Sociology Insanity

[Travis Retriever]

As promised, I shall post the fail of my Soc professor as well.
Same format as the Economic Insanity thread.

Again, starting with this fun bit:

"I've had this on my mind for at least half a year now.
I've been meaning to share this with Shane and the rest of the board for that time.
The idea is that we need the State to handle mental patients and the like was given to me by my Psychology professor.

The story went something like this: something odd about U.S. culture is our attitude towards the mentally disabled.
During the 1800s (or some early time like that), we would send them to a rural area around the south and forget about them.  As time went on the place would fill up.

To illustrate what happened next:
He got us to picture a guy wanting to make a profit who paid to have huge institution (building) built on land (I assume this happened around the 1920s to 1940s: he didn't give us an exact date), to where families could send their disabled/mentally retarded children/family members to.  They would "send them there and forget about them."  The idea was that having a child like that was a sign of bad parenting, so getting rid of them was the best thing they could do (according to the family's perspective).  Because these Institutions (as they were called) were not accountable to anyone, they kept making them more and more cramped until the point where each person would be literally chained to the walls a few feet from the other.  The guy who had the place built would have a check sent to him every month or so, sent to him by the people who sent their 'retarded' or 'mental' or whatever family member to stay there.  The guy running the place (whom my prof dubbed, "Bubba") would have no qualms with torturing and hurting and even sexually abusing the people inside.  There was often screaming around those places, and (during the 50s) parents would often tell there kids that, "if you don't behave, you'll end up there, with the crazy people."


He also described instances of corruption that led to people getting in that place that were not "mental" to begin with.  An example to  Ex.  A man and rich woman are to be wed.  The man has another woman whom he loves.  So he marries the rich women, but later bribes a doctor into diagnosing her as "insane" or something, and a judge to put her in one of those institutions (or something like that).  So he then divorces her, takes half (or all) of her money, and elopes with the woman he actually loves.

Later on, the laws were changed; only people who were, "A danger to themselves or to others" could be put into one of those places.
Because many of the people were mentally broken, they became the homeless people who live in many of our cities to this very day.

Now the guy who had the place built in Florida, because of the massive decrease in people able to be there no longer wants to run the place.  So the State had to buy it from him for a HUGE sum of money, and now runs it to this day...

I bring this up to you, because I would imagine you, Shane, would have looked into this kind of stuff, especially having a special needs child of your own.  What's your take on this?
I already know his point about the judge and doctor just screams corporatism.  As with Slavery, you probably know the full story here.
I'd like to hear it from you." (Because this is a description of what he did as well as words, I will not put this in red, or put it as "Prof:  " Like I usually do.)

Something I would like to clarify.
In an AIM session, Lord T Hawkeye noted ambiguity on this bit above: "The guy who had the place built would have a check sent to him every month or so."
I clarified it above.  It was the people who sent the mental patient there who would pay the fee.
Now here's something Lord T Hawkeye found that made me swoon: The 5 Ballsiest Acts of Undercover Journalism Ever By Cornelius Appin.  Read #5, the entry for Nellie Bly.  Really, what more needs to be said?
It was private journalists, not the state who found out about this crime against humanity, it seems.
Furthermore, assuming what my professor said was true, doesn't it seem a bit fucktarded that the state would REWARD those people for committing such heinous crimes?  That's an epic court system/Justice fail right there.
"Rule one of leadership: everything is your fault." -- a saying that really cements my sentiments on the above.

Now, the prof might argue that,

Prof:  "If something, a scientific observation, a statement, etc doesn't have controls, it is unreliable and invalid. [a statement that, in and of itself is true.  I put it here not for the fail, but for other stuff he says that don't jive with this bit.]"
(...about the above Cracked article, However, his above statements about what happened to mental patients have just as much credibility as Cracked:  he didn't provide a single source, much less a control.  Hell, at least the folks at Cracked provide sources on occasion, even if it's just Wikipedia.  It's still more than what I got from my professor..)

[Travis Retriever]

Prof:  "A basic assumption of science is that every effect has a cause."
Me:  "What about in Quantum mechanics?  Where things are probabilistic and non-deterministic?"
Prof: "I don't care.  Every cause has an effect, no matter what planet you are on."
(*Facepalms* What a douchebag.  Sorry, bud, but repeating the bogosity doesn't make it true...)

[Travis Retriever]

(From the To Catch a Predator thread):

In Sociology today, we went over taboos (what they are, some examples, etc).
I brought up murder for an example of a taboo in this society.
My prof's response?  To say that, "murder is the taking of a life, so if I defend myself against a mugger who might kill me, by killing him first, that's technically murder."
I went on about how I defined it differently, as an initiation of force that takes one's life.
His response was fucking priceless..."So those guys going over there in Afghanistan killing people by initiating force are murderers?"
I said "maybe" but mostly because of the shock he would ask such an unexpected question, and because it took me a while to figure out he meant the soldiers we sent there.
When I meant, "YES!"
So it seems that people--or at least my professor--knows that war IS murder and he does acknowledge that soldiers ARE murderers.  He admits it, that's the repulsive part.  Yet he just shrugs it off, as OK.  Because, I dunno, 'they're sacrificing for us' or some other idiotic bullshit.  But you want to know what he did call taboo?

But, the example he went on about?
'Child molestation.'  That is, a person over 18 having sex with someone less than 18 years old.  The age of the child in his example?  14--that is, sexually mature teen who no-one except people from the uber 'moralistic' 20th century would have a problem with.  He even went on about how, "I would never be convinced sex from an adult to a 14 year old is acceptable behavior" himself..."Nothing will ever convince me"  Spoken like a true dogmatist.
I mean, sure, even if it's sex with a pre-pubescent against his/her will (which IS wrong via the NAP), there are worse things...
Even if what he said is descriptive towards society's attitudes, it only makes it worse.  I mean, how on EARTH could this society (The USA) honestly think that things involving sex are worse than fucking murder?
I mean...wtf???


According to my Sociology Prof, sociology operates based on what groups people associate with (race, religion, voluntary association, etc).
So basically, it's a 'science' that uses the same grouping/research methodology of Marxism/Socialism.
Yeah...Forgive me for now being skeptical of that entire field now...

[MrBogosity]

Prof:  "A basic assumption of science is that every effect has a cause."
Me:  "What about in Quantum mechanics?  Where things are probabilistic and non-deterministic?"
Prof: "I don't care.  Every cause has an effect, no matter what planet you are on."
(*Facepalms* What a douchebag.  Sorry, bud, but repeating the bogosity doesn't make it true...)

Ask him what causes radioactive decay. Ask him what causes the Casimir Effect. Ask him what causes quantum tunneling. And you might also want to ask him why physicists such as Stephen Hawking disagree with him.

[Travis Retriever]

Thanks for the input Shane.


Here's a few more I've been meaning to post.  These ones aren't as...terrible, as some of the last ones to make up for the last ones.

Prof:  "There are two main theories as to why people behave the way they do.  The common answer is the nature/nurture argument.
If nature, you believe that my behavior , the way I react, everything about me is determined by my genetic makeup.  If you are a nurture person, you believe that all of these things are controlled by my environment.
So about [omitted] county:  why the increase in homosexuality?"
(Though last time I checked, there's more to the nature/nurture thing than what he provided to us here.
For example, something about the two not being mutually exclusive.)

Prof:  "[His answer to the question above]:  N.E.C.  Not Enough Controls.  Because you can't set enough controls to know what causes homosexuality, the final conclusion will always be NULL as opposed to TRUE."
(Eh, I'm not entirely convinced of that, given he didn't explain anymore, but merely stated it.
Also, maybe he could explain how all the research done on the topic disagrees with his bald assertions...)

Prof:  "No, you cannot be anything you want.  If you have lung issues, you can't be an astronaut, for example.  That stuff about 'all people being born equal'.  It's total nonsense." (Paraphrased)
(Well, it seems like it's yet another person who doesn't understand what was meant by that.  FlowCell cleared it up pretty well.  It just means that no man has a legitimate claim over the life, liberty or property of another man without his voluntary consent.  And that all people are born equal for the same reason all people are born atheists:  We are all born without knowledge <--A fact even he acknowledges.
Oddly enough, in near the same breath, he even acknowledged that we have free choice (free will), yet still seems to think of things as deterministic.  I doubt he's aware of the contradiction and conflicting nature of his assertions there...)

[Travis Retriever]

Here's an old one that I've GOT to share:

Prof:  "Theories are not facts.  When something is proven, it is no longer a theory, it becomes a scientific fact." (paraphrased)
(Did I just hear Charles Darwin roll over in his grave just now?)

[Travis Retriever]

I also kept thinking about how my soc professor would probably reject Austrian Economics on the ground that "they don't set controls, ergo it is invalid" despite:
1.  The fact that most, if not all of the controlled scientific research on economics supports the school.
2.  It is the ONLY school making any reliable predictions period!  How many schools predicted the Great Depression?  Or the current crisis?  Or the post WWII boom?
3.  He doesn't understand the method they do use, which is like Stef's method of philosophy:  the use of self detonating arguments, much like Stef's proof of property rights, the only way to argue against them is to confirm them.