It's why there has been a long, directed assault against things like "a liberal education." It's a word that absolutely does not mean what the conservative derposphere has long convinced their zealots it means. It does mean democrat. It does not mean leftists, but this is the definition that has been plugged in to their brains for so long, that you see this nonsense repeated ad nauseum here, without a single attempt by any of these people to ever question what that actually means. They "know," because all they "know" is whatever truths they need to tell themselves.
Classically, and fundamentally to this day--a liberal education simply means a diverse, well-rounded exposure to all forms of knowledge--It's not just science and math, but the pillars of knowledge that have existed just as long, and are still just as fundamentally important: the classics, philosophy, art...all of those things. They are fundamental for critical thinking, and for creating actual functioning adults.
This is why, while there is this directed assault on what that means, you now have people that seem to believe that the only purpose of education is STEM, because that is all society needs...this is observably, disastrously false, and it isn't any other way. At the same time, you have the same type of morons that claim these things, bitching and moaning that China and Japan are destroying us in education! We can't compete? Uh...why? It's because you dillholes have been systematically trying to dismantle what we have always done best with education--real critical thinking. Real creative, highly educated adults. STEM is only half, maybe less of any kind of real education. If you think rote memorization of fundamental laws is all there is to life, then you probably deserve the misery that you have absolutely brought upon yourself.
...and of course, this all plays into the same assault on education, explicitly by the GOP over the last several decades: convince the rubes that they just need to be unquestioning, functioning automatons that are highly-functional tech wizzes, they will never challenge what is going on around them. They won't care to observe, won't care to think for themselves, because they will be fat and happy in what is, fundamentally, a mediocre life compared to the trajectory that it was on 4 decades ago--when we decided to take all of their wealth from them, and give it to their bosses. They will be "happy enough," never accepting or ever believing that they are fundamentally valued at 60-70% less than what they were worth in the mid-70s. ...We took that from them, but they will never care, because they no longer trust "the elites," they are incapable of critical thinking and thus forming any kind of rational argument when challenged by the actual smart people that point out these fundamental facts to them--but it doesn't matter, because they don't care. They don't know what they don't know, so while they will continue to fail in defending what is their actual mediocrity, it won't matter because they don't believe. Truth is belief, and that is all they care about. Their brains are our prisoners, and that is all we ever wanted of them. Keep them fat and content, they will never know the theft that we have been funneling from them for decades. This, quite plainly, is modern conservatism. It is the plain truth, and best explained the then-scion of conservatism in his time, Barry Goldwater, and what he predicted is exactly what is, today, the modern conservative: ignorant to the core because they fundamentally lack the tools to know what they don't know--because faith is truth. Facts aren't facts when faith is all that matters. These are dangerous people, to any democracy. It simply can not work with them participating.
You can't talk to these people. You can't rationalize with them, because they have been conditioned from childhood to invent their own truths, and so they only find comfort in a political party that allows this expressly, and simply demands of them that they never question, never challenge. Remain fat and happy, distrust and smear those "elites" that mock your ignorance, that challenge your belief...oh but trust
us. because we are the best!