Critique of the dumbing down of America – How Liberalism Destroyed Our Educational System [BLOG] by Robbie Cooper
Well, if nothing else, this blog post was enlightening. I’ve heard of a number of other
downfalls of our educational system, including the inability to fire bad teachers
due to overprotective unions, the lack of adequate compensation for good
teachers, and even inadequate after-school programs to encourage kids to engage
in further learning, but never liberalism. Props for creativity. Robbie Cooper.
The basic claim of this post is that the American educational system has undergone
a “socialist/communist takeover” resulting in “globally conscious and useful
human[s]”; in short, our children have fallen party to “progressive thinking”
and it needs to stop. Personally, I find this a compelling argument for sending
children to public school. The author, however, disagrees. Instead, he suggests
home schooling as an acceptable alternative.
Given the caricaturized conservative language (“oh
hell yeah…war has solved plenty of
shit”), I’m going to go ahead and assume that this post is for the benefit of
similarly-minded conservatives, the ones that like “dogs, hunting, fishing,
[and] building forts in the green belt.”
Most of the author’s evidence about our supposedly
failing educational system is from personal experience and in reference to a
book that he has not yet read, although one of his frequent contributors enthusiastically
recommends it (“really this old lady has put together a great piece of
information here.”) The author’s (and his contributor’s) credibility is thus
somewhat questionable.
Regarding his post’s argument, as compelling as is
his laundry list of Republican values, I don’t follow his logic. He wants his
child to be “a critical thinker, a self-reliant and self-assured boy who takes
responsibility for his own actions…who deeply loves his country…understands
that nothing is free…etc.” But how is this mutually exclusive of a public
education? If he wants his child to be a critical thinker, he must expose the
boy to a variety of different viewpoints. And while I’ll agree public school systems
do tend to lean left (war is bad, white men have done a lot of damage
historically, etc.), snatching your child out of this system to raise them in a
sheltered, ultra-conservative (as I’ll assume by the content of this blog) environment
is only going to teach him to preach to the choir, should the boy choose to
adopt those same sheltered, ultra-conservative viewpoints. Without a public
forum in which to express his views and have those views challenged, the child
will be ill-prepared to tactfully deal with others with whom he disagrees. Most
of my teachers would have gladly entertained debate with a student over the
course material, if only to break up the lull of other students swallowing the information
“no questions asked”. If the author thinks his son will be so easily
brainwashed, he has too little faith in his child.
As for homeschooling, I feel the author has
little understanding of the scope of the project he has volunteered to
undertake for his child. Few parents have the time or the intellectual
dexterity to teach their children all the material they need to learn,
especially past the elementary level.
The contributor’s suggestion that the author
borrow books from the 1870s borders on silly. In the late 1800s they were
missing 55 elements in the periodic table, World Wars I and II had not yet been
fought, and…you get the picture.
And finally, regarding public education making
his son a “girly man,” I’m not going to honor that with a response.
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