Reactionary Essay: The Closet Genius

The Closet Genius

In Mark Edmundson’s Harper’s article, “On The Uses of A Liberal Education: As Lite Entertainment for Bored College Students”, he lashed out quite a lot of observations he deemed fit to use as basis for concluding the crisis of liberal arts education today and the reasons behind this crisis. Harsh comments on the students of today, who for the author is immersed too much on the culture of consumerism where everything should cater to or service those who have the power of purchase, on the universities’ response to this change of focus and pace of desired college education, which once again in the author’s opinion is just catering to the whims of their benefactors (the students and their piggy-bank parents), and on generally the prevailing culture today, which for him focuses too much on comfort that it fails to be a sustainable environment for the thirst for genius, adorn the article and give it its distinct sting. However, with its entire tang aside, I find the article with too much loose ends and biased judgments to consider it an authority on the various aspects of culture, education, and college life that it tackles.

The most problematic claim Edmundson expressed in his article is his concept of what the culture has sunken down to. Contrary to Edmundson’s thoughts, our culture is not that of mediocrity and impassiveness but that of passion and a deep desire for excellence so finely wrapped by the foil of humility and cool. This does not connote us being disinterested to step out of the comfort zones we have established with the knowledge we have amassed through these years, but that of calculation, on whether we really need to act like the passionate and on-fire beings that we are, on whether we need to shout it to the world and proclaim it to everybody and anybody. Whenever a professor hits down a hard question, whenever an educator challenges us to action, we do not just sit down in front of them, hunched on our seats, and pretend we did not hear what they were trying to say(as they do often interpret our actions to be), instead we actually think, choose, and contemplate. This is a generation of cautious intelligence, where everything is not taken in and then reacted upon solely based on the emotions felt by the moment, instead, points are considered from every angle by the silent and often misleading look of a blank face. This refined manner of accepting and processing, as I may dare say, is but the epitome of scholarship and academic progress, where students truly think before they act, where they do not see the need to respond based on the heat of the moment (as Edmundson so desires students to do so, especially in his statement when he commended a bellowing argument he witnessed one day between students in the school park). How then can Edmundson regard this as the loss of passion when passion is neither absent nor suppressed in these cases, instead it merely takes a step back and lets a façade of a blank face put it in perspective. Has he not heard of the terror of Don Corleone as shown in Puzo literature or the critically-acclaimed films inspired by the former? Don Corleone, as the head patriarch of the Corleone clan and Godfather to mobsters, casino owners, underground billionaires, and politician cronies, possibly the most influential and the most powerful man behind the scenes of the economy and politics of the America in Puzo mythology, has been the symbol of blank-faced cunning throughout the past decades. He has been feared not because of his outright show of passion and outbursts fired by the moment, but because of his poker face hiding the profound contemplation and vengeful passion he has underneath. In his example, the fear he inspires is not brought about by the seen (his mild-mannered, disinterested façade) but by the unseen (his murderous cunning, silent calculation, controlled passion). In this way, the students of today show the same characteristics of the Don, that by hiding beneath the mask of cool and unmoved beings, they nurture the genius within.

The genius has always rested in each student that enters university. The very fact that these students made the decision to make something of themselves and continue their education marks their acceptance of the limits of their knowledge and their ignorance of those things needed to achieve success, therefore the desire to learn more and to further broaden their horizons, and the thirst for challenge is there; it is merely a matter of how the teacher and his method succeed or fail to tap into this. Students willingly, even openly, accept the challenges teachers offer (whether, in Edmundson’s words, “offensive” or not). The very fact that students still listen to their professors is a sign that students still care for whatever the teacher has to say. The assumption that whatever professors teach in class go in an ear of a student and go out the other ear is simply preposterous. Students are not unthinking and unfeeling as educators consider them to be, instead they are beings who comprehend, who process what they hear, filter those to their judgment are useless and irrelevant and absorb those that are worthwhile, worth taking note of, and worth digesting. The questioning, the challenging of a professor’s ideas (as Edmundson so desires from his students and as other professors presumably do so as well) need not happen verbally, as is the case most often. These processing and questioning, and filtering of ideas happen in silence, when the professor asks his students their thoughts and no one answers; it may as well be in this period of disappointment and disinterest for the teachers that this internal war happens. Now why does this happen, this internal, silent, and personal discussion amongst one and himself? This happens most often because of the fear to disrespect, to openly challenge a teacher in authority over the student. Now Edmundson in his article sees this quality, the desire to be politically correct and pleasant to others, as detestable and not praiseworthy at all. Respecting Edmundson’s opinion, but considering the quality in itself, it is neither detestable nor praiseworthy as it poses difficulties in certain situations and garners admirable respect in most others; therefore to consider it either one or the other is unfair towards the students who possess it. Taking all this into consideration, the desire to acquire the genius has not left this generation or this present culture, instead it has continued to bud in all those students whose professors deemed them to be otherwise. Therefore it would be more fitting to dub the students of the now, belonging to this present generation and culture, as closet geniuses instead of stupid, dense, cold, and passionless gits who are just too immersed in consumerism and themselves according to the almighty Edmundson.