A new friend of mine at school talks with me a lot about politics and science, and we have very similar views. He is very much more interested in economics than I, so he knows of many interesting people. One of which he told me about tonight named Eric Hoffer. I found an Eric Hoffer quote with which I cannot agree more…

“A ruling intelligentsia, whether in Europe, Asia or Africa, treats the masses as raw material to be experimented on, processed, and wasted at will.”

I contradict myself in the feelings I get when I think about things like this. Part of me wants to get into a leadership position and tell people about this horrible truth that is happening the the academic world, but to do so would be, in a way, becoming what I attempt to warn against.

My experience in the academic world has revealed me to many things. I am around so many people who are incredibly intelligent, but at the same time, so crushed and manipulated by the lead feet of academia.

The kind of people I encounter are passionate, able to adapt quickly to change, and have a lot of will to cooperate in a drive to right the situations in the world that have gone wrong. The danger in this is that too many of us in this fantasy world get caught up in what we can do. Why has the idea of letting people decide for themselves left this school of thought?

Tonight was Speech Night at IUPUI, where 7 chosen speakers got to deliver a persuasive speech to all the introductory speech students, and I could not help but do cringe at how power hungry most of these people are. This tone of voice is dangerous. Luckily, the girl who ended up winning was an exception to this group I talk about. She was the only one who gave a speech directed at taking individual action, not applying yourself to group mentality and calling on the government to resolve the issue. For this, I congratulate her. It shows that when you speak at the individual level, it can be more powerful then any flock-of-birds mentality, no matter how shiny the results of the latter may appear.

This said, I ask for anyone who is in college right now to be careful in the progressive stream of thought you’ve been placed in, for if we continue without questioning it, we will become blinded by the control academia tries to persuade us that we deserve. Why should we think we know what’s best for the rest of society if we have repeatedly shown to be self-serving when we take reign?

That said, I dissent! And I hope you do, too!

I feel that a big congratulations is owed to Barack Obama for his achievement and his passion for helping people. The historical context of this election makes me proud to be an American, right now.

On another note, Barack said in his celebratory speech that those who doubt that anything is possible have seen otherwise tonight. In my not-so-humble opinion, I beg to differ. As a child growing up in a middle class home, I have for 18 years been preached to by teachers, family members, and the like about American Democracy and the power that the people hold in this country.

If you’re a believer in this idea, I will tell you right now that my opinions made absolutely no difference in this election and I don’t feel like anything I want done in our government is possible. As a constitutionalist, classical liberal, and pure democratic-republican, I feel more walked on today than I have before as far as politics go. I was not very excited last night or this morning when I voted. After hearing and seeing the celebration, I am feeling completely ignored. I really hope I never feel like this in an election again. I feel like I’ve definitely lost a chunk of my passion for politics tonight and it’s really sad. (NOTE: this doesn’t have to do with Barack necessarily, but election day in general.)

The next few months will probably be annoying from hearing the press, hearing people that are mad about the win, and others that believe their savior is now in office, but the last stomp on my dignity will be to see the president be inaugurated on January 20, 2008. Barack is going to say to the world, “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Based on what he has been campaigning on and why people follow him so passionately, it follows closely that he has not said ANYTHING about any of this during whole campaign. (Not that John McCain was any different in that respect!)

The last thing that is a little bit scary to me is the fact that our whole Federal Government is (as of next year) going to be dominated by a pretty angry group of Democrats. I guess we’ll see how much they’ll get done together, and whether it will be for better or for worse. I also feel that although I like Barack Obama as a person, I don’t think I can trust the kind of choices he would make in picking Supreme court justices.

Overall, I still feel like government is going to be in my way, and that it is going to continue to discourage individuality, continue to waste billions of dollars on lazy bureaucracy, and continue to take my rights as a joke.

Also, I hope is was worth the hundreds of millions of dollars put into these presidential campaigns.

I got a snapshot of one of the greatest hypocrisies of modern American culture, today. I was in the drive-thru of McDonald’s, picking up some delicious McNuggets, and I realized that the truck in front of me had an environmentalist license plate. And this wasn’t just any truck. This was a huge Ford F-150. And it wasn’t just a truck… it was a truck… in a drive-thru! At McDonald’s. So to share the joy that I found in seeing this, I took a picture with my cell phone so that I could share with the world!

Last night, in my French Class, we talked all about feminism and equal rights and things like that. It kind of bugged me. We talked a lot about how women don’t make as much money doing the same jobs that men have and how our society should do something about it. That is such bull crap! It IS up to the employer on how much (s)he wants to pay an employee. And employers ARE allowed to judge people for things like this.

Is it fair? No! It’s not, but if a woman wants to make just as much money as a man (as if success is based on how much money you make anyways) then do something about it! Don’t get the government involved, though! I agree totally that women can do many things better than men, or just as well. But I also believe that men can do many things better than women, or just as well. It’s not that we’re equal. We’re just different. But constitutionally, a woman does NOT, by any means, have the RIGHT to make as much money as a man. However, she has the opportunity to do so, and I think any woman, if she puts her mind to it, CAN do it. Our society is just still and always will be in this transition period where women are becoming part of the work force, and part of the government! I think it’s great!

Another thing that was said was that humor regarding minorities, such as blond jokes, racial jokes, gay jokes, and so on… these jokes are wrong because they enforce incorrect stereotypes. WRONG! Stereotypes don’t just happen… they do actually and usually have some truth to them, whether it still is partially true or if it disappeared. But just because we laugh at these jokes doesn’t mean we hate gay people, or we’re sexists, or we’re racists. Just because stereotypes exist, does NOT mean they’re going to be true for every person of that minority, and if someone isn’t intelligent enough to judge a person individually before they resort to stereotypes and prejudgments, then they definitely have some issues where racism is concerned.

So that’s my individualist rant for now. And by the way… don’t take this as I hate today’s liberals. I love liberals. I love the spirit, I just don’t agree a lot of the time. I’d say the majority of my friends are rather liberal. My girlfriend, Olivia, is and her twin sister and parents are as well… and I really like all of them and respect them politically! Also, don’t take this entry as me judging all liberals. I don’t think all liberals are the same. And I don’t think all liberals are hypocrites like the woman driving that truck in the photo above. And I DO think many conservatives are hypocrites, as well. But hypocrisy is part of our nature as humans. None of us are going to be completely non-hypocritical. But we can work towards something… that’s the important thing to remember… and that’s why I love the spirit of liberals.

Speaking of Olivia… we went to Target tonight looking for things for our Halloween costumes for the parties this week. I got this adorable picture of her in a sweet hat…

Friday is our nine months! Yay!