Recently, Stanford University declared that calling yourself an “American” is racist.? Why because Canada, Mexico, Latin and South America are also Americas. Only the dumbest of people think that a Canadian is an American. Try calling a Canadian an American and you will get a lot of grief—they are proud people, proud of their nation. The real problem is that Stanford has gone from being a world Class University, to a cheap, bigoted, hateful back water facility run by sick people.
“It’s worth noting why. The people who are putatively in charge of Stanford are not as stupid as this example seems to suggest. The problem is that all American institutions of any size now have uber-woke diversity czars, who are indeed stupid and also anti-American. The bosses are cowed by these stupid anti-Americans for fear of being called racist. The net result is that the smartest people at the institution are ruled by the stupidist.”
America has not bottomed out yet — ask Stanford
Aspen Beat, 1/1/23
In stock market investing, you’re supposed to be pessimistic when everyone else is optimistic, and optimistic when everyone else is pessimistic. Warren Buffett famously put it this way: “Be fearful when others are greedy, and greedy when others are fearful.”
The reason the aforecited principle applies well in stock market investing is that the herd instinct makes people buy or sell stocks because other people are buying or selling. The result is that the stocks get over-sold or over-bought, thereby driving their price too low or too high in relation to their real indicators of value – mainly their current and future profits.
Eventually, the herd drives the stock so high or so low that even dedicated herders cannot fail to miss the fact that the stock is mispriced in relation to objective value indicators. At that point, they finally change direction – they start buying while the herd is still selling, or vice versa – and the price trend reverses. The herd reverses direction, and stampedes off the other way. You can make money by being contrary to the herd. Be a bull when they’re a bear, and vice versa.
So, does the same principle apply in evaluating the state of a culture? Has the assessment of American culture become so bearish that it is surely too much so?
No. One of our formerly great universities teaches us this week that we are still headed down.
Stanford announced that “American” is hate speech. That’s because it ignores the part of the Western Hemisphere that is outside the boundaries (I’ll avoid the hateful, racist, anachronistic word “borders”) of the United States. It effectively eliminates Mexico, which after all is in América del norte. And Brazil, which is in América do Sul.
Baloney. The fact that people of the United States refer to themselves as “Americans” (and so does the rest of the world) does not mean that they are the only Americans. The people of Germany and elsewhere sometimes refer to Germans as Europeans, and they indisputably are. That doesn’t mean anyone thinks the French and Spanish are not.
The worst that can be said about Americans and the rest of the world refering to people of the United States as “Americans” is not that it’s wrong, but that it’s imprecise. It fails to specify which Americans are being referenced. But Stanford objects to “American” not on the grounds that it is imprecise, but on the grounds that it’s racist. It’s a dig at all the Americans who are in Latin America and, for that matter, Canada too.
When I call myself an American, the person I’m speaking with is free to ask, “¿Qué país de América?” In my many travels, that has happened only once. It was from a young French woman (who was obviously hitting on me, as they usually do).
That one of our formerly greatest universities would reach so deep to find fault – of the vile racist kind! – with an innocuous and universal word that they and their countrymen and the rest of the world have innocently used for centuries to describe citizens of that country, is stunning.
We’re still sinking.
It’s worth noting why. The people who are putatively in charge of Stanford are not as stupid as this example seems to suggest. The problem is that all American institutions of any size now have uber-woke diversity czars, who are indeed stupid and also anti-American. The bosses are cowed by these stupid anti-Americans for fear of being called racist. The net result is that the smartest people at the institution are ruled by the stupidist.
