The plight of the anti-austerity crowd in the PIIGS countries often loses my sympathy when I notice that the most vociferous and violent protestors seem to be students against cuts in university subsidies. If there is one “entitlement” that has no moral basis whatsoever, in my opinion, it is this one, yet these free-riding students are the most self-righteous. I pity many of the people who are dependent on the bankrupt systems they grew up in, sometimes through no fault of their own. These include it’s-too-late-to-start-over Social Security dupes, already-sick Medicare recipients and I-paid-into-Unemployment-for-years dolees.
Professional students, however, are not on my sympathy list. I have come to believe that higher education is not really serving the social purpose these angry, marching students seem to base their sense of righteousness on. That is, higher education is not simply the great equalizer, the path on which the have-nots can learn the secrets of the haves and enter their ranks based not on birth but on merit. Today’s higher education is not intended simply to illuminate the minds of the children of the ignorati with crucial facts, critical thinking and the art of argument–doing that really would give the ruling classes a run for their money!
