Disrespect & Social Decline

C. S. Lewis said: “Education without values, as useful as it is, seems rather to make man a more clever devil.”

This quote is vindicated all the time! It’s something I think law students in particular struggle with because law school doesn’t teach what is “right”, only what is “legal”. Sudents are taught to make legal arguments, not ethical arguments.

But I think the problem is getting worse, i.e. not only are students being deprived of values education, they don’t seem to be getting an education at all! Indeed, some recent students exposed their incredible ignorance by not even knowing what a question is and is not. A handful of leftist hacks attempted to heckle Justice Antonin Scalia this week during a speech he gave at the American Enterprise Institute. You can watch and hear the speech and the absolute lack of self-respect these people have by going here.

One punk, Aaron Yule, exposes his ignorance and lack of tact starting at 30:35 (for those of you who don’t have the time or interest in listening to the whole speech). Then at 38:10, more irrelevant attacks began to really annoy Justice Scalia. At 38:28, you can even hear a sorry attempt at a joke about V.P. Cheney and his recent hunting accident (again, totally irrelevant to a speech about use of foreign law in U.S. Federal Courts). At 39:40, more irrelevant attacks are made. Then, finally at 43:00, Aaron Yule is escorted out of the conference because of his total inability to keep his yapper shut. The whole thing is actually quite disheartening!

So, while education without values makes man a clever devil, now attending school seems only to make students ignorant devils. It is a symptom of our current social decline.