College — the epicenter of the realm of academia, a place where your parents and/or the state pays $50,000 a year for you to go and learn what they learned, only to find you returning with ideas of your own that will shock them both. Democratic socialism? Is that what’s hot these days?
Hundreds of years of human civilization, spanning from East to West, have shown us no shortage of student activists changing their communities. For those of us with boundless enthusiasm for politics, this fact plays in our head a triumphant, heroic kind of music (think “Avengers” victory score). But as citizens of the Western democracies became more and more politicized, these already-noisy academic halls become even noisier to a point of being quite alarming, what with the hate speech, the cancel culture, and the protests-on-protests. The situation on the campus grounds seems pretty dire, but even in times of great megaphones and chaos, a sufficiently reasonable and uncomfortably confused undergraduate can find their peace of mind just by adhering to this simple rule: to find certainty, let go of it.
In other words, if you want to be someone with lots of opinions, it’s best not to take your opinions very seriously.
Do stand up for yourself. Do fight for what you believe is right. Do try to persuade others of your viewpoint. Don’t be surprised to find out in the end you were wrong. And, don’t take it personally.
As the country’s politics divides, the political junkies on both sides seem to get even more stubborn than ver. Nothing is more humiliating nowadays than a public apology, and nothing is more infuriating than a refusal to make a public apology. Being wrong is now the hole where dignity goes to die. Being cancelled is a fate worse than death. The fact that this is especially true in academic environment is ironic: if the students already knew what their unshakable, inarguable beliefs in life were, why bother paying hundreds of thousands of dollars to learn more?
The fear of error is normal, but the refusal to accept it negates the process of the learning, which in turn negates progress. This short-sightedness is often seen coupled with passion, something stemming from unique experiences and strong points of view that very effectively insulate us from seeing past ourselves to observe others. An opinion makes us feel loud and strong and important, but often the truth is that we are not. At least, not any louder or stronger or more important than those whose viewpoints we fight against. The stubborn cling to one set of knowledge is a special kind of stupidity. The vicious clashing of immutable beliefs is a scene of great foolishness.
As college students just now entering the vast vaults of politics, philosophy, arts, and science, it’s shockingly easily to feel like we’re already qualified to be President of the United States. Maybe further down the road, when we’ve been cancelled once or twice and flipped-flopped three or four times, this confidence would waver. Or it would collapse completely, and we’re left with an existential crisis and nothing to believe in. In such times, I suppose it smart to listen to Socrates, allegedly the wisest man of Western civilization, who allegedly said the following, “I neither know nor think that I know.”
And therein lies the trick to being an opinionated college students: Don’t claim your belief as knowledge. Do learn to accept that you may know nothing. Ignorance can evolve. Stubbornness cannot.
And, in the spirit of the article, do take my word with a grain of salt. Who knows whether I will recant everything tomorrow?
