The credentialism that permeates discussion in Bolshevik adjacent circles annoys me deeply.<p>Famous political authors that sold a lot of books don't bring any more credentials to an idea than if I said something in a 4chan post. Argue with the ideas you got from the author, don't keep using them like a religious figure!<p>So many comments here are just quoting things without pondering if it's bullshit. Sometimes it is!<p>For irony and fun here's a quote from PhD dropout Natalie Wynn:<p>There’s also a certain amount of genuine leftist bullshit passing itself off as scholarship. I was once in a comparative literature seminar that I foolishly took in the hopes of getting to read something written with a decent prose style, or at least something by an emotionally competent human being. Boy was I disappointed when on the first day the professor made two allusions to “my good friend Derrida.” Those are quotation marks around “my good friend” because he mentioned that Derrida was his friend every time it came up. Pass the cyanide, honey.<p>Anyway, the low point of this guy’s endless, beginningless, argument-free impromptu lectures came when he baldly asserted that the poetry of Milton had a direct influence on the workings of ISIS. Yes, this would be John Milton, the 17th century English poet, and ISIS, the contemporary Syrian terrorist organization. And what evidence did the professor adduce in support of this outrageous claim? None whatso-fucking-ever. And the other grad students in the room just sat there nodding knowingly, taking notes like a bunch of sycophants. No one raised their hand, no one said, “Excuse me professor, but what in Jesus’ name are you fucking talking about?” I didn’t even say anything. I had no spine!<p>The only explanation I can think of for this was that the professor had this reflexive hatred of himself, of English literature, of basically all of Western culture, and so he had to hallucinate that Islamic terrorism is in some way the outcome of over-zealously reading Paradise Lost.<p>I guess this is what being good friends with Derrida does to you.