Gosh, Thomas Aquinas College was a strange place to go through the collegiate experience.
how strange was it?
Well, just imagine a whole bunch of terribly sheltered jumper queens (I'm not even kidding) thrown together with a whole bunch of snarky smokers, drinkers, and reactionaries, on an isolated rural campus in Southern California. The hijinks. They were wacky. Basically, due to the lack of cultcha in the surrounding environs, as well as the poverty of the student body, our entertainment options were limited to drinking in various outdoor locations (not, mind you, under the auspices of local law enforcement officials...rather the opposite), and, umm...yes, that may have been the extent of our recreational activity. Ooh, and we had an eleven pm curfew on weeknights; there was an off chance of being chased around by prefects with flashlights if we came in late. Of course, most dorms were one story buildings with windows close to the ground, so curfew was more of a polite advisory than a strict mandate.
In between drinking in the woods and baiting neo-Jansenists, I believe we may have studied some St. Augustine, Lavoisier, Nietzche, Locke, Aristotle, Newton, Freud, and so forth. Classes were small, although a classroom of fifteen glassy-eyed, slack-jawed college students is not markedly more pleasant an experience than a lecture hall of five hundred glassy-eyed, slack-jawed college students. Our classes were seminar style; we had "Socratic dialogues," wherein three or four individuals would shrilly talk at or over each other until it was time for lunch (the less talkative members of the class would typically resign themselves to apathy and stagnation). Truth, pursuit of, often took a back burner to in-fighting, brown-nosing, squabbling over minutiae, sophistry, partisanship, and other activities proper to the burgeoning peripatetic.
Strangely enough, I found this the ideal learning environment. Irritation at the nonsensical statements of others was a powerful motivator in my own scholastic progress. Also, our tutors (we called our professors tutors, cause we all egalitarian like that) were for the most part holy, patient, brilliant people. I made some wonderful friends there; the pressure cooker environment really helped us bond. On the whole, I would say that it was a positive experience. Would I recommend it to the younguns, though? I'm not really sure...
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Give it two more year, and you'll say it was the best place on earth.
Years, that is. (The price I pay to be anonymous.)
Well, I'm approaching one year out, and I am filled with furious anger every time I think about the college. Much more so than while I was actually there, because back then I didn't have anything to compare the experience to. I'm not sure how much of this is attributable to My Own Personal Issues rather than to the college itself. But it can't be all my fault.
Sure, having a TAC education means you’re not going to fit in the world any longer, and you will, for the most part, feel a slight pang of regret that while those around you seem to be taking great delight in things, their fleeting nature will leave you empty. You will also find that you cannot take yourself seriously when you try to act hip and cool; and that deep down, you know your vices are wrong and to do nothing about them, even the smallest of them, means you are not being honest with yourself.
Yet, probably most importantly, you’ll find yourself alone–alone because there are very few persons in this world who are, at the same time, intelligent and striving for the Good. Those that are, are most likely religious, and most likely further along the path to sainthood than you, meaning that you won’t get along, or, at least, not be able to drink with them.
All this though, is part of His plan: to leave you hungry after you’re fed, thirsty after you drink. Only after you have tried every prosaic and sampled every vice, will you find that you need Him to be happy, Him and only Him. And when you let go of everything else, He will grant you joy, and just maybe, your soul mate. Until then, you’ll be the raccoon who gets his hand caught in the trap because he cannot let go of the shiny object.
Oh, and a having a TAC degree means that you have to go to grad school if you want to find a job.
Anonymous, dahlink: I know plenty of TAC students, present and former, who are able to get along just fine with the world's inanities. Just *going* to TAC doesn't automatically make you a knight errant of infinite intellectual solitude. Nor does it necessarily wake you up, shake you out of your complacency, or put you on the path to virtue or philosophy. I would venture that it has such an effect on few of its students. I think that TAC provides a fine education for those willing to really engage the texts. However, the institution as such is hardly a surefire source of enlightenment. You get out of it what you put into it...
Not anything in particular against what you're saying, it just irks me when people say "A TAC education makes you blahblahblah..."
Cuz, for most students, all it makes you is more smug.
For my description to be characteristic of TAC, it need not be true of a majority of graduates, it merely needs be true for more TAC graduates than graduates of other institutions. My point, however, was not that TAC makes anyone automatically anything. In an effort to sound poetic, I resorted to the cliche of speaking in absolutes about things that are essentially personal. Though I have found that my experience is common for many a man that leaves TAC. The education at TAC is a singularity and is profound in many ways. The profundity of its effects can be seen in those alumni who leave the school with utter hatred of it. Though, the effect I am speaking of is much more subtle.
I’m not claiming that alumni leave as “knight[s] errant of infinite intellectual solitude,” or that TAC is a “surefire source of enlightenment.” I am claiming that it wakes you up. It wakes up in the student ideas that were heretofore completely foreign. The waking, however, is not sudden, and the ideas are only nascent. The ideas, while at the same time contrary to this world, are the path to virtue and enlightenment. Virtue and enlightenment can only come from experience, and for many that experience comes from a dissatisfaction of the world around them or a heartfelt love for things not of this world. Both dispositions come from the education you receive at TAC.
Plus, if the education was taken to heart, the graduate then becomes an assertive individual who speaks of moral and theological absolutes. This, in and of itself, makes you an outcast in today’s world. Just look at the new Star Wars movie, where Vader remarks, “If you’re not with me, then you’re my enemy,” to which Obi-Wan responds, “Only a Sith thinks in absolutes.” C.f. Mt:12:30, Lk:11:23.
As I mentioned, my comment was rooted in personal experience. While at TAC, the notions of virtue, self-sacrifice, and the emptiness of worldly gains were awakened for the first time. Could it be that your disagreement with my comment also stems from your personal experience? I don’t know much about you, but from what I have read, it sounds as if your family and early education gave you many of the gifts that those of us received only later, at TAC, making your TAC experience not quite such an event. After all, you are smarter than your average bear.
I do agree that most graduates, myself included, walk out of TAC as arrogant bastards. I wonder if the arrogance stems more from impatience than from actual disdain, though that’s not the point––arrogance is arrogance. Luckily time cures that as well. You’ll have to forgive me for irking you with my dissertation on the effects of a TAC education, but, you see, this sort of behavior is exactly what a TAC education makes you do.
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There are a few weaknesses about the college that have nothing to do with the student body per se. First of all, if we are to take the Philosopher seriously then (most)people straight out of high school schouldn't pretend to be philosophers, going in or upon graduating. This is the cause for a lot of the arrogance. Secondly, we shouldn't pretend that this is a speculative school of philosophy. TAC is elevated catechism class(note how Berquist runs his silent discussions). Thirdly, we shouldn't pretend that people are not here to get married, first and foremost. If were otherwise, then TAC would ideally be single sex, as all the great academies were in the past. Fourth, all this talk about liberal arts graduates being more employable in the long run is rubbish(to employers at least). This all being said, TAC remains the finest intellectual blueprint available, but you must be able to read between the lines. Moreover, you must take into account nature and youth.
LOL! I love this "anonymity" thing. It just goes to show that whatever TAC does, it doesn't give people the courage to personally stand behind what they believe. That's freaking awesome!
Especially when one of the the "anonymous" folks decided to mention how important it was that TAC groomed us all to strive for the Good. Apparently courage isn't part of the Good. Or this person isn't striving very hard for it.
Even funnier is the absurd belief that you need to go to grad school to make a decent living. I guess Peter Fry, Don Turrentine and myself are just amazing anomalies. Or maybe it just takes hard work and preserverance. Just like for everyone not as "intelligent" as us.
I disagree with a lot that this "anonymous" or "unknown" poster has posted.
And I think it's ridiculous for him or her to conceal their identity.
Not that ANYTHING on the internet is TRUELY anonymous, heh heh heh...
I enjoyed reading your post and all the comments.
I can tell you coming from a ghetto school which many liken to a jail, I often thought of the glories of a "proper" school such as you described.
But in hindesight I now find that my experience at Vanier was fundamental in shaping a balanced and postively enforced viewpoint of the world (at least I believe so).
Also, despite the moral bankruptcy of my school system (Toronto public)I had the pleasure of studying(if you can call it that) underneath two brilliant teachers who fundamentally shaped my life. Two diamonds in the ruff...
Therefore although I understand and appreciate you school system/school, I believe each of us has an open opportunity at a "righteous" and dignified life irrespective of schooling,upbringing,financial situation,etc etc.
Ha! I heart Sean.
Courage, indeed! Is this what this is all about? I thought I was talking to wavelet.
I am the anonymous who posted the first, second, fourth and sixth comments. My name is John Tuttle and I am a '98 grad of TAC and '04 grad of Ave Maria Law. Anonymity in this case isn't something to hide behind, much like your pseudonym Mr. "Smoker" Grumbine. Instead it was meant to enhance my comments by divorcing them from the identity that wrote them. And, in some sense, it was to foster a sense of mystery with wavelet. If you wanted to know who I was, you merely needed to ask.
I'm surprised, quite frankly, that my comments were received with such hostility. I find it hard to conceive that it could be based on the actual content of the comments themselves, and not their perceived content.
Also, punster, the Star Wars comment is apt, not for its properties as an anology to Georgie's fantasy religions, but because it was included in the movie as a political jibe, aimed at the current administration. (The fact that it completely contradicts earlier and later dialogue supports the notion that it was added for some other purpose, other than to support the script.) The purpose was to have the antagonist repeat a line used by the President. But the retort couldn't be disapproval of relativism, because that is an ideal of the left. So Obi Wan had to disapprove of an ideal of the right, viz., moral absolutism. Thus, the quoted passage serves as evidence of the world's distaste of the ideals held by the likes of TAC graduates.
Finally, my comment that you had to get a graduate education to find a job was 1) a joke, and 2) at most a general statement. Citing three examples merely proves the rule, Grumbine. And by the way, congratulations to your older brother for getting into Notre Dame's graduate school for architecture. From reading your blog, I figured you had a good nature and were full of mirth. What's up with the attitude, Grumbine? I guess wavelet was right: TAC only makes one smug.
As a footnote, I would like to add that wavelet has one of the most brilliant and alluring blogs out there. I apologize now for not having the restraint to keep it free from this blight of a response.
Well, it simply isn't a part-ay until the flame war starts.
Serious chilling is warranted. Arthur: anonymity does not necessarily indicate cowardice. I'm pseudonymous, y'know, mostly because I don't want my students to know toooo much about my *cough* rich interior life.
Mr. Tuttle, don't know you from Adam (though possibly had good reports from someone or other...Chaney, mebbe?), but your remarks are appreciated. I suppose that for many TAC can be an intellectual re-birth; for some, though, it merely provides a better vocabulary to supplement close-mindedness. Those who go through the program are definitely given the opportunity to begin the intellectual life proper. Arguably, it's one of the best opportunities out there at present. You can lead a horse to water, though, &c.
Kids these days. I tell ya.
re: graduate school. The truly liberally educated man should be able to pursue the highest things on his own, right? So, I'm not sure that grad school as furtherance of philosophibabble/education is necessary. Bookstores and libraries and interesting people you meet in bars and life experience is probably better for you than further former schooling in that regard. As furtherance of ability to win bread, perhaps. I'm doing all right sans further sheepskin, but who knows...
Seriously, folks. Can't we all just make strong statements without getting our knickers in a twist?
Ooop. Formal schooling, not former.
i actually stopped smoking awhile ago.
but i still think this thread needs to mellow out a little.
This has to be one of the most epic, in yo face, phi slamma jamma, aunt jemmima, comment threads i have ever seen. So FUN! Anonymity is so scandalous and even dashing. It's like the mystery lover who comes into your bedroom and leaves without a trace. The whole town gets all hot and bothered. By the way, my name is Publius.
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