Higher Learning

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I came to this university with an open mind
and a fire burning in my chest
I was on a quest for higher learning
now here I am

I’d like to thank my professors
for teaching me to be a free thinker, where I’m totally free to think…
what you want me to think

I loved my favorite class so much
it’s hard to put it in words
Destabilizing Hegemonic Cishetero Amatonormativity
in Birds
changed my life

thank you for teaching me problematizing
instead of problem solving
all this time I could have been trying to cure cancer
instead you taught me to point at someone and say “you’re the cancer”

I asked you to help me unravel the great philosophers
you dazzled me with 100 Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion officers
I was going to say
that their 15 million dollar combined salary didn’t actually help educate anyone but
they did keep over 100 chairs from floating away

you taught me to lower my gaze
whenever I tried to think for myself
you censored me
and lowered my grade

thank you for exposing the lie of objective truth
I mean, I came to University to participate
in the universally respected pursuit of wisdom
and the transmission of knowledge

to learn to differentiate between the intellectually fashionable
and the perpetually applicable
to partake of your sacred manna

I was starving for your esteemed insight
and you fed me propaganda

I came to you seeking a guardian of reason
and you discarded reason

I came for critical thinking
you gave me critical theory

I wanted to build on a shared foundation
you told me there’s no such thing
thanks to your advice
I’ve learned to turn openness from a virtue into a vice

I wanted a liberal education
I wanted to see the world
I was told this was the place
you showed me that the only way to see the world
is through the lens of gender, sexuality, and race

E Pluribus Unum lol
thank you and your syllabus for disproving
such nonsense
thank you for teaching me to look at diversity as a device for division, I was naive to think that diversity could be beautiful, that we could learn from each other and build a society together, strengths and weaknesses weaved into a tapestry of unanticipated breadth, depth, and majestyno – your way is better
we must deconstruct

we must reject the great books in favor of the great grievances
I used to think the American dream was
the opportunity for each to achieve according to his or her determination and honed expertise
no ma’am – now I know
the American dream is a government program

I used to think morality stemmed from natural rights
now I know that morality stems from status and likes
and trendy ideologies

after four years
I can’t tell you anything about molecular biology or chemistry
or the importance of nucleic acids or adrenal glands
but I can tell you that abortion should be legal, free, and on-demand

I didn’t learn anything about what truth is
but I did unlearn what 2+2 is
you say I’m smarter for that
and I believe you

I believe you
that what happened to the universities in Germany in the 1930s
certainly isn’t happening here

I didn’t study much history
but the one thing I learned about its atrocities
was that I could not possibly be guilty of the same foibles that foiled those civilizations
the same infirmities that put millions in infirmaries
no
those are past people – savage
I have surpassed people
make statues of me
that mobs will never find reason to ravage

thank you for bringing me up in front of a class of people
for struggle sessions
thank you for bringing my friend up – he agreed
that it was so virtuous of you to tell everyone that because of his skin color, he’s unlikely to succeed

they say oh, the humanity
I say oh, the humanities

thank you for replacing facts
with post-factual narratives
and for your relentless attacks on America

thank you for never letting anyone with a dissenting sentiment speak on this campus, or any campus
I know that what you’ve taught me would stand against whatever they have to say so you’re right
it’s best to just keep them away
thank you for the safe spaces

thank you for the guest lecturers that you did allow who spoke so graciously about “fantasies of unloading a revolver into the head of any white person that got in their way”
that always made my day
I never once questioned why that was acceptable
but having someone come and speak about, I don’t know, the Constitution, or freedom, or fulfilling one’s potential
that was forbidden

they say that you should be ashamed of yourselves for what you’ve done to free speech, free thought, and truth seeking
and for shaming anyone that dares break from
the mold that every one of your ideas are shaped from
they say it’s crazy that people feel less free to speak in your classrooms than they did in the authoritarian states
that they escaped from

I say, well… I say whatever you want me to say

I came to this university with an open mind
thank you so much for closing it

thank you for what you’ve become
for what you’ve done to me
to my generation
to western civilization
for putting thousands of years of human progress on the brink

what a legacy
I think…