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Rob Sheldon is our physics color commentator. In response to this item, he kindly writes to say:
I was mulling over this topic this morning. In this case, why Hollywood continues to spend $100 million on flops. Surely someone could have read the script of the recent Wonder Woman sequel beforehand and noticed the stink bombs? But then, perhaps the audience is not the customer.
A few weeks ago, while listening to talk radio, the radio host was listing all the newspapers that received a total of $2.2bn from China. It didn’t go into advertising–there were no pages dedicated to that purchase. Rather, the money was intended to influence the current crop of opinion writers. It was advertising through the op-ed pages. The radio host assured me that this was intended to offset the loss in subscriptions that the same editors were suffering due to their unpopular op-ed pieces.
![The Long Ascent: Genesis 1–11 in Science & Myth, Volume 1 by [Robert Sheldon, David Mackie]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51G-veeEcdL.jpg)
Applying that same logic to Hollywood, the producers are not expecting to recoup their investments in Wonder Woman sequels, rather they are desiring to push the community in a certain direction. Or perhaps they expect to recoup their investments in markets I know very little about. In either case, US ticket sales were not the point.
The point I’m making is that in today’s world, I was wrong to think that newspapers get their income from subscribers, or that movies get their income from ticket buyers. That is how it used to be done, but not today. As the gap between the ultra-rich and the remaining 90% grows wider, movies or newspapers are like the free bread and circuses of ancient Rome–not exactly a capitalist business model.
Likewise, high school and college math classes used to be about mastering skills that would both further employment opportunities or possibly lead to a career in math. But college has converted their English departments into indoctrination courses, and college is no longer about education but about making workers for government and society. And workers don’t need math as much as they need to be governable. Math destroys their gullibility. Far better to eliminate the history knowledge, the math skills, the civics lessons that make them difficult to control. Talking to a retired St Louis public high school math teacher, the battle was first enjoined 30 years ago over Geometry–eliminating it from the curriculum. Why? Because it was the only course that taught logic, he said. The “woke” mobs didn’t exist in 1990, but even then, the elites had a plan.
After all, the elites have their own private schools that still teach math. Public schools, on the other hand, teach what the elites deem important for everyone else.
Rob Sheldon is also the author of Genesis: The Long Ascent and The Long Ascent, Volume II
Note from News: Media have certainly changed their role in society. It’s no surprise because – some of us have made this point numerous times – no one needs the newspaper to find out whether it will rain this weekend, what’s on TV, or where to buy Greek deli. The owners and staff are probably glad to be bought up and put to work. My guess is they’ll be part of a war on math if that helps keep them going.
See also: My “War on Math’ article at Salvo. Like most opponents, [a math teacher friend] attempts logical refutations. But logic is the prime target in the war. A bit of recent history might help…