My wonderful Adolescent Psychology professor was in quite a funk today. She came in and yelled at us because she found out that a student had been plagiarizing all of her papers. I can understand Evelyn’s pain as that is the bane of any professor’s existence. To make matters worse, she was really upset about the participation in book discussions being so low. She actually said “if you aren’t planning on participating, just don’t show up!”
She was so flustered that she was actually shaking. After class, I headed to her office and we chatted for a while. We talked about the political issues that were swimming in my head last night. She confirmed my beliefs that the intent of laws has shifted from protecting people to relentlessly crucifying people for acting in supposedly “criminal” ways. That type of paradigm shift shows the completely lack of understanding of the human psyche and mind. Legitimate law is rooted in some type of empirical evidence; illegitimate law (like many that have recently been put into place) is rooted in nothing more than a maniacal politican’s “gut feeling.”
As if unethical law-making wasn’t demoralising enough, the masses (especially under a conservative régime) simply digest what they are handed. People are so apathetic that they don’t even look up issues on their own, but rather kick back and read what the newspaper has to say (that is, if they are even literate).
It seems like academic integrity is no longer a big concern for students either. I may be in a philosophical rut of bitterness right now, but am I really to blame for that? Maybe partly so.
|:| Zach |:|