There was a time when to be educated was something sacred. When to quote poetry, to ponder philosophy, to discuss art history over coffee wasn’t pretentious — it was aspirational.
But that time has passed.
We now live in an age where ignorance is a performance, and it’s rewarded. Online, stupidity gets engagement. In politics, it gets votes. In culture, it gets applause.
The Death of Depth
Today’s conversations aren’t driven by truth, complexity, or thoughtfulness — they’re driven by clicks and algorithms.
Long-form thinking has given way to 15-second videos, academic rigor replaced by viral outrage. And we celebrate this shift as if it’s progress.
An MFA today isn’t a badge of honor — it’s often treated like a joke.
Why read Yeats when you can scroll TikTok? Why study history when you can just Google a meme?
As someone who pursued graduate studies in the arts not to make money, but to become a better thinker and human being, this cultural nosedive is painful to watch.
Education Is No Longer About Becoming Educated
Today’s education system is transactional. You get a degree to get a job.
The deeper, classical idea — of education as a moral and intellectual awakening — is gone.
Ask a teenager today what they want to be, and if they answer “a poet” or “a philosopher,” they’ll be met with laughter or concern.
Because in a hyper-capitalist culture, usefulness is the only virtue. If it doesn’t make money, it doesn’t matter.
But must everything be monetized to have value?
The Cultural Shift to Anti-Thought
You’ve probably seen it — crowds twerking in the street, videos celebrating ignorance, movements driven more by emotion than analysis.
There’s a rejection of standards, of nuance, of art for art’s sake.
And before you accuse me of elitism — this is not about taste.
It’s about the loss of curiosity. The decline of reflection. The abandonment of the intellectual life.
Romanticism in a Mindless Age
I’ve always seen the world through the lens of mortality, empathy, and beauty. As a child, I was obsessed with death — not out of fear, but wonder. I devoured poetry, longed for the sublime, and mourned even the pain of strangers.
Today’s world doesn’t understand that kind of sensitivity. It mocks it.
But I believe we need more Romantics, not fewer.
Morrissey once sang:
“It takes strength to be gentle and kind.”
Strength, indeed. Especially now.
Why Western Civilization Still Matters
The canon of Western art, philosophy, and literature is not above critique — but it is the foundation of much of what we call the humanities.
To discard it entirely is to unmoor ourselves from context, from history, from depth.
We are not more advanced than our ancestors. We are simply louder, faster, and shallower.
Look around — does this feel like progress?
A Terrible Beauty Reversed
W.B. Yeats wrote in Easter 1916 of a “terrible beauty” being born.
He was referring to transformation, to revolution, to passion erupting into the world.
Today, something else is being born — or maybe something is dying.
The arts are no longer sacred. The intellect is no longer admired.
We are surrounded by noise, but starved for wisdom.
And unless we course-correct, the celebration of stupidity may become the only tradition we have left.
Final Thought
This post isn’t a cry of superiority. It’s a plea.
For dialogue. For curiosity. For remembering that being smart, thoughtful, and open-hearted isn’t something to be mocked — it’s something to be honored.
Because a culture that rewards stupidity will eventually forget how to be anything else.