>>7915429
Because anti-intellectualism was the flavour and still is to an extent, people have been shooed away from books due to either having terrible teachers or they've been dumbed down so much through the media that they really can't grasp anything outside of basic YA shit. This is probably why so many people would rather be sitting in front of their arses all day on their computer watching someone else comment on a children's game rather than reading something enlightening.
>>7915442
Also because somehow reading and philosophy have had a negative image in the media, unlike STEM related jobs which are constantly praised and shoved down our throats in nearly every major blockbuster people are easily swayed away from pursuing degrees in literature and philosophy because they aren't really profitable.
This shows why universal literacy was a mistake.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=39UJuPogwiY&feature=g-vrec
>>7915451
Oh god, this. More than anything, the idea of "worthwhile = profitable" is killing culture.
>>7915429
That's hardly universal. My prole-tier grandfather whose highest educational attainment was a GED from the Navy has always read a lot. Not the same stuff I read, but that's not what you asked.
Lots of anxious middle-class people (like a lot of this board) think they have to read certain books to look educated and distinguish themselves from the proles.
Lots of well-educated, high-income people read either to learn about business or to keep their minds active and because they enjoy it.
If you're from the kind of community where nobody reads, I hope there's still time for you to do well in school and get out.
>>7915478
>If you're from the kind of community where nobody reads, I hope there's still time for you to do well in school and get out.
>>7915442
I agree. In my high school our reading assignments were never enjoyable. Annotating and skimming for specific details always seemed like a complete waste of time, and ruined several books for me. Had we been able to read the from the beginning without butchering the entire plot, many more might have gained an interest in reading instead of viewing it as 'work'.
>>7915498
*way too high a number
I'm tired
>>7915474
The problem is that you shouldn't have to go into crippling debt to get a degree. If you have six figure student loan debt and majored in something like Philosophy, I have no pity for you if you can't pay it off because you can't find a decent job.
>>7915474
Exactly. It got worse with the rise of the internet and the whole "Youtuber", crazy where they could make millions from being a retard.
I also want you to do a challenge for me, list three movies and TV shows which glorify literature and STEM jobs. It's going to be a lot harder than you think.
>>7915513
The flagship state universities where I'm from will give you full tuition for a 33 on the ACT and a 3.5 GPA. They will furnish you with tuition, housing, a laptop, a living stipend, a grant for research or travel, and a guaranteed work-study job if you're a National Merit Scholarship finalist or have the aforementioned stats and know how to bargain.
The private university I went to is loan-free up to like $120k household income.
So yeah, people taking out huge loans to get those degrees are dumb, but you hardly "have to".
>>7915514
I don't watch much tv but I'll give it a shot.
Iron man
Breaking bad
Big bang theory
CSI
Numb3rs
Grey's anatomy
The Martian
>>7915451
>you need to get a degree to read philosophy and history and books in general
>blames STEM
>doesn't know that STEM and reading history, philosophy, and books in general is not mutually exclusive
Typical insecure /lit/erati type. I bet you can't even do basic algebra.
>>7915514
ok, youre asking for movies which idolize jobs based on knowledge, whether technical/lit related/etc? rather than jobs which are built around gut/feel/instinct/talent/etc?
>>7915429
Because people have come to realize that "literature" is nothing more than pretentious hollywood scripts and the only books worth their salts are written by philosophers or are called "textbooks" instead. Only pseudo-intellectuals waste their time reading some fucks rant about life with metaphors dumped everywhere to make themselves look smarter than they are. I don't need some middle-aged cunt to tell me life is shit or what politics to choose. I go outside nigger, I read REAL political books nigger, and I can think for myself. If you need some pretentious shit with an elementary understanding of the world to "enlighten" you you're as retarded as the dmbasses you're making fun of. Plain and simple.
>>7915565
>Bobby is upset he doesn't get cookies if he doesn't sit through story time.
>>7915565
Pretty much this. Only neckbeards waste their time reading fictional trash shit like "portraying" a time period through fictional characters and scenarios instead of reading actual accounts from people who lived then.
And if no accounts exist they go out and study it and interpret it for themselves. Not through the eyes of some fuck with an agenda who did a quick skim on Wikipedia.
>>7915565
>I don't like something so no one else should
>>7915565
Only a few books are an exception to this. True classics, like the Illiad and the Aenid.
Otherwise I agree with you.
>>7915611
Did Harris actually say something with this sentiment? I knew his philosophy of religion was retarded but this sounds more anti-intellectual than I imagine him to be.
>>7915611
I don't think those two were serious...
>>7915565
Fucking this.
All reading allows for are morons to squawk out the opinions of actually intelligent people. It's no better than a shitty blockbuster or video game aside from the fact you actually have to find the meaning yourself, which doesn't take much effort most of the time.
>>7915565
Missed quads by 10 posts. Truly a 4chan tragedy.
In all seriousness now, what fascinates me is plotline and story structure mostly. If a piece can completely hit me over the head with originality and not do what I was expecting, then I'll find it enjoyable. It's the same with most Television and movies I watch.
I don't know why /lit/ doesn't read for plot, but I think this is the end result of that.
>>7915645
So then people shouldn't read? Nobody should bother writing anything down because morons will read it?Are you projecting?
>>7915660
I was referring to fiction faggot. Not books that are actually meant to educate you.
>>7915429
Because books are extremely inefficient in terms of delivering information compared to podcasts or Youtube videos.
>>7915429
Because it won't make you money, and isn't race to the bottom enough for either the vidja or reality tv crowds.?
>>7915678
for you
>>7915669
>he believes in facts
ouch, man, i feel for you
>>7915669
>believes fiction can't educate you
Okay buddy
>>7915703
If you need made up tales to teach you things instead of being able to come up with it on your on you should probably stick to cartoons or anime.
>>7915461
I'm honestly hoping that immigration will destroy English literacy to such an extent that having a humanities degree will become valuable again. Someone on /lit/ once pointed out that English literacy is one thing you can't automate or outsource. I think I read a statistic once that said that of the migrants entering Germany, one in twenty spoke "a few words of English" Fluency is not so widespread as people would believe.
And it's not like we're "all going to have to learn Chinese." We're importing so many immigrants from so many different countries that no one group will be able to dominate. The West will become such a Babel that English will remain the only useful lingua franca.
I seriously can't wait to become a literati elite just like in the Middle Ages.
>>7915719
*own
The same reason watching TV, movies, etc. is?
>>7915554
There's nothing incorrect about what he said, though. Science means paving the way for more technological inventions, which can be used in order to make more commodities, which can them be sold to the public, generating profits for various corporations. Society rewards those that contribute to its overall structure, As Marx noted, your very ideologies are based upon the economic system in which you are encased. Hence why more money is given to those working in the sciences. It's also why teachers make so little money, and why so many rules and constrictions are implemented in public education institutes. Having a educated citizens is not needed in a corporate capitalistic system; only obedient consumers are wanted.
>>7915767
There's so much wrong in that paragraph that I'd literally have to quote every sentence separately. Alas, I can't be fucked as I'm in bed and I'm about to go to sleep.
>>7915429
Because you can just watch the movie!
Seriously though, I don't think anyone considers reading a waste of time more-or-less than anything else. People have their priorities and bad habits. Video games, social media, and television seem to make the bulk of these bad habits. They are not inherently bad, but they are generally more entertaining, and require less effort than reading, so it is easier to waste too much time on them. So it can be hard to fit reading in for the average person, therefore, people need a strong motive to do so. This anon >>7915478 touches on a few of them: enjoyment, anxiety, status, education,understanding memes, etc. And as >>7915451 and DFW (>>7915467) point out, there is a certain need for people to be "productive", and outside of reading something that can directly impact your income (e.g. STEM textbooks at university), reading has no real-world value in that sense unless you are an English teacher, or whatever.
>>7915800
>I can't be fucked as I'm in bed
top kek.
98% of humanity never did any considerable intellectual effort throughout history.
What we have today is more professionals who got deluded into thinking that's the equivalent to being well read and insightful. So, you are going to hear a lot of 'Deadpool is the best movie ever' by the young professionals in STEM fields who don't really read. Those same people could tend crops on their father's land 80 years ago or sell something on the city market, doesn't make a lot difference to them.
You're also going to have a lot of loud supporters of atheism from those fields, while their actual insights don't go any further from grasping Dawinks' speeches and Da Vinci's Code. (this isn't bashing insightful atheism per se, which Dawinks is NOT)
>>7915767
>Having a educated citizens is not needed in a corporate capitalistic system
>Science means paving the way for more technological inventions, which can them be sold to the public, generating profits for various corporations.
>>7915823
This makes me sad as a young STEM professional, because I completely agree with you.
Some of my coworkers are technically speaking, good at what they do and genuinely smart people. Outside of their field of study however, they can be completely incompetent. Getting a BS or MS takes a lot of work, and the last time they really studied the liberal arts was in high school, and boy does it show.
>>7915850
>educated citizens
pretty sure he's referring to the bulk of society. the bulk of which are not scientists. the majority of society are consumers. also, is being educated synonymous with being scientific? he's comparing two different things.
>>7915442
I'm a firm believer in the canon and deeply sympathetic to this argument, but I think this line of thinking sometimes works to its detriment. How many kids who could be reading use canon-worshipping as ideology to dismiss their assignments as "YA shit even less valuable even than watching Fight Club" and so read sparknotes and then watch Fight Club instead. I'll even confess to having been that kid. Shat on everything assigned in school, purchased Gravity's Rainbow and other "hard books" that I never read, and spent most of my time reading wikipedia, browsing the internet, and watching "patrician movies" like Red/White/Blue.
Once you get it in your head that you can take all you need from a book - even YA shit - by reading the wiki, then you're pretty well doomed not to read (see most posters here, who know what Harold Bloom defines as the canon, but who couldn't talk in any detail about most of the books therein listed). It wasn't until I somehow got it into my head to read Anna Karenina that I really discovered literature and began to read in earnest.
>>7915547
Thank you. Couldn't have done it so well.
>>7915600
Confirmed didn't read Anna Karenina, but poster is getting at something real. There's a sort of tension in writers like Shakespeare, Cervantes, Goethe, etc. who reject writing for ideology in favor of representing the whole human experience. If you accept that definition, you do have to ask yourself why read at all (not difficult to answer, but something that needs to be worked through)
>>7915565
I can gree
I'm not going to read fiction to get an idea of how the world works, for me its about its more about emotional texture and technique. Even in my own writing I don't really care about "edifying" the readers on my political or philosophical views, even though those do affect my work I'm really just interested in telling a good story.
Its common sense to actually study history and philosophy if you want to know more about thse things. And I actually find it easier to read nonficiton than most fiction.
>>7916123
>If you accept that definition, you do have to ask yourself why read at all (not difficult to answer, but something that needs to be worked through)
It wraps back around to reading to understand people and ourselves rather than worldly things, for me at least. I know some would disagree but there is a very definite feeling of connection and enrichment after reading a very good story or poem.
>>7915721
That is not going to happen.
>>7915653
most users round here would probably answer something like 'prose' or something but structural analysis really rings my cherries, y'know
>>7915740
>>/a/utist
0/10
>>7917646
>0/10
>still replies
