Posted by
Josh Kon on Wednesday, January 21, 2009 8:50:00 PM
Schools are just for education, detractors claim; school is not the place to embrace or reject any particular moral or value, educated critics argue; figuring out those things should be left to the individual -- and if we're lucky, their family -- they whine.
There is my best attempt to encapsulate a widely-held position regarding public school education (of course, with a bit of satire -- there are no "educated" critics). Yet with this position alone, I have few complaints; it is not wholly unreasonable.
But as with most arguments put forward by those with whom I disagree, I am angered most not by their argument's lack of reason. Nor am I most frustrated by my ideological opponent's inability to support their position with anything but the fact that "they just 'feel' that way." Rather I am most annoyed by my cultural counterpart's apparent contempt for intellectual consistency -- their hypocrisy.
More specifically, those that take offense to the morals or values engendered by things like a) non-sectarian school-prayer, b) classes that let our children be proud of our country, or c) courses which embrace the truth that a child deserves a father and a mother, among many others, do so frequently based on the claim that, if anywhere, school is not the place for such pedagogy. This might appear to be a sane position for one to take, so long as they take it everywhere -- yet they don't.
I am wiling to bet that the same people who gag at the mere thought of teaching children horrible ideas, like that one should save themselves for marriage, would not get so nauseous about teachers explaining to their students that a person's race is as important as their shoe size? So, what happened to not teaching kids morals or values? Let the children figure out for themselves whether they want to hate a person just because the color of their skin is white.
Do not misunderstand me. I am not in any way suggesting that a teacher should not tell a child to be blind to another's skin color. Quite the contrary, I believe that is not only a teacher's right but their duty. I am one, however, who believes that education does have a role in passing on our values and morals to the next generation; it's those whiners that don't.