. Rotation will stop!!!!The wind will cease,The rain will cease, Millions will taste Death! Because you have removed his Law.WormWood is 3000 miles wide Traveling at 180,000 miles an hour and when she hits the earth there shall be great trembleing They have removed his peace So now shall ye Recieve.