Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
This morning I opened the Jerusalem Post and found these two articles next to each other:
Hamas PM: Only Armed Resistance Will Liberate Palestine
and
Israeli Leftists Demonstrate for PA Statehood in Tel Aviv
Those leftists can't have all been unconscious when the PA returned to the Hamas fold last spring. They appear, then, to be choosing not to acknowledge it. How can they possibly justify that choice, considering the likely consequences of the reconciliation not only for Israelis but for Palestinians? What is going on here?
In the United States, life in the academy can be so effectively insulated from reality that it becomes possible to bury oneself up to one's eyebrows in philosophies that contravene all evidence, history, and common sense. Here in Israel, though, it's much harder to cut oneself off from reality to the extent generally necessary to wholeheartedly embrace the philosophies of the left.
Nevertheless, academics here are as susceptible as they are anywhere else to the temptation to deny reality, even when it's literally screaming in their faces. Why is that? And the same seems to go for artists. Several of my favorite Israeli actors -- world-class artists whose work I will go well out of my way to see for the sheer, awe-inspiring gratification of being witness to their talent -- are proud, vocal, hard-core, die-hard leftists.
I don't intend by any means to tar the entire academic and artistic communities of Israel with the same brush here. The word "dozens" in the first sentence of the second piece speaks rather poignantly to the sorry state of the Israeli left. But here, as much as anywhere else, the perception exists that an academic or artist who bucks the leftist trend is somehow anomalous, if not downright bent.
There are no doubt plenty of Israeli academics and artists who are right or center-right, but they certainly don't make a public show of it. In the case of academics, that might speak to a fear of providing ammunition to the blithering mouth-breathers abroad clamoring for academic boycotts of Israel and Israelis. And who knows -- maybe right-wing Israeli artists are also afraid of inviting hostile and even violent responses when they perform abroad. But it does appear that among these two communities in Israel, there's something shamefaced about being an out-and-proud right-winger. A no-questions-asked embrace of the left offers a luxuriously comforting, pillowy embrace of collective self-righteousness, and that's got to be tempting.
Maybe that's all there is to it. When reality is painful, there's a certain self-protective logic to a flat denial of it -- especially when most of your colleagues are denying it too, and are enjoying the perks of the moral high ground. Or let's think positive: maybe academics and artists try harder than the rest of us to see the other as individuals and not collectives, and enough of them have personal experience with individual members of the other that they can't help but extrapolate good intentions to whole communities. Maybe scholarly and artistic pursuits are believed by their practitioners to transcend cultural boundaries (although in the case of Israeli academics, they are regularly barred from enjoying reciprocal consideration from their colleagues abroad, a point I don't remember ever seeing addressed directly by an Israeli leftist).
Maybe it's just good old-fashioned peer pressure. I'm stumped. What do you think?
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May '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
If you really want to know the answer to this question I strongly suggest Ludwig von Mises' The Anti-Capitalistic Mentality.
Feb '11
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
Nobel Laureate Professor Aumann has no problem with saying what he thinks. perhaps because he can demonstrate his points, rather than talking about "beliefs."
On the other hand, the standard left-media won't quote him, so what he thinks doesn't matter to those dependent on such sources.
Oct '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
Perhaps because the academy and the artocracy (obviously words fail me) are self-selecting and self-perpetuating. Matters are not arranged such that you become an academic or an artist and then become part of the academic or artistic communities - rather it is the pre-existing communities that declare that you are an artist or an academic. And they choose people who think and act like them.
Quite apart from the ideological lock-step of the art world (indicative of how little they truly care about things, rather than how deeply), look at what passes for important visual art these days. Only because the faculties of the art colleges and the curatorships of the museums and the approbation of the critics (for one another) are self-perpetuating and self-reinforcing does there appear a consensus - and, once again, a consensus completely divorced from the real world. If you really want to fill a museum, you have to put on an exhibition of stuff by long-dead white guys, ancient civilizations, or fashion designers.
Which points to the final piece of the puzzle - the academy and the artocracy are insulated from the market by government largess and bequests. QED.
Jun '11
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
The people you describe tend to fall into one of two categories: 1. The reflexive leftist. These are the artists and academics who espouse leftist beliefs because it is fashionable in their world to do so. Their opinions are as shallow and ill-thought-out as your average MTV watcher when it comes to matters in the political realm. I have known, for example, professors of music and art who were deeply learned and utterly engaging when discussing Bach and Botticelli, but who literally had the reasoning power of five year olds when the subject turned to politics. They reflexively adopt leftist views because that is what they believe learned people should do, not because they have done any deep thinking on these particular subjects. 2. The religious leftist. These are the people who have abandoned traditional religion and find succor in their leftist ideology in the same way other people find it in their religious faith. Their Credo is the perfectibility of society (if only evil, rich corporatists would pay their fair share to fund the government programs needed to achieve such perfection!). Come to think of it, I guess these two categories are not mutually exclusive.
Jul '11
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
Artists and academics hold their positions only after years of being stroked by their respective establishments. They've been told they're brighter than everyone else and, by inference, better than everyone else. So they adopt a mentality that sees themselves on a higher plane: they can see how things should work, but the masses, being stupid, are incapable of doing so.
The only political philosophy that accommodates this world-view is that of the Left - that which sees power wielded by a small (and needless to say, smart) vanguard as the only means to the betterment of mankind. The appeal of the naked power grab espoused by the fascist Right would be of little appeal, but the dreams of utopia promulgated by the Left are very seductive. It goes without saying that the absolute mess and chaos that would result from limited government is unappealing on several several levels so it's often just dismissed out of hand, even if all the evidence points to its practical success. Such "success" is dismissed as being of a shallow, materialistic nature, not the metaphysical elevation of mankind to a more perfect being.
May '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
I come from an apolitical family and when I first encountered committed leftists in college I was impressed. Then I came to realize they were different from me. They seemed to be motivated by some internal resentment, not political philosophy. I now feel the leftism is self-hatred turned outward.
Mar '11
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
It is easier to understand how the academians and artistes can behave like they do in this country -- there are no rockets coming down on their heads. Why anyone would buy into the "live together in peace, based on the ’67 borders and mutual agreement" drivel who would actually plan on living there is beyond me.
" 'It hurts to see a president like Obama, who caused us to feel such great hope, dismiss Abu Mazen [Abbas], who has spent three years working on the diplomatic track,' [former Israeli Ambassador Alon] Liel said. 'Obama and the US are no longer running the world today; there is a larger international community that can run the world.' "
Call me a crazy reactionary goi, Al, but I don't think that the larger international community has your best interests at heart. I'll go further - I don't believe that their plans for the region include your staying above room temperature.
Aug '11
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
As far as the artists are concerned, I think its just the lefties who are more vocal, because they wear it on their sleeve like a badge of honor. Most of the more practical people just shut up and don't make fools of themselves.
In academia, its a matter of the type of Academics that make a noise are involved more in the humanities, and there its just much safer to be left wing, and its like a self feeding monster thats just grows and grows. I'm sure engineers, bio-chemists, nuclear physicists, etc. etc. are as equally on the left as on the right.
Jun '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
Do you think it might have something to do with education/experience in the broader sense? Often times I see a very talented actors/musicians on the screen or stage but when they are interviewed on a talk show they don’t seem to be that intelligent. Lacking in formal education, they seem to adhere to what they perceive as pop culture’s interest. Academics? I think they lack experience in the real world—they seem to only relate to what life “should be” rather than what life “is”.
Nov '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
I have come to see leftist solipsism as a form of grandiosity, that gives one a comforting, albeit delusional sense of control over a chaotic world. The belief that one's own culture/polity is responsible for the evil that others do means that self-reform is all that is needed. It saves one from the far more difficult work of finding practical ways to cope with reality. It is akin to the sad strategy of the child of an alcoholic who struggles to be perfect in order to correct parental misbehavior. If daddy drinks because I'm bad, then if I change, order will return. It is a species of magical thinking. For (notably, American) leftists, to attribute any responsibility for the perennial troubles of the Middle East to the intractable pathologies of Muslim societies that we are powerless to change is literally unthinkable. Rather, support for Israel is our Original Sin, expiation for which is a simple matter. A similar grandiosity characterizes the thinking of global warming alarmists, whose delusional ambition to control nature serves to medicate their own spiritual chaos, and is impervious to argument.
Edited on Oct 3, 2011 at 4:57amNov '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
In the fine arts, it's pretty simple (I could write acres on this, but I have a model coming in & have to go clean the studio...maybe later). But in brief, conservatives - when they buy art at all - tend to go for safe, unchallenging, traditional work. Bright young potential artists tend to find that intellectually stultifying, and either gravitate to the left, or move into other fields.
Nov '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
Also: artists are all still mostly in thrall to the ego-gratifying Romantic ideal of the artist as lone genius. No humbling thought can penetrate it. The same notion also helps to explain why so much modern art is so bad. Academics have long been similarly idealized. And the little cadres that run university departments are intellectually incestuous, reluctant to admit anyone from outside the clan. And what person of integrity, anyway, would want to work in such a snake pit? I knew Party members in the PRC who had more intellectual honesty than the parlor Marxists that infest the faculty lounges of American universities.
Nov '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
You might want to read a biography of Michelangelo; the idea certainly predates Romanticism. And the fact that, yes, an artist has to spend a lot of time alone, is not an ideal, it's just the way things work. The mythology helps one survive it ( there's similar ideas in other highly individualistic fields as well).
May '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
You folks make things way too complicated.
The academic is a theorist whose ideas can never be disproved. The artist gets praised, not for portraying realism but by bending it. The writer, the actor, the film director are all mini-gods working in worlds of their own creation like children playing with dolls.
Oct '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
For a wonderful exploration of Beauty and it's abandonment by the art world, see conservative philosopher Roger Scruton's Why Beauty Matters (here on YouTube before the BBC takes it down again). Never again will you be at a loss when someone tries to use 'safe' and 'unchallenging' as criticisms of a work, for example.
May '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
I'd say, this is closest to the truth in my experience. However, it's not impossible for a conservative to work their way up in academia, granted that they don't outright draw the attention of the wrong people. That said, at least in the humanities, grad school is psychologically very draining given the rigors of research, academic politics & bureaucracy, low pay over a long period of time, and putting up with stultifying students, even when an individual is appropriately aligned ideologically. Feeling a permanent sense of alienation as a conservative just makes surviving the process that much more burdensome.
Aug '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
The musician and the actor are primarily paid to make the audience feel something. In the performing arts, emotions almost always trump intellect. "I feel, therefore I am." Nothing wrong with that, so long as once the lights come up the audience sees it for what it is.
The problem comes when we ascribe to musicians and actors insight or authority in the fields of politics, business, and world affairs - just because they can act well, sing pretty, or write a catchy tune. Don't give us that power.
Never forget, we are mostly just old teen-agers, still trying desperately to be the cool kids in school cafeteria, in hopes of getting a date with the head cheerleader.
Dec '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
While discussions on one continent were still heated about their ancestors’ crossing of the Bering Strait, on another, the ancient Greeks were wearied by pesky artists and the man to whom we owe the word academy also gave us the words of his teacher condemned to death for corrupting his community’s youth.
Artists and scholars do not work. They play. Tormenting those who toil with calloused hands is less satisfying than criticizing the masters, so artists and scholars entertain by using their tongues for arms against those who live well.
Their refrain “can’t we all just live together” resonates with them because they are first and most persistent in viewing life as an aggression of them against us. They just don’t want to get their hands dirty, so they stay away from the tidy suburbs and go off to live messily amongst themselves in their own world.
When they engage in petty violence against the masters, they are secure in the comfort of knowing that the working world will do them no harm.
Jun '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
Capitalism rewards careful planning and perseverance much more than it rewards highly-specialized academic knowledge or a raw unfocused creativity. The people that can't do careful planning and don't have any perseverance think that's somehow unfair.
Sep '10
Re: Why Do Academics and Artists Lean Left?
Arrogance.