Doing an international relations class at a leading university and finding it impossibly hard to get through. It really seems like it's all just jumping through hoops of semantics to 'prove' that you're woke.
Is there any reason to take this stuff seriously or is this literally just a meme class? Timothy Mitchell, Susan Strange and the rest just seem to be incredibly bias.
I'm not asking for a 'red pill me on X' but rather can someone explain to me if this is just word woo-woo or if there is any merit to any of this?
I think it’s what you make it. If you’re considering politics, standing up for your beliefs with eloquence, good arguments and unshakeable confidence may sharpen your teeth for down the road.
Juan Mitchell
Youre gonna need a tongue of steel razors to get through, its gonna be tough but the consequences of not being there in the trenches will be much much worse.
Jason Hall
user, international relations is a dogmatic course. They're not there to teach you to think for yourself, but there to teach you how to understand the current international system and how you manouver within it. If you were doing your masters, or a Ph.D, then you'd have a right to be mad about the superficiality of a course. But my assumption is that you aren't. And thus, you wouldn't need to know about nuances in international relations, or the alternative theories to statecraft and diplomacy.
You SHOULD however take the course very seriously. It is in fact a window into how the current system has been constructed and upon which values. Even if we don't always agree with it, it's what people currently consider the best / established system. Does that mean you shouldn't insist on challenging it? Of course not, challenging the teacher on what you're being taught forces them to elaborate and explain the system in greater detail, showing both flaws and brilliance in it's design.
But you chose the course mate, what did you expect from it?
Dylan Myers
It depends on the format of the class. If it's a lecture format, check the curriculum for any flags. If it's reading journal articles, you'll actually learn a lot. The three main schools of thought are realism, liberalism and constructivism, alongside a hodgepodge of Marxist schools like postcolonialism and feminism that aren't taken seriously even in the academic environment. Realism, in its slightly different incarnations, was the preferred theory of well known American statemen pre1980s. Liberalism emphasises democracy, free trade and institutions like the UN as major factors, while realism rejects this (mostly) instead asserting power politics as the primary way by which things should be understood. Liberal theories don't have as much weight behind them, in my opinion, but they appear to be very important in the field because they have institutional backing. Clinton-era Albright statesmanship was liberal, and anything to do with the UN, EU, NATO, Council on Foreign Relations, Royal Institute of International Affairs etc will employ liberal theory. (Of course, each of these institutions is engaging in their own power politics, using academia as the battleground, but that sort of analysis doesn't get you tenure…)
You will probably go over Kenneth Waltz, who popularised a variation of realist theory, as well as Mearsheimer, who is known around these parts for his oh so antisemitic book on the Israel Lobby. It's not a woo woo field, but it has been abused by Marxist status seekers and is warped by globalists and their fancy clubs for their own gain.
I've attempted to do this and received a poor mark for using "problematic" sources. I have been told if I use "radical" sources again (anything right of Antifa) to 'reconsider my choice in course'.
I'm actually doing my masters right now and it seems to be tedious. It will quite literally start with presuppositions. "Africa isn't poor due to poor economic choices, it's because we never considered THEIR economic systems :(" it's ridiculous. They praise aboriginal australian economic systems of 'sharing the weight'.
Currently I'm keeping my head down and attempting to write as a card carrying member to avoid anything that may come my way. I expected a balanced argument of globalisation and international trade not merely critical theory and marxism.
The diversity of literature is purely feminist or marxism. For example we read about Petro-Sexual Violence and 'understanding the native american, choctaw, approach to economics and why it could work in modern day'
Should I just keep my head down?
Nathaniel Stewart
Sorry I forgot to add, thanks this post really helped me. We're touching on Realism now in class. Waltz is actually in my reading list currently
Hunter Powell
This is what the dean is for. Your instructor will likely have to reconsider their choice of employment.
Brandon Moore
LOLOLOLOLOLOL
Not using water-based lube?
Jose Rogers
If I can do this, I will do it. I've considered doing it but I'm also considered losing my chance to get this as I am on my last semester and don't want to get in trouble before I graduate.
nooo! OP, don't go to the dean! if you do you will be tagged as the ebil nahtzee who should be barred from getting a diploma in political sciences anywhere your teacher can send messages bow down your head and bear the degeneracy if you want, you can compile a list of all the assumptions and imbecilities in the authors your teacher wants you to use, but only speak about it and publish it once you've got your diploma, not before dude, we're talking about [current year + 3] at "a leading university," neither the teacher nor the dean will consider anything else than OP's problematic gain of a valuable diploma while not being a braindead marxist
Asher Taylor
It's basically a propaganda class to help brainwash you into globalism. Real international relations is geopolitics which is the study of the waxing and waning of national powers, their territories, and policies. Unless they're getting you woke on how Europeans are being genocided by banksters, bankster Kikes, corrupt politicians, and secret societies, you aren't learning real international relations (geopol). Unless they're informing you about how China is buying up Australia and NZ, you aren't real international relations (geopol). Geopol is not something they'll ever present properly to you, because if they did, it'd contradict their narrative.
this better off studying philosophy, classical history, and math
Joseph Cooper
There are some great books on geopol if you want a formal intro; however, Zig Forums provides a really good geopol education. Face it, we know what's happening on a global political scale better than almost anyone. Don't fall for the uni meme and believe that they have some kind of divine knowledge to give you, because they don't.
If you want geopol education, read pic related, especially Tragedy and Hope.
Start with the Anglo Establishment first. It's much shorter than Tragedy and Hope, which is over 800 pages of history of bankers and kikes.
Mason Brooks
If you are looking for a good mark tell them what they want to hear.
Aiden Gomez
Academic brilance
the relationships between petroleum and gender violence and the role colonial powers possess LOL Decline of the West
Why are you wasting your time and money with such unmarketable “skills”?
Are there any usable studies left, perhaps for the children of the elite?
Aaron Jackson
IR "classes" exist to create a bunch of lukewarm IQ apparatchiks for the Jew world order. It is not a real class that actually teaches anything factual.
Levi Harris
No, you're a retard. There is only a single school of thought.
Kayden Adams
Everything PC is "word woo-woo." I call it wordism, but yes, it's pure kikery only based in terminology and not reproducible in the real world from objective concepts.
If you're just starting out, try inverting the statements or switching things around. Switch Blacks and Whites for race cuck shit. Switch men and women for feminist shit, etc.
Does it disgust you? Surely. So rebel, as I did.
David Lee
This is a mandatory class. I am studying something that is very different from the field in the legal domain and have a job lined up. This is merely my last semester to make up the points.
Thanks guys this is really helpful. I've decided not to go to the dean and instead just try and out-study others. I like to keep a high grade average and sucking it up so I can get through it seems to be the most viable solution. I appreciate all your efforts
It's also nice to have a thread about the study of political theory
Andrew Richardson
It disgusts me. I've somewhat tried this by almost parodying an argument. We have a short discussion after class and a student said "We haven't even CONSIDERED african economics" so I decided to push it to the nth degree and say that we should look at natural sources too like Bonobo and Gorilla societies. Went full Jean-Jacques Rousseau and started praising the virtues and chivalry of the natural world. Thought the teacher would tell me I'm wrong.
He agreed with me
If you're wondering, yes he is a balding bearded bespectacled man who draws allegory to Marvel films.
That seems to be the best option right now and these additional sources are making me see it's not totally cucked.
Christian Hill
That's the only way to go. Get the best grades you can and get out. The only thing of real value you will get is the paper upon completion, because the education, of course, can always be attained for free with higher quality and more red pilled books than you get in uni, unless you're doing med, engineering, or compsci.
William Morales
How did you make it to your last semester and still not understand that college is a joke and all the classes are worthless?
Asher Hall
EZ MODE
Read this to know more than 90% of your professors. It's a short paper by a British General Sir John Glubb on comparative history and the forces that shape it.
Grayson Green
This career is shit, trust me. And don’t even consider Liberal Arts.
Study and engineering, administration or finances of you like news, politics and business.
This is a pretty good source for CIA niggers and state department queers giving long speeches on the mechanics of what they do.
Isaiah Lopez
Because the job I desire requires a certain level of education and my company has allowed me the privilege of working and studying. To move forward I need these credentials. It is only worthless if you have no assured end goal and no assured career at the end of it.
I'm doing auditing/accounting, I have to do atleast one 'political' class per semester and most have been baseline "feels > reals". This one though has been incredibly verbose but quite hollow so I opted to make the thread. So far my grade score is quite high (luckily)
I'm in accounting
Thank you my dude
Joseph Powell
In other words, it's leftist. Yeah, that's how leftists approach geopol. Any actual discussion or study of geopol almost immediately destroys their leftist narrative. They patch over the omitted truths with rich bombasity, which goes unnoticed by the leftist students because they're creatures of emotion and fantasy. My suggestion is, take it as an opportunity to study leftist propaganda and behaviour and the university system The universities themselves act as a machine of sorts for producing a fake intellectual and ruling class so the real shot callers can work by proxy, behind the curtain, as Hobbes noted in Leviathan.
Colton Martinez
This is the major thing I've seen happen quite a lot. "As we see the rise in petrol dependance rise, so too do the native populace begin to become more violent. This is because of reliance creates a sense of status above others etc etc"
