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"Where are the Yale men who had their soft tweed jackets and their Oxford-gray flannel trousers made at J. Press and Arthur M. Rosenberg; who trod the Memorial Quadrangle shod in the Raywood-model, full brogue, slip-on Peal shoe and the Oxford-cloth, rolling, button-down-collar Brooks Brothers shirt?
How can such noisome behavior, base and vile, reek from this once-great flower of American academia?”And what’s happened to the tables down at Mory’s, which the 21 Club wished it looked like? And whither the Fence Club, the swellest undergraduate sodality, where Huggins, the club permittee, the white-jacketed Negro gentleman’s gentleman, brooded over his boys with warm breast and, ah, bright wings? Ralph Lauren would have made a mess of himself had he seen such authentic WASP class and décor: stuffed leather chairs, polished mahogany tables, Turkish carpets, and framed pictures of Y-sweatered Eli captains sitting on the Yale Fence.
Ties and jackets are gone. It’s all jeans, sneakers, and T-shirts. By looking at him, you can’t tell a modern Yale man from a University of Connecticut townie. God knows what the female undergraduates look like, but “Yale slut” hardly bespeaks knee socks, pleated skirts, McMullen blouses, cashmere cable-knit cardigans, and circle pins. Socially, Yale is in the Ivy League basement..."
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One might, of course, extend the point. The entire Ivy League and American higher education establishment itself is in the basement. It is best to be avoided. I tell my clients, and their children, to stop feeding the Beast and to consider universities in Canada, Australia, Britain, and Europe, where higher education is not only arguably better, but also cheaper and marginally less politicised. Or, to forego university completely. But that is a subject for another column. The American Ivy League universities have not been Preppy or Ivy for 30 or 40 years now. Come to think of it, they have not been properly American for decades either, inhabited today mostly by Mongols, Planetarians, foreigners, and swots. Which renders the homage paid to them in certain American quarters a foolish exercise in sycophancy and sentimentalism.
http://takimag.com/article/remembrance_of_yales_past
Yes, Yale is no longer Yale. A few years ago, our daughter was considering attending, and so we dutifully sat through an introductory video about the campus. It told us everything we wanted to know -- about never going near the place. The video started off with an insolent Korean from San Diego bragging about his accomplishments. Next a shot of Freshman Orientation Day featuring a beaming Mexican girl leading parents and slovenly dressed students around. More foreigners (East Indians, Nigerians, etc.) were interviewed. Then the inside of Calhoun or Saybrook (?) was shown with two pretty girls parading past holding hands. The camera did not want to miss the message and focused on them. Fact: 50% of all freshman slots are reserved for “minorities and foreign students”. Any wonder why Eli Yale is holding his nose? A sad shame.
ReplyDeleteIt's my opinion that you think better, speak better and behave better when you are well dressed. I'm not saying that men and women in t-shirts can't do a good job but I'm convinced that they would do an even better one dressed in something that can't be considered as underwear.
ReplyDeleteI just can't imagine how truly awful the "students" will be attired by the time my young daughter attends university. Thinking about it makes me want to drink and I'm trying to give my liver some time off for good behavior.
ReplyDelete"Harvard Hates America—America Should Shun Harvard"
ReplyDeletehttp://www.vdare.com/mcculloch/110602_harvard.htm
Perhaps a new secret society is needed at Yale. NumbSKULLS and BONEheads. The origin of the word DIVERSITY: An old Jewish man was walking the streets of New York and said, "Mein Gott! Look at all these foreigners--da verse city I have ever seen!"
ReplyDeleteUniversities themselves are going down as institutions of higher philosophical (and theological) education, instead they seem to be merely relating technique/s and practical skills.
ReplyDeleteI was fortunate enough to attend one of those rare oases of free thought in the American educational system, but even without the local PC commissariat about, I could still see that many had already ingested the toxic brew of liberalism. The zeitgeist is simply that powerful; however, it was still a grand academic experience.
ReplyDeleteI believe that many should forgo higher education; some simply aren't meant for it, and for those that are, the institutions won't live up to their potential. I have heard that one can get an English major without even reading Shakespeare. You'll pay thousands of dollars over four years for a useless major when you could read all of Shakespeare in a year and come away with a soul immeasurably enriched. The English major who is put through the university industrial complex may well be hopelessly deformed by all manner of horrid ideas.
What the university has become is something far more insidious than reeducation camps, gulags and tiger cages, for young men and women flock to them eagerly. They get their credential, cheap beer, and brainwashing and pay for the privilege.
I agree; if one is not fortunate enough to go to Cambridge, it's probably best not to bother with anywhere else.
ReplyDeleteBoola, boola, bow wow wow.
ReplyDeleteEnvy, ignorance, arrogance.... Whatever the source of our fears we must compete and not pretend we are better. We must fight to be the better in all things so as to dominate the definition of our character.
ReplyDeleteAs a current undergraduate at Oxford it's not like its much better here. The Eurotrash-Look prevails.
ReplyDeleteAnd business suits at dinner. In black.
The various societies generally have good standards, but outside of their own socials you never see that stuff (boat club blazers, rugby club gear, etc)