Most of the bad ideas and theories that currently hold sway in America originated in our academia.  University professors use their position to indoctrinate their students with ideas that are untested and often just plain wrong.  They have now succeeded in creating an army of graduates willing to implement these ideas, especially because many find jobs in government.  These theories are now getting a real-world test on real people, and the experiment is turning out exactly as might be expected.

The progressive Democrats are using a slim majority in Congress and a barely elected president to begin an experimental transformation, affecting almost every area of government.  The professor class has become the ruling class.  Professors are highly educated in their specific fields, but outside STEM, few are highly educated in things that work.

Universities promote Marxist theories that Americans managed, for the most part, to ignore.  However, there's one form of Marxism spreading outside of the university.  Secondary schools and even businesses are embracing Critical Race Theory or CRT.  CRT is the racial adaptation of Marxist Critical Theory based on wealth or class.  That is, this new American Marxism is built around race.

This racism is said to be part of the system and can be eliminated only by tearing down the system and rebuilding it.  Critical Theories based on class have been tested repeatedly and found to fail.  This Critical Theory experiment using race just might work to tear down the American system and rebuild it.  No one really knows, as it is an experimental work in progress.

Our government is experimenting with our financial future through Modern Monetary Theory or MMT, another academic theory.  MMT is a radical departure from traditional economics about government spending.  Central to MMT is the theory that government can print money without ever paying down debt.  Traditional economics says uncontrolled government spending will lead to inflation and possibly hyperinflation — and that's what's happening with the past 18-month-long experiment in MMT.  Our current leaders seem surprised that damaging inflation is exactly what is happening.  At least, that is the theory.

Image: Harvard Yard (edited in befunky).  Public domain.

Unproven (and, indeed, invariably wrong) theories about climate change are being used to control our lives and commerce.  The theory is simple: burning fossil fuels increases the amount of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere.  This is certainly true.  What is unknown is whether this constitutes a cataclysmic problem for future generations.  Theories are developed to predict future changes, and then mathematical models are constructed to "prove" the theory.  No one may question the theory or discuss proof that it may be wrong.

Climate change theories are used to regulate much of our society, including energy production, manufacturing, sustainability, and population.  It is truly the one-size-fits-all theory.  The minute details in the regulations and laws implemented to counteract theoretical damage affect every one of us.

However, the models are stubbornly consistent in their inaccuracy.  Not only do they fail accurately to predict the future, but they also fail to predict the past.  A visible result of the policies to address this theory is the rapid increase in the price of energy including gasoline and heating oil.  The long-term results of this vast experiment are still unknown.

A British academic incorrectly theorized that COVID would quickly kill millions in the USA.  The policies implemented as a result of this theory shut down vast portions of our economy and led to the deaths of thousands of elderly Americans in nursing homes.  Some states are still implementing partial restrictions and shutdowns in hit-or-miss experiments in controlling what might be uncontrollable.  These life-and-death control experiments use real people, and the final results are not yet in.

Criminal justice theory is used to justify releasing violent criminals and to decriminalize theft.  It seems clear that this policy, when applied to Darrell Brooks, contributed to the deaths of six people at the recent Waukesha Christmas Parade and mob thefts in California.  After George Floyd's death, theories about community policing have been developed and promoted that would defund police.  It is unknown if these experiments will have the desired outcomes.

Every day, we are subjected to experimental policies that originate in faculty lounges and ooze out into our society through the graduates who have filled the ranks of federal, state, and local governments and regulatory agencies.

Most of these are untested and unproven.  We are living in a connected and unending series of massive university research projects for which the results remain unknown.  We are the subject of these experiments.  It is an academic "hold my beer and watch this" stunt being done to us.

With a whole lot of luck and the grace of God, we might put this stuff back where it belongs, discussed as how not to do things and certainly never to be implemented again.  We first need to survive.  Then we need to build permanent reminders to never do this again.  Maybe a later generation will not tear them down.

Update from Andrea Widburg: This video, from the mid-1980s, seems to sum up the disconnect between academia and the real world:

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