Amid re-emerging discussions about the unfairness of student loans in the UK, leaving many graduates forced to pay ridiculously inflated prices as their monthly payments are soon “dwarfed by the interest that is slapped on their debt every month,” many, particularly right-wing leaning, individuals have argued that these inflated payments are a self-perpetuated problem— a logical, deserved consequence for people who choose ‘non-economical’ degrees.
For example, Telegraph columnist Zoe Strimpel has stated that many degrees are knowingly pursued despite being of “not high quality,” and that graduates need to “stop whining” about their loans. Similarly, Director Nick Hillman—a Conservative hiding behind the so-called ‘independent’ politics of the Higher Education Policy Institute—claimed that the issue is “overblown” and that some of these complaints are “nothing more than successful graduates wanting someone else to cover their own debts.” Interestingly, he stresses in this statement that he only speaks of “some” graduates, yet somehow still fails to acknowledge the entire rest, whose sincere frustrations and financial concerns are wholly justified.
Although I have a lot to say about the student loans discussion in itself, I would more specifically like to focus on this strange sentiment of ‘economical’ versus ‘hobby’ degrees, which clearly reflects the long-standing STEM versus social sciences, humanities, and arts culture war, and how perceptions of these (academic) fields reflect our current political environment.
Several times, I’ve had individuals (usually young men my age) simply scoff when I expressed my interest in fields that were once highly respected, like sociology or journalism, or say that my creativity-oriented passions will soon be replaced by a lifeless and untalented AI. Since when has it become acceptable to so easily discount the significance of human-oriented pursuits?
As geopolitical attitudes increasingly shift towards a prioritisation of hard power, technology, militarism, and national strength, it seems that the world has developed a strange stigma or shame around ‘softer,’ social areas of knowledge that have potentially ‘non-economic’ incentives driving people towards them.
This isn’t to say that STEM isn’t crucial as well. Obviously, various scientific and technological forms of progress are in many ways essential. But by terming degrees which focus on developing creative, critical, and social forms of intelligence and knowledge as ‘hobbies,’ or ‘unworthy’ of a financial and time investment, we threaten to fundamentally disregard the importance of maintaining a diverse assortment of creative skills among our societies to create passionate and sustainable economies.
Even if one might argue that ‘times have changed’ and we must now prioritise technological and scientific developments, it seems genuinely ridiculous to claim that at any point in time either the arts, humanities, or sciences could ever lose their intrinsic significance to humanity. Rather, the context of our times is shaping what seems to be important, making us undermine the creativity and sociability that maintains our societies.
Photo by Will Lander for The Student