How Colleges Promote Victimhood Over Heroism | Douglas Murray & Vivek Ramaswamy

I love the idea that Merit is a unifying idea in America it seems to me at any rate anyone who doesn't guess for my accent knows I'm not from these Shores um it seems to me at any rate that that this is still prevalent in America to a great degree than it is in Europe for instance uh the idea that achievement is not a zero-sum game and uh if if this guy makes some money it's not to my detriment it's to everyone's Advantage um so I love the idea that Emeritus is a unifying idea in this country um we have a very concrete case coming up which is of course the Harvard admissions case I was at Harvard the other week and um I was gathering that it seems like the Supreme Court will probably issue its uh its verdict on on this before the summer recess um if as a lot of people think Harvard is found to have been doing something illegal um then almost every institution of higher education in America will have been found to have been over the same line what do you think happens if if a verdict does indeed go that way so if I were on the board of a university and uh I'm not currently on the board of a university I think it would be financially irresponsible if you weren't setting aside some reserve for litigation right now and I think that's going to be a good thing in disciplining as a function these universities that have engaged in systematic discrimination of a kind that history will judge very poorly it is an ugly form of discrimination not that different in Harvard it's my alma mater so I'll be gloves off in my criticism what they did to Jews 50 years ago that they'll apologize for today that is what they're doing actively today they intended the effect is on Asian Americans history will not judge that kindly and I think that that's going to come with real legal teeth and consequences and their you know accountability I think is a precondition for justice and so I think that accountability is going to come in the form of a wave of lawsuits that these universities should set aside or reserve for I mean that'll actually even be good because it's going to put more financial pressure on an educational industrial complex that itself should be called out including with the Department of Education here lurking behind the scenes artificially subsidizing for your college education institutions that have become this corrupt so I I hope actually I'm rooting for a form of creative destruction here that this unleashes a wave of and you want to do the math on this these liabilities can be quite uncapped that actually financially punish universities for engaging in the kinds of behaviors they have that Financial accountability then triggers revealing the way in which the entire system was based actually on a large force of the value in the inflated value and subsidized value artificially subsidized value for your college education that really delivers a much needed Reckoning to higher education itself that's what I'm rooting for and I can tell you I'm not just going to be passively rooting for it in whatever capacity I'm in you know two years from now I think that there's ways we can use this finally to deliver the wake-up call to fixing a broken higher education system in this country yes it does seem that I mean it's been an enormous Boon to the HR departments all of this of course it is um Stanford which had such a fine reputation until recent weeks um Stanford um it turned out there is there is roughly one one uh HR person on staff or faculty for every student it would be cheaper to get everyone a butler [Laughter] and much more useful [Applause] and it would make me want to go to Stanford [Laughter] um but I mean I mean one of the great scandals that has to be addressed in this country is how you have people coming out of University in Evermore dead paying for these vast bureaucracies of bureaucrats and every year year on year being stupider and stupider I mean something has to give at some point does it not it does I think you've put your finger on the right pulse it is not an accident that this correlates with rise in college tuition actually so in woke Inc my first book I cited this at the at Michigan State but may as well have been many other universities too there's been a order of magnitude so 10x explosion in the ratio of administrative staff to students and so the rise of this managerial bureaucracy is part of what creates this anti-meritocratic force in all of our institutions by the way I talked about it in government right the the administrative state does to government what the managerial class does to the university what increasingly you see happening in the HR ranks of corporate America too now there's a linkage between these things okay so Lyndon Johnson said into motion the Great Society which is the biggest misnomer uh in in I think American History For What it's done for even the very people that was supposed to protect in many cases black Americans but one of the things he said to motion was the executive order that created affirmative action in America by the way if a U.S president can create it by executive order you could end it by executive order we need to remember that and hold Republicans accountable for that but here's here's actually what happens with the Civil Rights statutes we ended up protecting attributes like race and and gender and sexual orientation now how does that relate to some of the other travails we see in America it goes back to actually the antimatter culture even creates an assault on Free Speech I can tell you on how that happens both in universities and in Corporate America where now those statutes are read so broadly that if you now say something that's if it's not even just about antimattercratic hiring if you say something that is deemed to be hostile to or experienced as hostile by a member of a protected class that that is creating a hostile work environment that's what these HR deputies are there to police they're even legally required to it and so if they allow that person to speak in a way that creates a hostile work environment for someone who's a member of a protected class then that could be a basis for a Title VII violation or a civil rights violation under the Civil Rights statutes well what does that mean we've created the very conditions then for Viewpoint discrimination while leaving political expression itself unprotected and so these Concepts between the assault on Free Speech which itself is part of a meritocracy of ideas is actually deeply related to The Assault on Merit in hiring itself and the managerial bureaucracy that administers the latter is actually responsible for creating the anti-speech conditions in the former and so these it's not an accident people wonder why do we see these malayses rise at the same time you think Free Speech culture assault and cancel cultures over here an anti-meritocratic stuff and affirmative action and Dei bureaucracies are over here no no these are it's not a coincidence these are deeply linked and if we get to that root cause with an affirmative alternative vision of our own then we can stand on strong moral and principled footing to not only gut that system but create a new one to take its place let me um lead us on to what's perhaps one of the most awkward parts of this conversation which is uh we talk most of the time in discussions about neurotoxy about the people who can and the people who can succeed um of course in any society but particularly in a democracy like America you have a flip side of that problem you said I was very struck by hardship is not the same thing as a victimhood I couldn't agree more but we do live in a society in which victimhood is is the main goal um to be a victim and to be on the victim hierarchy to be to have the delicious opportunity to be the most victimized person is is is clearly the aspiration we've all seen it in our lives when people pick up the microphone in a q a and they say speaking as and I think ah everything is going to come afterwards is going to be garbage [Laughter] and then they'll say something about their lived experience as if there's any other kind of experience in my unlived experience but but we do have this problem in particularly in America that the the the the the the seeking of victimhood in our own lifetimes and you wrote about this obviously in both of your books but um in our own lifetimes we've moved in America in particular which is so striking from a culture of heroism to a culture of victimhood and and if I can lay out very quickly there's there's one particular problem in this in a democracy which is something which um I quote Nietzsche a little bit of my most recent book in the war on the west and um whenever a student says to me that they're a fan of nature I always say oh yeah which bits you you've got to think it's worth using carefully um but I used rather carefully Anita's uh um work on the genealogy of morals it's my last book and there's one particular Insight of his that really struck me as pertinent to our situation and to our discussion today which is this Nietzsche talks about the type of person who he says a person of resentment who among other things and see if anyone can recognize this type in the society we're now in among other things uh tears he says that wounds long since healed and then cries about their hurt um now Nietzsche says there's one particular problem which is that the person of resentment needs somebody to stand over their lives and make a correction but it's not even clear to Nature who that person should be it's not clear to me who it should be um Anita ends up talking about the person maybe being a secular priest is the term he uses quite an interesting term but he says that somebody must stand over the over the life of the person of resentment and say to them at some point you are right you have reason to be resentful there is somebody who has ruined your life there is somebody who has held you back the person is you now that is probably the least Pleasant thing to hear and probably one of the hardest things to ever say how can a politician should a politician say to certain people you know you have screwed up your life and it's been your responsibility and your fault you could turn it around but if you don't want to you'll still be the only person to blame I think here's how I would say it it is still in your power to turn it around but that is your choice to make I think hardship is not a choice victimhood is a choice yes and the best a politician can do certainly a president can do is at least to create the conditions in a country where we don't create the incentives for people to choose victimhood and so what I what I if I'm speaking as a as a national leader here would I point to the person and say it is your fault I would say it the other way I think it is our fault for creating a culture including the economic incentives that backstop it for you to make the choice that you are making today to be a victim rather than to be a Victor okay now we will do our part and fix that on the expectation that you will then do yours and I think that is the that is the kernel thank you for a national Revival in this country I think it makes the difference it would that that single trade will make the difference of whether we are Rome or more likely look at how long we've been alive as a country more likely whether we are Carthage or whether we're just a little young going through our version of adolescence adolescence is a period where even absent those government incentives there's a there's something about adolescence that makes you want to see yourself as a victim of your parents of your conditions of your high school peers right there's something about this is woven into nature too it's not just a governmental citizenry relationship it's something within each of us well we're going through that version of adolescence as a nation right now and I think in the good version of this where we have leaders that are willing to change that incentive structure and To Boldly look their citizenry in the eye and speak that hard truth back to them set the expectation of what we expect of citizens the idea of being a citizen entailing a duty part of that duty is to look within not to blame the other but ask about what I can do myself well if we're able to do that then I think as a nation itself we will too get through our version of adolescence and be stronger on the other side of it as there were many Rises and many Falls of Rome actually that's one of the secrets of history there was no one rise in fall of Rome there were many rises in many Falls I think we may still be ahead of the next rise in the American experiment I I truly believe that I think it depends on the leaders who we have who are willing to speak that hard truth um I'm so glad that you said that about Adolescence in America it comes much better from your mouth and from mine I I was brought up to believe as Jessica mitford once said we weren't taught much about American history in Britain what we were taught was that basically the Americans had done something unspeakable in the 18th century and we preferred not to talk about it [Laughter] very embarrassing for them um but let me let me just two points that we should hit on before we wrap up the first let me bring us onto a sort of metaphysical point before before we bring us on to a more practical one metaphysical point is this you mentioned the issue of of free speech a couple of times it seems to me that the the great problem uh that exists in that regard in America is that we've lost we've lost confidence in the idea that Free Speech leads to truth because we've lost the idea of Truth we've lost the idea that this the this this battle of ideas this this this knocking of stone on Flint refines things that you get to the point it seems as though we're actually trying to avoid the point as though I mean look at all the words that the modern Academy has used problematize an extraordinarily ugly word and we have problematized a lot of things fantastic have you answered anything not yet um we have we have created problems that didn't exist 20 years ago under endlessly again to fiddle with them but the idea that that we need speech we need inquiry because we will get to a truth and that truth exists seems to be one of the underlying things that has fallen away I agree with you you're right over the flame with truth actually in the rejection of Truth now I think this puts pressure helpfully on the partisan political framework through which we're taught to see the actual divides in this country because where you began Douglas in your remarks you know when you were speaking was actually on the idea that the left and the right differ on how to achieve a world in which those who are endowed with whatever their talent is are permitted to achieve it and I think that there's a lot of Truth to that but there's also a strain in this country that rejects that as an objective in its own right that doesn't disagree about the means but disagrees about the end itself and so I it's actually though I run for president as a Republican it's the least important part of it is that label I think that it puts pressure on us to revise to update the actual political divide in our country which is not between Republicans and Democrats these labels have come out to mean hollowed out husks of themselves on the left there's the Divide you just talked about on the right there's an increasing strain of victimhood itself right it's a victimhood culture that's spread in many different directions let's let's let's for a moment dissolve that distinction and see this through a different lens itself of yeah the way I'll describe it simply is are you pro-american or anti-American but what does that mean it means are you Pro truth do you believe in the existence of an objective truth and then we can disagree about the details of how we get there but do we agree on that basic end or do we not and I think that there there's a good 20 25 of this country that does not but at least we can then see that with Clarity and smoke that out rather than talking about Republicans and Democrats do you then believe in Merit or do you not and you know the optimistic note with which I'll end that is I think that's not a 50 50 divide in this country that's something like a 75 25 maybe 80 20 divide which means that if in the conservative Movement we make the say the next election in 2024 like Reagan in some ways did in 1980 about that underlying actual reality could be a landslide election and probably the most unifying thing we could deliver to a country that's in bad need of it but that's I think the prism we have to take off the goggles of partisan politics to actually see that reality that's the real fissure at the heart of the American politic not some sort of artificial retrofitted partisan distinction the clock is running down but let's finish on an easy question what should we be doing with our lives [Laughter] okay all right I was waiting so so look I think that I'll end it in I'll end it in equally lighthearted tone but when I wake up to a country right now especially my generation especially younger I feel like we're like bats we're like blind bats lost in a cave lost in some Abyss we always have been in some ways but we send out a signal how does a bat figure out where it is in that cave it doesn't see it with its own eyes sends out sonar echolocation and it bounces off something that is true okay the fact that I'm a citizen of a Nation the fact that I am a member of this family with two parents who brought me into this world the fact that I believe in this true God the fact that I worked hard and created something true in the world we send out these signals Faith patriotism hard work family and then it bounces back and it says okay I derive my identity from these things this is where I am I'm not lost this is my location and I think today the moment we live in is one where we send out those signals but then nothing comes back faith is gone patriotism is gone hard work has basically disappeared the idea family has receded and so then we're lost in that abyss and so I think what what do we do for rediscovering that purpose of life I think we have to recreate those Pillars of Truth that when we send out those signals desperately as we do that something actually does come back and teach us who we really are so that we're not lost in the desert and I'll close with this version of it I'm not you know I'm not a Biblical scholar or anything but you know the book of Exodus when the Israelites are lost in the desert it is when they are lost and cannot see where they are in that desert that they then say let me go back and be ruled by that Pharaoh that we escaped and I think that we can complain about big government all we want the question is actually take that look in the mirror and ask ourselves what is it that makes us want to bend that knee it is the fact that we are lost and the task ahead is can we find ourselves in that desert I think we can yes King Charles is still willing and eager he's open for business to accept if you if you do decide to bend the knee uh um let me uh finish apart from saying thank you to Rebecca by making one very quick reflection of my own on this it seems to me that we we've among other things fallen into a listlessness because we've given ourselves a task that is impossible and told us it is the purpose um we've told ourselves that endless diversity inclusion Equity that every Everything ending up the same is the purpose and it's impossible is be invited to play a game that cannot be won uh in this life and so I submit in that case you don't play the game but um but but it's it's it's a powerful invitation which is being put out there to young people because it gives them purpose and much more let me finish this you made a Biblical reference let me make a quasi-religious one um one of the things I hear very often I've just finished speaking at various universities in the South and one of the things I hear very often is is the the conditions are not optimal at the moment um and you can argue that for instance there's no reason why somebody should be a capitalist if they cannot accrue Capital it's extremely hard to get onto the housing ladder much more many people have large amounts of student debt Etc et cetera Etc my point has repeatedly been to say to students and others to Young Americans but the conditions never were optimal um one of my favorite sermons was given by C.S Lewis in October 1939 the University Church in Oxford and C.S Lewis said there he said um he said the conditions we find ourselves in are certainly not optimal and some British understatement for you um he said they're certainly not optimal but he said the search the search for truth and Beauty must persist in any case he says if if human beings have put off the search for these things until the conditions were right the search would never have begun and as he says and maybe I'll close on this as he says in that sermon he says the ants have found their own arrangements and presumably have their own pleasure from it they've decided to accrue some food and and a colony and he says he says but we human beings are different we he gives the most beautiful list he says we we discuss mathematical theorems in beleaguered cells we discuss the latest poem whilst marching on the walls of Quebec we make jokes on scaffolds and comb our hair at the gates of Thermopylae this is not panash it's our nature I'd love it if more Young Americans realize that but in any case it's been a great pleasure good luck I'm rooting for you and I'm still going to hold you to that promise thank you thank you to everyone [Applause]

Channel: National Review

Views: 243,017

Keywords: douglas murray, vivek ramaswamy, college campus protest, conservative, news, politics, national review institute, douglas murray national review, douglas murray speech, vivek ramaswamy meritocracy, douglas murray interview

Id: giiy2SaQb1w

Length: 24min 24sec (1464 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 26 2023