[linuxftw]

The pro college crowd has a tool the anti-college crowd doesn't: They understand that the masses respond emotionally rather than rationally. If there is to be meaningful change in society, we need to make people feel embarrassed for attending college.

[corrral]

You don't need to stigmatize college. Just get employers to stop favoring graduates, and enrollment will plummet to a tiny fraction of its current level. Meanwhile, you'll have trouble getting people to feel bad about going to college if graduates still have an easier time in the job market than non-graduates.

[dahart]

I don’t understand framing this as some kind of tribal pro or anti college. Are people against education, or upset by the costs in the US? Other countries manage to fund it a bit more sanely. You will otherwise be pretty hard pressed to make people embarrassed by learning more and earning more.

[linuxftw]

There's a lot to unpack here. College is not synonymous with education. I'm anti-college insofar as I feel that it is a net-negative for society, and greatly so. For the vast majority, college is a means to an end, a way to receive some training at best, or mere credentialing at worst, to work for some entity (mostly for-profit corporations). Does society need this to function, is it even desirable?

The university system is full of cons and frauds. Anyone that gives that system money is helping to perpetuate the system.

[dahart]

> College is not synonymous with education

Right, that’s my question to you, what exactly are you referring to when you say you’re anti college: the cost or the education?

What’s the evidence for college being a large net negative? Are you talking about the US only, or are you including, say, Norway too? (Are you actually anti college, or anti current US education funding?)

What do you mean is it needed/desirable? Are you suggesting that education alone is a bad thing, or that well rounded (non-vocational) education is bad for society, that people would be better off not taking math / writing / history? Is vocational job training unnecessary? Any reason to think it would be equally effective if corporations did it privately, or that it would cost less all else being equal?

Currently, the training plus credentialing yields 2x earnings in the US above non college graduates. Whether good or bad, the result is more money moving to society. There is no clear financial net negative, in fact the current financial benefit to society is so large that it’s obvious the US govt could fully fund college education for all on the increased tax revenue alone, and still have multiples more than that to spare. I don’t yet see your argument at all.

[2snakes]

Like Chomsky says the elites said, education is for the indoctrination of the young.

[dahart]

Without context, that’s nothing more than a platitude. In some sense it is perhaps tautological and meaningless since the words educate and indoctrinate could be viewed as practically synonymous. Anyway I’m sure there’s a pithy quote about lacking education and being less educated and/or more poor, but the real question is what is the actual, realistic, practical alternative? There is nothing wrong with choosing not to attend college with eyes wide open IMO, but globally increasing education opportunities is considered to be critical for eliminating poverty. So is Chomsky’s quote even relevant to whether to go to school, or is he critiquing or reflecting on the philosophy of our style of education? The man has a PhD after all.