My alma mater never ceases to amaze. Here is the most recent exercise in weirdness that has come out of it:

Yale Law School professors Akhil Amar ’80 LAW ’84 and Ian Ayres ’81 LAW ’86 are now pushing . . .  for law schools to offer to pay off part of their first-years’ loans should these students realize that their prospects of successful legal careers are slim. No law schools have policies like this one, and the law professors want Yale to be the first to adopt their proposal.

Yes, let’s reward failure instead of success because there is not enough of that going on at Yale.

I especially love the part that states “no law schools have policies like this one.” I bet they don’t. I also bet that in most graduate schools students don’t conceal their publications in prestigious peer-reviewed journals for fear of being dumped on. I’m sure that in most grad schools people don’t petition to abolish the grading system because those grad students who pass and fail undergrads on a regular basis are too traumatized by the idea that their work might be graded. I can pretty much guarantee that in most grad schools people don’t slink out of the library hoping that nobody sees them carrying scholarly volumes because reading is not prestigious.

If we are talking about Yale, then the last thing this school needs is to reward people for dropping out of grad school, failing, and messing up. It is done way too much as it is. Maybe it’s time to start rewarding success, for a change.

The article I quote above proceeds to get boggled down in really ridiculous philosophizing:

The argument hits a classic question: Should the responsibility of a student’s success in school fall on the school or the student?

This isn’t a classic question. It is a stupid question. Those who want to learn, learn. And those who don’t come up with a shitload of excuses about how they are huge victims of everything. If we attribute a student’s failure to his or her university and proceed to compensate students for that financially, then it stands to reason that if students have wildly successful careers after graduation, they should pay bonuses to the school for making this success possible. And how much success does that make?

This patronizing attitude that completely denies any chance of personal responsibility to human beings is really annoying.

A guy was trying to pick me up yesterday. He is an engineer who is a passionate political activist and whose hobby is XIXth-century history. He wasn’t, however, trying to get me to like him by discussing these topics. Instead, he did what I call “the Superman schtick” and offered me stories about how he was in the Marines and then later participated in covert operations hunting war criminals in Central Europe.

Men always do that a lot with me. I’ve had people drop on the floor and start bench-pressing (or whatever this strange activity is called) in the middle of a conversation in hopes of impressing me. I always somehow provoke the nerdiest guys into enumerating their high-school athletic achievements to me.

I know why this happens, of course. People see how I perform gender and immediately assume that I’m into men who are a collection of macho stereotypes.

In truth, however, I’m into the exact opposite. Nowadays, nobody has a chance of attracting me because, as we all know on this blog, I am passionately in love. However, in the times when I could be attracted, I was totally into the “I spent all day writing code today, after which I played Call of Duty for six hours and other players said my strategy was gay, so I went and wrote a poem about being lonely and misunderstood” guys rather than “I worked out at the gym, watched a football game with my buddies, and swapped memories of our times in the army after that” guys.

The point that I’m trying to make is that the way people choose to perform gender says nothing about their politics, their lifestyle choices, and their dating preferences. My dresses, makeup and shoes mean only one thing: I like wearing them. There is nothing else you can deduce about me or about anybody else on this basis. Gender is always a performance (want bibliography? I have it). And as such, it says nothing about the nature of the performers. An actor who plays Hitler is not an evil person. And a woman who wears heels and makeup is not . . . anything other than a woman who wears heels and makeup.

This is a cool meme from Shakesville:

What would you miss most on the internetz if the supporters of SOPA/PIPA get their way?

I will miss the possibility to quote stories, link to them, and discuss them. It will feel really weird to write a post saying, “I read a story today that said some interesting things that I can’t share with you and whose provenance must remain shrouded in mystery to protect us all from something undefinable.”

I will miss Wikipedia, too. Today, while it was down, I missed it. I wanted to research Sen. Dick Durbin who supports SOPA, and where was I supposed to go? To his official site? He sounds better than Jesus on his site (seriously, check it out.) Besides, his site is set up in a way that prevents you from leaving it easily. Is there really a person around who doesn’t use Wikipedia at least once a day?

I will miss letting people comment on the blog freely, exchange links, discuss things without me having to vet every comment before letting it through.

I will miss Craigslist because it’s a wonderful website that serves a multitude of useful purposes.

I will miss all those blogs I read and that keep me informed about the news.

What will you miss if we allow this to happen?

“I’m withdrawing my co-sponsorship for the Protect IP Act,” said Sen. Roy Blunt, a Missouri Republican.

Sen. John Boozman, an Arkansas Republican, “will be withdrawing his name as a co-sponsor” of Protect IP, a spokesman told CNET today. Fellow Protect IP co-sponsor Sen. James Risch, an Idaho Republican, said today that he wants “more time to re-examine the legislation before going to a vote” and has asked staff for a detailed briefing, a spokesman said.

And Sen. Orrin Hatch, the Utah Republican who has long been a close ally of Hollywood on copyright and is up for re-election this year, said on Twitter that “I will not only vote against moving the bill forward next week but also remove my co-sponsorship of the bill.” […]

Rep. John Carter, a Texas Republican who is listed as a SOPA sponsor, “reserves judgment on the final bill,” a spokesman told CNET today. “He’s certainly not saying pass the bill as-is — there are legitimate concerns in this bill.” SOPA sponsor Tim Griffin, an Arkansas Republican, now says: “I will not support a bill unless my constituents are comfortable with it.”

If you keep reading that story, the Democrats listed all remain adamant that they’ll remain co-sponsors of the legislation but work to “fix it”. . .

Those goddam Democrats would rather keep collecting their Hollywood checks, than heed the will of millions of Americans who have lent their online voice in an unprecedented manner.

Are they really this stupid? Can they really be this idiotic?

Yes, they can. The most recent whooping that the Dems got in the 2010 elections apparently taught them nothing about the need to listen to their constituents. And then they will be publishing endless articles trying to solve the mystery of why they are losing their voter base. Truly, who can solve this enigma?

Idiots.

We need to keep pushing because:

The whip count against PIPA now shows 24 senators opposed, and 36 in favor. This time last week, five were opposed and forty were in favor. Nine of the nineteen new opponents announced their opposition during today’s protest.

The stream of senators who keep flipping on this issue should give hope to anyone who doubts that elected officials listen to them. Please, keep sending emails to your senators, telling them to oppose PIPA. Through strength in numbers, we really are making a difference.

12:35 PM PT (Joan McCarter): Add one more to that list of Senators withdrawing support. Sen. Orrin Hatch, an original cosponsor, says that the legislation “is simply not ready for prime time and both sides must continue working together to find a better path forward.”

I guess the Senators need their Wikipedia as much as anybody else, eh?

Now let’s imagine the depths of despair the Senate would plunge in if Google went completely dark, too.

Seriously, folks, this website is doing a brilliant job of protesting SOPA/PIPA. It’s just too funny. Highly recommended.