The Cult Continues Its Takeover Of Philosophy

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Philosophers like to think that studying philosophy does all sorts of things for people that it probably doesn't do. For example, they think that:

Studying philosophy makes you less susceptible to groupthink.

The leftist cultification (cultivation?) of academic philosophy, however, seems to provide at least some evidence that this is false. Instead:

Philosophy gives people rhetorical tools that permit them to spin out more sophisticated and baffling sophistries to "support" whichever view they happen to prefer.

Which often simply makes the prevailing groupthink groupthinkier.

   That's what's happened with transgender ideology in philosophy. The arguments for it are embarrassingly terrible. But it's become basically unquestionable. So the twin tactics are:

[a] Produce intricate, unsound, bullshitty defenses of the view, so that it's no longer possible to see exactly why they're unsound at a mere glance.

[b] Shriek down, "shame" (stupid term), and character-assassinate anyone patient and ballsy enough to analyze those sophistical arguments in detail.

   So far as I can see, philosophy hasn't been notably resistant to the leftist cult taking over the country. Mostly philosophers are either cultists themselves or afraid to speak out against the cult. Philosophy's certainly been more resistant than e.g. women's studies--but that's a pseudodiscipline specifically created as a locus of cult activity. Philosophy's probably been more resistant than usual suspects like lit-crit and sociology. Probably less so than econ. I'm not sure about the sciences. Conventional wisdom is that they're less lefty. But they're also really bad a philosophy, and I see some pretty nutty stuff about this sort of thing over there. 

   But here's the important part: philosophy has probably been less resistant to the cult than ordinary people have been. This suggests to me that whatever intellectual tools philosophy might provide aren't valuable enough to make up for the exposure to the cult that is required in order to acquire them. That is: on average, if you want to be a better reasoner and develop a more reasonable worldview, you are better off not getting a degree in philosophy. Whatever improvements it offers are unlikely to be valuable enough to offset the harm done by additional exposure to the cult. 

   A lame analogy: there are some books containing wisdom, but to study them in an organized way, you have to basically go into a nuclear reactor. Learning (in philosophy, anyway) is a sketchy, hit-or-miss affair. But the harm is nearly a sure thing... 

   Too rushed to think about this any better right now.