“This kind of thing” certainly focuses your rebuttal.
Why should the tax payer fund several years of fake knowledge or socialist indoctrination? Let support – if required – come from the gaining entity: unions, political organizations, foreign enemies, etc.
I would concede, given how tax money is so often wasted anyway, that there may be value in subsidizing studies of value to the economy (strength of the nation)such as medicine, hard science, engineering.