Posted on 12/19/2006 6:55:51 PM PST by wintertime
(snip)
It goes back to January 2002, when Juneau-Douglas High School student Joseph Frederick held up a sign emblazoned with "Bong Hits 4 Jesus" as the Olympic torch passed through Juneau, Alaska. Frederick refused to put the sign down when principal Deborah Morse ordered him to, so Morse suspended him, asserting that she could not allow a student to encourage illegal drug use and defy her instructions.
Because citizens have a right to expect that the schools for which they pay won't permit behavior that disrupts learning, or promotes illegal activity, Morse did what she had to. But then there are those pesky competing values again: While districts must maintain order, government may not punish speech just because some people find it inappropriate.
"We thought we had a free-speech right to display a humorous saying," Frederick has explained.
Unfortunately, while Frederick's sign might have been unique (though not, frankly, all that funny), neither the fight over it, nor the Seattle and Louisville cases, is the least bit novel. The sad reality is that public schooling forces Americans to fight constant, values-laden battles not just over race or free speech, but a myriad of other issues as well, including sex education, religious expression, homosexuality, evolution, and so on. And brace yourselves, because the Christmas season sparks some of the fiercest battles of all.
These conflicts are inevitable: No school can simultaneously respect all speech and censor disruptive expression; engineer integration and be colorblind; celebrate Christmas and be totally secular; and so on. As a result, citizens have no choice but to engage in political combat to get what they want from the schools they are forced to fund.
Thankfully, since these battles have a common cause, they also have a common solution: Unfettered school choice, in which the public ensures that everyone can afford an education, but individual parents and autonomous schools decide what values they'll embrace.
Want a racially diverse student body, as many parents, both black and white, do? Pick a school that has one. Not fond of kids talking up bongs? Choose a private institution where children check their speech rights at the door. Want to end the fighting? Let parents select the schools they like, and the underlying cause of combat will disappear.
Whether it's an issue as contentious as race, or as strange as a kid's sign about bongs, public education is beset by constant political warfare. But it doesn't have to be. All we need to do is set people free.
Neal McCluskey is an education-policy analyst at the Cato Institute's Center for Educational Freedom, and author of the upcoming Cato study "Why We Fight: How Public Schools Create Social Conflict."
Then there are the free speech issues. The case mentioned above plainly illustrates that government schools can NOT respect the citizens right to free speech, free press, free expression of religion, and free assembly. Government schools tell students to shut up for a large portion of the day, and then, when the child is allowed to speak, his speech is tightly regulated. He can not publish freely. The government, for most of the time a child is in school dictates with whom the child can associate.
If the child refuses to participate, he and his parents are given the "Godfather's" offer that they can't refuse: Go to government school prison ( oops! school) or face armed police, court, and foster care action, or, pay both private school tuition and government school taxes. The cost of private school tuition is really a religious tax to escape the government clutches, or homeschool ( again with serious **extra** financial costs).
If the taxpayer objects to the government school trampling of his freedom of conscience, too bad! He too is given the government "Godfather's" offer he can't refuse: Pay for an abhorant government school curriculum that undermines the his religious, cultural, and political beliefs, or have his home and business sold at sheriff's auction. ( Real bullets in those guns on the hip.)
The education of children never was, never can be, and never will be religiously, morally, ethically, culturally, or politically neutra. NEVER! It is impossible, because it is the passing on of the important values and history of a culture. It can never be all inclusive because time and money or finite. Choices must be made as to what to cover and what to ignore. In making those choices government schools uphold the religion, culture, and politics of some and destroy that of others.
Great article and your commentary is right on the money!
Exactly - education is culture. If I am teaching my culture, you are prevented from simultaneously teaching your culture.It is blindingly obvious - but how many refuse to consider it? None so blind.
The whole First Amendment thing is remarkably simple, if you are willing to accept the actual meaning of it. But most people - not to mention the Supreme Court - have to make it complicated to keep its actual meaning from goring their own ox.
Freedom of speech, and of the press, simply means that I can speak if you can speak - but no one has to listen to me if they prefer to listen to you - or to neither of us. I can print if you can print - but no one has to read what I print, either. And by implication, I can post a web site if you can post a web site, and anybody or nobody can pay attention to it. And by the same implication, I can transmit on the radio if you can transmit on the radio.
But of course, that's not the way the law reads, is it? Principled interpretation of the First Amendment would destroy broadcasting just as it would destroy government schooling.
Good. Please ping me when you do!
Ping.
BTTT
If anything, the Public School system needs to start actually doing what the taxpayers are allegedly paying them to do: TEACH OUR YOUNG PEOPLE THE BASIC AND FUNDAMENTAL SKILLS NEEDED FOR THEM TO SUCCEED IN THE WORKFORCE.
They also need to stop wasting time and money on garbage and become competitive.
...This could be done if the Teachers' Unions would also quit politicizing and place the focus on getting American children learning.
I agree 100% about the uselessness of the NEA and am glad I work in a right to work state so I do not have to be part of the union. I have friends in other states that do not have a choice. They must be members and dues are taken out without consent. That is wrong. Unfortunately that type of coercion boosts the NEA numbers and coffers.
In addition, I am constantly FED UP with any new and improved reading program that comes down the pike. What schools are trying to do is to foolproof reading education, which can't be done because there are just too many ways to reach too many kids. It takes an educated teacher to figure out the balance between whole language and phonics to reach a kid who isn't cracking the code.
'I agree 100% about the uselessness of the NEA and am glad I work in a right to work state so I do not have to be part of the union. I have friends in other states that do not have a choice. They must be members and dues are taken out without consent. That is wrong. Unfortunately that type of coercion boosts the NEA numbers and coffers.'
That's definitely a problem out here in California. I've seen many a good educator leave the field because of the ATF and NEA.
But I certainly do appreciate those like you who are hanging in there and fighting the good fight, actually doing what Teachers are supposed to do: Build the future leadership of this country.
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