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The Case Against Public Education ( Abolish it!)
American Thinker ^ | December 26, 2012 | By Daren Jonescu

Posted on 12/26/2012 11:03:12 AM PST by wintertime

If public education is allowed to survive, all efforts to resuscitate the inert husk of modern civilization will fail. It is time to unravel the most wasteful and destructive entitlement program of all. .

(snip)

For years, reasonable and serious people have known that the educational establishment is at the root of the undoing of modernity and its natural political fruit, individual liberty. And for years, excepting a tiny, brave minority of parents and educators, most citizens have assumed that the problems of the education system, however grave, are to be resolved through legislative reforms, bureaucratic changes, or school board activism.

Such methods, though often undertaken with the noblest of intentions, have always failed, in spite of the few heartening but minor victories that may have been won on the way to ultimate defeat. This general failure is inevitable, as treating the superficial symptoms of a fatal disease will always be, whatever temporary relief such treatment may bring to the sufferer.

It is time for all those who have struggled in frustration to change "the system" -- and that includes the brave minority of public school teachers who have chosen to stand quixotically against the progressive avalanche -- to band together with other advocates of freedom and virtue in taking a bolder step: acknowledge that the system itself is rigged to fail, or, at its worst, to "succeed" on evil terms. Acknowledge that, implausible as it may sound to most people at this early stage, if you really want to raise a generation of rational, decent adults prepared to shrug off the chains that today's majority has accepted in exchange for its "fair share" of the state's ill-gotten booty, you must emancipate the next generation of young adults from progressivism's universal indoctrination program.

(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: arth
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To: Revolting cat!
I haven't accused anyone of supporting slavery. This is **your** strawman. You own it.

However...

Definition of slavery from Websters:

Slavery:: submission to a dominating influence

Is compulsory attendance and compulsory funding of government indoctrination centers ( Oops! “schools”) under the threat of armed police and court action qualify as “submission to a dominating influence”?

I think that ....?..., “Yes it is! It is definitely a form of tyranny!” That is my conclusion.

41 posted on 12/26/2012 1:21:54 PM PST by wintertime
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To: wintertime
Public education is government controlled means of production, the very definition of socialism.

Socialism can not be reformed, it can only be replaced by freedom.

That's all you need to know about government schools.

42 posted on 12/26/2012 1:24:22 PM PST by Jabba the Nutt (.Are they stupid, malicious or evil?)
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To: raybbr
Do think people should NOT be allowed to create a local public school system if they want to?
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Sure! Provided children are not compelled to attend ( by threat of police action) and citizens are not compelled ( by threat of police or court action) to pay taxes toward it.

For example: I think it would be completely acceptable for an HOA ( Homeowners association) to have have its own school(s). Citizens are completely free to buy or not buy a home in a community with an HOA.

Please remember that government schools can not be religiously, politically, or culturally neutral. No school can be. Another is government schools, just like all schools, must strictly control speech, press, assembly, exercise of religion and all indoctrinate the students in a non-neutral religious worldview.

Government should NOT be in the business of compulsory attendance and compulsory funded socialist-based school because to do so trashes the First Amendment Rights and freedom of conscience of its citizens. The most powerful voting mob gets to crush the human rights of the less politically powerful.

43 posted on 12/26/2012 1:30:13 PM PST by wintertime
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To: Jabba the Nutt

You get it.

Socialism is slavery to the voting mob.


44 posted on 12/26/2012 1:31:04 PM PST by wintertime
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To: Dick Bachert

Thomas Jefferson believed an EDUCATED PUBLIC to be the cornerstone of the system he and the other Founders TRIED to leave behind.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

An education is likely the last thing a child will get in a government school.


45 posted on 12/26/2012 1:33:11 PM PST by wintertime
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To: Dick Bachert
Until the sane adults in America get a handle on the government schools (aka indoctrination centers), they will continue to churn out millions of new little socialists and they will ultimately "elect" our very own Hitler. Hell, they probably already have.

In fact they did, and moreover they just reelected him.

46 posted on 12/26/2012 1:36:16 PM PST by Marathoner (Our forefathers would be shooting by now.)
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To: Mr Ramsbotham
In a few decades the **same** arguments used to defend government schools will be used to defend ObamanationCare.

Also...if the words “slave” and “slavery” are used to substitute for “school”, “child”, and “student”, the same arguments used to defend socialist-entitlement schooling were the arguments used to defend slavery. .....Hm?......Maybe that is because socialism is slavery with softer handcuffs.

By the way,....In one tiny and minuscule way slavery is better that socialism. At least a private individual was holding the whip. In socialism, ( government schooling **is** socialism) the bullets in the gun are on the hips of government police and the sting of punishment is from government sanctioned courts.

47 posted on 12/26/2012 1:41:44 PM PST by wintertime
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To: Gene Eric
The dominating Leftwing faction of media is a greater threat in my opinion.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

A dominating Leftwing media would be impossible in a nation of morally grounded, God-fearing, and educated citizens ( as Jefferson warned) .

A morally well-grounded, God-fearing, and education citizenry can not be produced in a socialist-funded, single-payer, and compulsory system of indoctrination centers. All it took was one to three generations of this indoctrination to give us Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Example:

Beginning of state ordered socialist-entitlement schooling: 1853
My great-grandparents born 1860s
My grandparents born 1890s
My parents born 1913

All of the generations above thought Franklin D. Roosevelt walked on water and that socialism was their redeemer and savior. That is was socialist school does to a free people in less than 3 generations.

48 posted on 12/26/2012 1:51:06 PM PST by wintertime
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To: wintertime
All of the generations above thought Franklin D. Roosevelt walked on water and that socialism was their redeemer and savior. That is was socialist school does to a free people in less than 3 generations.

Agreed. My elders, who pretty much all lived in rural Tennessee and who were fairly conservative on most things, thought FDR was one step below Jesus Himself due to TVA.

49 posted on 12/26/2012 2:00:41 PM PST by Marathoner (Our forefathers would be shooting by now.)
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To: wintertime

Chicken, egg.

If the media was reporting the truth about schools, ...


50 posted on 12/26/2012 2:53:34 PM PST by Gene Eric (Demoralization is a weapon of the enemy. Don't get it, don't spread it!)
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To: wintertime

BTW, Andrew Carnegie was a big proponent of public edu.


51 posted on 12/26/2012 2:54:41 PM PST by Gene Eric (Demoralization is a weapon of the enemy. Don't get it, don't spread it!)
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To: wintertime

The problem with public schools, and to a large extent with private schools today is that administrators and teachers are unable to distinguish philosophy from religion.

There are only three ways to think about reality. You can can a philosophic idealist (Plato, Lao Tzu) a philosophic realist (Aristotle, Confucius) or you can be a Sophist (De Sade, Heidegger)

Protestants and Greek Orthodox following Agustin early Church Fathers are typically philosophic idealist and this is reflected in their theology. Catholics follow Aquinas who was following Aristotle are typically philosophic realist. (Notice I am not advocating one over the other)

However, if you make an argument for ethics or morality from an idealist perspective in a school setting the idiots in charge call you a Baptist. If you try and make the argument as a philosophic realist you are denounced as a Catholic. Thus all that is left to the educator is the Sophistry that is Post Modernism.

While Idealism and Realism are different in many ways the ancients realized that the true enemy was was Sophistry and both were ways to combat it.

It is impossible to have any meaningful educational reform until educators understand this. Public schools should be, in their current incarnation be abolished because they teach Sophistry


52 posted on 12/26/2012 3:05:44 PM PST by Fai Mao
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To: wintertime

Public educations was good when it was strictly on a local basis and paid by (and controlled by) local taxpayers. When it became funded by state and federal government it went straight to the socialist way of life.

I started school in 1950 and the percentage of tax paid by my parents for my education for 12 years was NOTHING compared to the same costs for a 1 to 12 education today.

I believe that property owners (and renters who pay property tax as part of their lease or rent payment) should ONLY pay school taxes WHILE THEIR CHILDREN ATTEND SCHOOL.....................PERIOD!

Don’t make people like me (66 years old) pay my entire lifetime for a “piss poor” socialist indoctrination of our little liberal zombies at a cost that is simply stupefying and cannot be justified at all.

When people have to pay for their children’s education while they actually attend school they will be one hell of a lot more concerned with both the quality and scope of the education they are paying for. If they know that they will pay up to 12 years for their own children’s education and then be forced to pay another (estimated) 75 years for other people’s children and have no say about it.....wouldn’t that be a clear case of forced servitude to the government and wouldn’t that be called Socialism?

It’s time for a property tax revolt.


53 posted on 12/26/2012 3:06:57 PM PST by DH (Once the tainted finger of government touches anything the rot begins)
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To: oldenuff2no
The top producers from our schools right now are not from home schools but are Asians who attend our public schools.

And you don't attribute any of that to the "public school" part, do you?

because that would be stupid.

54 posted on 12/26/2012 3:12:45 PM PST by Trailerpark Badass (So?)
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To: wintertime

The problem with public schools, and to a large extent with private schools today is that administrators and teachers are unable to distinguish philosophy from religion.

There are only three ways to think about reality. You can can a philosophic idealist (Plato, Lao Tzu) a philosophic realist (Aristotle, Confucius) or you can be a Sophist (De Sade, Heidegger)

Protestants and Greek Orthodox following Agustin and early Church Fathers are typically philosophic idealist and this is reflected in their theology. Catholics follow Aquinas who was following Aristotle are typically philosophic realist. (Notice I am not advocating one over the other)

However, if you make an argument for ethics or morality from an idealist perspective in a school setting the idiots in charge call you a Baptist. If you try and make the argument as a philosophic realist you are denounced as a Catholic. Thus all that is left to the educator is the Sophistry that is Post Modernism.

While Idealism and Realism are different in many ways the ancients realized that the true enemy was was Sophistry and both were ways to combat it.

It is impossible to have any meaningful educational reform until educators understand this. Public schools should be, in their current incarnation be abolished because they teach Sophistry


55 posted on 12/26/2012 3:15:12 PM PST by Fai Mao
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To: raybbr
Do think people should NOT be allowed to create a local public school system if they want to?

Sure, as long as funding is voluntary.

Do I think people should be allowed to make other people pay for their kid's education? Not only no, but...

56 posted on 12/26/2012 3:15:28 PM PST by Trailerpark Badass (So?)
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To: Fai Mao
It is impossible to have any meaningful educational reform until educators understand this. Public schools should be, in their current incarnation be abolished because they teach Sophistry
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Socialist-funded, single-payer, and compulsory schooling must be abolished because they can not be philosophically, religiously, culturally, or politically neutral. It is impossible for any sentient being to be in a state of such neutrality. It can't exist.

When government owns and runs schools, the most politically powerful will have the government ESTABLISH their anointed and NON-neutral worldview. The less powerful have their freedom of conscience and First Amendment human rights crushed.

It is a conundrum that has no resolution. IT CAN NOT BE FIXED!

Fundamentally...Government schools are a freedom of conscience and First Amendment abomination. That they are also failures academically is secondary to the crushing of the human spirit.

Some institutions must be shut down because they are, to their core, oppressive to the very nature of what it means to be human. They must be shut down even if those enslaved in the institution are worse off materially after emancipation. Slavery is one of these institutions. Government compelled incarceration in a government indoctrination camp is another.

In two tiny ways, the institution of slavery was actually better than government schooling. At least the government didn't force citizens to pay taxes to support it or force citizens to use or buy slaves. Also, in slavery, the whip was held in private hands. In government schooling it is the government police and government courts that do the punishing.

57 posted on 12/26/2012 3:16:28 PM PST by wintertime
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To: RobbyS

History is replete with self-taught geniuses, with no more elaborate instruction than God’s own creation to inspire their beautiful minds.


58 posted on 12/26/2012 3:18:24 PM PST by Trailerpark Badass (So?)
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To: wintertime

As is demonstrated with the private Saturday schools I often pass in Asian neighborhoods.


59 posted on 12/26/2012 3:23:54 PM PST by tbw2
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To: DH
Public educations was good when it was strictly on a local basis and paid by (and controlled by) local taxpayers.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Would slavery be good if controlled locally? Really?

Well....Government schooling can NOT be religiously, politically, or culturally neutral. It is WRONG for any voting mob to impose its anointed and NON-neutral worldview on other people's children, and imprison children in its government buildings, by threat of government police and court action. It is WRONG for the government to force citizens to pay for this abomination by way of police threat.

The above is true for slavery or government schooling whether the community consists of 30 people or 300 MILLION.

Fundamentally..,. Government schooling is a freedom of conscience and First Amendment human ABUSE! It must be ended even if those enslaved in the system are worse off after emancipation.

60 posted on 12/26/2012 3:25:07 PM PST by wintertime
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