I'm right there with you, in a not very hard to imagine alternate universe, I would've been right there with them, being shown the door after following the rulebook for decades. And you're absolutely right that they have "engineered their own professional demise", in my opinion, by allowing their institutions to become partisan. And yes, they are not WWII resistance fighters in 1941, they are Soviet apparachiks in 1991.
Few of us enjoy cleaning house whether it is a small apartment or a big house. It's messy and generally not very fun. But if we don't do it, we soon find ourselves living in filth. Trump has taken on a massive house cleaning task. The craziness that hard-working taxpayers have been forced to pay for is appalling. God bless Trump for being willing to get some very needed things done. He'll be called every name in the book, but he doesn't care.
This could have been me, too. At least for a little while. I'm really, really bad at following. I'm even worse about shutting up. I wouldn't have lasted long, which in my opinion, are exactly the type of people I want running things. See something, say something? Yes. About grift and graft, about robbing Peter to pay Paul, about turning the mechanisms of war funding kickbacks into social justice kickbacks. Not only are these people overly produced, they've decided to choose the most pliable, lowest scoring, most ideological NPCs for these roles. I don't feel bad for them. These aren't the thinkers. The meritorious will find jobs, even if they have to become what they dread - irrelevant.
I often wondered if people could just smell the outsider in me -- I did try my level best to present myself as one of them, and I had a great CV and references etc. I know conspiratorially minded people would tell me I wasn't 'the right sort.' Personally I think it was more likely just a matter of a zillion applicants per job. Either way, now I'm so relieved it didn't work out the way I wanted to back then. You are right, these people are not the best and the brightest -- I mean, look at the outcomes they have produced. The proof is in the pudding.
I was offered a job in a federal security role (because of who i know, my degree is in history, lol) It only required out of state travel 3x per year. It was years ago and my boys were still little. I didn't want to leave them and my husband was making decent money by that time. It was state-based work, so I didn't have to fit in like that. Good thing, too. 😂
American Education should be an armament to prepare you for adversity. Instead of a training program to fit you for a cocoon. We really have been captured by socialism.
Trump gave offered 8 months severance, that should be enough time to figure out a plan B Obviously there are programs we want to put in place for the new restructure, and help will be needed.
For many, it will be the end of a way of life. A deep and abiding loss of not just livelihood but community. Trump’s administration would be well served to offer some kind words to scared people. Something along the lines of how great the economy is going to be, etc.
Well said. Liberal arts grads have, basically, no career path without the NGO industrial complex (NIC). Censorship, DEI, climate change, LGBT etc. There's a whole set of non-profits that might hire them, if they're really "elite."
In the old days, just having a college degree vaulted you into the upper middle class. Nowadays, that's no longer the case, UNLESS you can worm your way into the NIC.
I suspect forms of this bloated bureaucratisation and right think have metastasised all over the western world. We are ripe for a clean out everywhere. More than that, we need it.
Correct! I had a paragraph in there about the kinds of funding that Ireland's Media Commission (the body that polices what is said on the internet) doles out -- a diversity film festival, "narratives about climate change,' etc etc. I cut it out as the piece was a little too long.
Read your older post. "Unable to earn more or enjoy a higher living standard than the workers, the would-be professionals retreat into the cultural realm. They use the language and ideas they learned at university to assert their moral superiority, gaining an imaginary victory over the workers.” These people will bring all of us down rather than just regroup and find a new path.
AID was an arm of the CIA. Those of us serving in places like Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, etc. in the Sixties were well aware of it. JFK was guilt-ridden because of the Bay of Pigs fiasco and tried to redeem himself by using the CIA, with the military, and AID to win friends and influence people. Yep, it attracted those who had been disillusioned by American academia just like the OSS did in World War II.
“…these moves look like the grown up, real world, hard consequences of decades of spoiled neoliberal posturing.” Yes and yes. Thanks for this excellent analysis, Jenny.
Too many of us fall into the trap of saviorism only to realise we’re part of a larger machinery of funding dependency and power. Your story sounds like a blessing in disguise to have never contributed to the mess nor suffer moral injury from selling your soul.
very honest article. As far as "elite" overproduction, I think we can agree that if there are far too many of something that is not really needed, it speaks against it being "elite". Only in a socialistic bureaucratic morass would "right thinkers" who never seem to get actual positive results from their programs, be considered elite.
Yes fair point. That's what the Benjamin Studebaker essay is basically saying -- you should check it out. And my question is -- what happens to these people? I mean, after I was turfed out of the professional managerial class, I ended up starting a food business with my (working class ) chef husband that paid our salaries for a few years. Then Covid (funded by USAID!) destroyed that. I'm four years into Substack so I'm slightly ahead of the game for once, but it's not like I have a pension and job security! Turns out I got lucky by being one of the 'fallen' earlier than this tsunami of unemployed post-grad professionals that's heading our way. I was also very lucky to have a hard-working husband and family support.
I can't speak to what ultimate occupations they will find, but I feel the answer should be to let markets work and society comes out ahead in the long run. Creating a bunch of jobs at taxpayer expense that produce goods and services people don't want, or worse yet produce limits on others' freedoms, surely that isn't the way.
Anyway, I keep hearing that Trump's return to enforcement of immigration law is going to create a scarcity of all types of workers. Maybe, there will be good, honest work available.
I had a similar experience in life. I dreamed of speaking 5 languages by the time i was 25 and becoming "a spy". That didn't happen because I feel in love with being a singer and eventually ended up teaching at a university in a deep blue state for 9 years. But as a non-tenure track, non-conforming, non-joiner type person, that was bound to end with me looking at tenure track people as game-players, who recognized the system and arranged themselves to succeed in it by achieving tenure and then choosing to coast at that level, suddenly not required to think creatively about problems. They seemed bored and unable to awaken, unwilling to think critically when needed, joining the great tribe of progressives with relish. Those seem like the same kind of people you describe losing their civil service jobs right now.
I'm right there with you, in a not very hard to imagine alternate universe, I would've been right there with them, being shown the door after following the rulebook for decades. And you're absolutely right that they have "engineered their own professional demise", in my opinion, by allowing their institutions to become partisan. And yes, they are not WWII resistance fighters in 1941, they are Soviet apparachiks in 1991.
That's exactly right, well said.
Few of us enjoy cleaning house whether it is a small apartment or a big house. It's messy and generally not very fun. But if we don't do it, we soon find ourselves living in filth. Trump has taken on a massive house cleaning task. The craziness that hard-working taxpayers have been forced to pay for is appalling. God bless Trump for being willing to get some very needed things done. He'll be called every name in the book, but he doesn't care.
This could have been me, too. At least for a little while. I'm really, really bad at following. I'm even worse about shutting up. I wouldn't have lasted long, which in my opinion, are exactly the type of people I want running things. See something, say something? Yes. About grift and graft, about robbing Peter to pay Paul, about turning the mechanisms of war funding kickbacks into social justice kickbacks. Not only are these people overly produced, they've decided to choose the most pliable, lowest scoring, most ideological NPCs for these roles. I don't feel bad for them. These aren't the thinkers. The meritorious will find jobs, even if they have to become what they dread - irrelevant.
I often wondered if people could just smell the outsider in me -- I did try my level best to present myself as one of them, and I had a great CV and references etc. I know conspiratorially minded people would tell me I wasn't 'the right sort.' Personally I think it was more likely just a matter of a zillion applicants per job. Either way, now I'm so relieved it didn't work out the way I wanted to back then. You are right, these people are not the best and the brightest -- I mean, look at the outcomes they have produced. The proof is in the pudding.
I was offered a job in a federal security role (because of who i know, my degree is in history, lol) It only required out of state travel 3x per year. It was years ago and my boys were still little. I didn't want to leave them and my husband was making decent money by that time. It was state-based work, so I didn't have to fit in like that. Good thing, too. 😂
Well done Jenny. Yep mommy and daddy MAGA are home and the partying is over and it’s time for cleanup.
Someone called the police, and the party’s over! All that’s left is for the few left who aren’t too drunk on the punch to get out…
American Education should be an armament to prepare you for adversity. Instead of a training program to fit you for a cocoon. We really have been captured by socialism.
Trump gave offered 8 months severance, that should be enough time to figure out a plan B Obviously there are programs we want to put in place for the new restructure, and help will be needed.
For many, it will be the end of a way of life. A deep and abiding loss of not just livelihood but community. Trump’s administration would be well served to offer some kind words to scared people. Something along the lines of how great the economy is going to be, etc.
Yes I agree with you.
Well said. Liberal arts grads have, basically, no career path without the NGO industrial complex (NIC). Censorship, DEI, climate change, LGBT etc. There's a whole set of non-profits that might hire them, if they're really "elite."
In the old days, just having a college degree vaulted you into the upper middle class. Nowadays, that's no longer the case, UNLESS you can worm your way into the NIC.
Yes -- and that's not a good thing. Think of the millions of kids with six figure debt and no jobs to go in to? They were sold a lemon.
I love the last line Jenny about mommy and daddy MAGA taking away their allowance....perfect.
So much corruption. So many unaware souls. May God have mercy on those who love truth and are not afraid to speak it or live it. Much love....Joe
I suspect forms of this bloated bureaucratisation and right think have metastasised all over the western world. We are ripe for a clean out everywhere. More than that, we need it.
Correct! I had a paragraph in there about the kinds of funding that Ireland's Media Commission (the body that polices what is said on the internet) doles out -- a diversity film festival, "narratives about climate change,' etc etc. I cut it out as the piece was a little too long.
But it's the same across the entire world.
Read your older post. "Unable to earn more or enjoy a higher living standard than the workers, the would-be professionals retreat into the cultural realm. They use the language and ideas they learned at university to assert their moral superiority, gaining an imaginary victory over the workers.” These people will bring all of us down rather than just regroup and find a new path.
Correct. 😳
AID was an arm of the CIA. Those of us serving in places like Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, etc. in the Sixties were well aware of it. JFK was guilt-ridden because of the Bay of Pigs fiasco and tried to redeem himself by using the CIA, with the military, and AID to win friends and influence people. Yep, it attracted those who had been disillusioned by American academia just like the OSS did in World War II.
Bullseye.
“…these moves look like the grown up, real world, hard consequences of decades of spoiled neoliberal posturing.” Yes and yes. Thanks for this excellent analysis, Jenny.
Well said, Jenny. Thank you for speaking truth on this matter!
The parents have come home and the party is over.
Too many of us fall into the trap of saviorism only to realise we’re part of a larger machinery of funding dependency and power. Your story sounds like a blessing in disguise to have never contributed to the mess nor suffer moral injury from selling your soul.
Yes! It's saviorism and toxic empathy.
very honest article. As far as "elite" overproduction, I think we can agree that if there are far too many of something that is not really needed, it speaks against it being "elite". Only in a socialistic bureaucratic morass would "right thinkers" who never seem to get actual positive results from their programs, be considered elite.
Yes fair point. That's what the Benjamin Studebaker essay is basically saying -- you should check it out. And my question is -- what happens to these people? I mean, after I was turfed out of the professional managerial class, I ended up starting a food business with my (working class ) chef husband that paid our salaries for a few years. Then Covid (funded by USAID!) destroyed that. I'm four years into Substack so I'm slightly ahead of the game for once, but it's not like I have a pension and job security! Turns out I got lucky by being one of the 'fallen' earlier than this tsunami of unemployed post-grad professionals that's heading our way. I was also very lucky to have a hard-working husband and family support.
I can't speak to what ultimate occupations they will find, but I feel the answer should be to let markets work and society comes out ahead in the long run. Creating a bunch of jobs at taxpayer expense that produce goods and services people don't want, or worse yet produce limits on others' freedoms, surely that isn't the way.
Anyway, I keep hearing that Trump's return to enforcement of immigration law is going to create a scarcity of all types of workers. Maybe, there will be good, honest work available.
But ‘good honest work’ is exactly what us effete libs fear the most! 🤣
lols!
Hmm, you and I have in common the spanning of different countries/cultures but also social classes.
Oh really?? Please tell me more. (DM if you prefer. 💜)
I had a similar experience in life. I dreamed of speaking 5 languages by the time i was 25 and becoming "a spy". That didn't happen because I feel in love with being a singer and eventually ended up teaching at a university in a deep blue state for 9 years. But as a non-tenure track, non-conforming, non-joiner type person, that was bound to end with me looking at tenure track people as game-players, who recognized the system and arranged themselves to succeed in it by achieving tenure and then choosing to coast at that level, suddenly not required to think creatively about problems. They seemed bored and unable to awaken, unwilling to think critically when needed, joining the great tribe of progressives with relish. Those seem like the same kind of people you describe losing their civil service jobs right now.