haha, I so share the view of the OP, and I have a great story behind the fascist, intolerant nature of some English teachers, EVEN at the University level:
This one English Professor for Comp 1 had us do one of our writing projects on Wal-mart. We had to find evidence either supporting or defending what wal-mart does for the economy and for the country as a whole. She made it evident, early on, her opinion: Wal-mart is a satanic scourge on this country because it pays ppl nothing, kills competition and destroys local culture and we are better off shopping at garage sales and flea markets (lol, go figure that one, huh)
I, of course, didn't like this. Not just because I think Walmart is good for the poor and middle class, but also because I don't like being told how to think or feel about something. So I went out of my way to find 3 economists that said walmart was good more or less (this was hard to do as it was the peak of anti-walmart sentiments). I even quoted one Ivy league economist as saying that wal-mart "single-handedly prevented a recession" during 2 fiscal quarters of the previous two years.
At the end of the project we got our papers back with our grades and we were discussing what we learned about Wal-mart. She said it was abundnatly clear that wal-mart was "only bad and we shouldn't shop there if there's an alternative" and there was NO evidence found that wal-mart does anyone any good. I had received a B+ for that paper but because I feared she would fail me if I disagreed with her inconquerable anti-walmart Zeal, I didn't speak up, because by GOD i didn't want to be stuck with her or anyone like her as my instructor again.
Now I know ALL english majors aren't like this, but I have yet to run across anyone in the academic world that was as narrow-minded and pig-headed as she was. The rest of the English Department professors at USF didn't seem much more enligthened, either, so I kind of share the sentiments of the OP.
This is very telling of the way so many in academia tend to be just as rigidly dogmatic in their beliefs as the very far right groups they exist almost solely to condemn.
I find that, consistently, the most intelligent people are economic moderates who take each issue on a case by case basis. (Every time I come home, and inevitably discuss politics, I gain more and more respect for my brilliant INTJ father.) But my ESTJ sister is an extremely liberal English grad student, and I find myself utterly unable to discuss any politics or economics with her, because her answer is almost invariably: "You're not a SOCIALIST? IDIOT."
As for social issues, the far left isn't as socially liberal as they'd have you believe--they're socially liberal insofar as they stand against the far right's social views, but try to challenge one of THEIR precious social policy babies and they'll flip the fuck out even worse than their far right enemies. It's actually kind of comical, once you get over how sad it is.
Worse yet, I'm a college dropout, so I'm not
qualified to discuss anything intelligently (apparently.) Every time I start to get close to backing her into a logical corner, I just run into the same tired rhetoric about how "Well the people who are writing these ideas have DOCTORATES and OTHER FANCY PIECES OF PAPER STATING CLEARLY THAT THEY ARE SMART, how could they possibly be wrong about this???" (Note the cute parallels between this sentiment and, "Well the Bible obviously says it, so it has to be true!" from the far righters. tee hee)
I don't care what qualifications you have; if you can't objectively present a compelling rational argument for why I should believe you, I'm not going to.
They have a nasty habit of getting way too offended, even more than the far right, if anyone pokes fun at them or questions their methodology. "Our cause is too IMPORTANT to be made fun of; we're busy LIBERATING THE WORLD FROM THE EVILS OF CAPITALISM!"
For instance, we tried to have a discussion the other day about use of the word "gay" in a negative context, and I tried to make a rational argument that this word in and of itself is not negative, but only becomes negative when used in an intentionally demeaning context. (In my experience, it has developed an entirely new meaning totally independent of homosexuality in general, and most of the kids who say it these days have no homophobic tendencies or intention of slighting homosexuals.) But NOOOOOO, hyper-liberal sister wouldn't have any of that, you fucking blatant homophobe! THAT WORD HAS GOTTEN PEOPLE KILLED BLAH BLAH FUCKING BLAH!
No, words don't get people killed; bigotry does. There are no combinations of syllables that are inherently offensive without being given social or cultural context. Leave it to the SJ to utterly ignore context and the bigger picture in favor of an obnoxiously indignant present-moment emotional crusade. The funniest part is that she thinks she's "sticking it to the man" by fighting back against those rigidly dogmatic far-righters, but never really picks up on the fact that she's doing the same damn shit.
In short, devoting your life unquestioningly to the far left is no better than devoting your life unquestioningly to the far right; the only difference is trading a big, dumb elephant for a total jackass.
Anyway, English was one of my better subjects, so I never have any real hard feelings to teachers who give me good marks, heh.
