I suspect half of what pisses people off about acad leftists even when arguments are good is language. It is not that it is arcane (it is, but easily learned) but that it seems to assume a reader is either hostile or an unquestioning ally.
No room for just 'curious, listening'
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Always felt most appealing acads were masters of analogy - a unique ability to downsample their lofty ideas into relatable, perhaps even punchy hooks.
Common denominator of Sagan / Cathy O'Neil / Hofstadter / Kahneman / deGrasse Tyson / Hawking / Deutsche ?
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I'm talking specifically about academic leftist humanities people who talk academic pomoese... Derrida/Foucault stuff.
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Beyond liking to say panopticon to impress, i haven't really accessed any of these folks.
I guess Gore Vidal was the only lefty that I liked to listen to for long periods but he was no academic, and thank god for that.
I've never understood why it's entirely acceptable for physicists and astronomers to use arcane language when describing the nature of the universe but Derrida is supposed to describe the nature of language itself as if talking to a 12 year old.
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