Posted on 10/25/2007 5:31:26 AM PDT by Ouderkirk
Liberals are tremendously attached to the idea that we are apes, but are unwilling to face the fact that we humans still retain an awful lot of our ape programming. This is what led to the Christian concept of Original Sin and the Jewish concept that we are all born with both the urge to good and the urge to evil. And this programming is not identical for men and women, because behavior that enables a male chimp to pass his genes on might get a female chimp a new home in a saber-toothed tiger's stomach.
Sometimes when I read about the manifestations of this ape programming I'm pretty disgusted. Here's one, and this one reflects badly on both sexes: stepfathers (or "mother's boyfriend") are significantly more likely to abuse and even kill children than anyone else. This behavior is seen in plenty of other mammals as well: when new males come in and take over a territory, they kill or drive off the adult males, kill all the children, and mate with the females. The females seldom attempt to protect their young; instead they start producing new young with the new males. This behavior is seen in lions, monkeys, and humans. Appalling, yes, but if our ancestors hadn't had this programming, they wouldn't be our ancestors. A female who objected to this arrangement, unless she was a human female living in the very recent past, would have been killed or driven out of the tribe to fend for herself. A male who refrained from this behavior would not have reproduced. This was a matter of survival for our ancestors, both human and primate, so we really shouldn't condemn them for it. Condemning modern humans for it, of course, is entirely appropriate.
But, you rightly protest, we're not mere apes. Can't we expect better from civilized humans? Of course we can, and should. The point is that the programming is still there. When I see something shiny I might have the same impulse as a gorilla to bop the guy who has it on the head and snatch it away, but unlike that gorilla, I will restrain myself. It isn't my sterling moral character alone that makes it possible for me to let my neighbor keep his shiny things, though. Nor is the threat of going to prison the chief deterrent. The real deterrents are my conviction that taking someone else's shiny things by force is wrong, the belief that God wouldn't approve, and the knowledge that everyone who knows me would give me dirty looks. That is to say, philosophy, religion, and manners.
The whole point of civilization - of philosophy, religion, and manners - is to bolster us against our instinctive behavior. I'm sure I don't have to explain how giving in to our instincts to grab, hurt others, be lazy, etc. will destroy all the benefits of civilization.
Notice that liberals are the avowed enemies of all three of these bulwarks against instinct. According to liberals, philosophy is just a conceited attempt for us humans to convince ourselves that we're special, religion is a device for oppressing the masses, and manners are hypocrisy to keep the lower classes down. Liberals work hard to liberate themselves from everything that helps humans behave better than apes, and consequently they have no defense from their own instincts. I have joked that they are so enamoured of the theory of evolution that they are determined to demonstrate by their behavior that they are nothing more than apes.
This is why, for example, schoolteachers, almost all of whom are female and liberal, make no effort to discourage violence in the classroom. Ever since our distant ancestors grew fur, female survival has depended upon placating and currying favor with rampaging males, and that programming is still with us. A conservative woman understands in some way that seeing a violent male triggers that impulse in her, even if the violent male is six years old and can't really hurt her; for most of human and primate history, violent males have travelled in packs, so the fact that one in particular isn't a real threat doesn't prevent them from triggering this instinct. Because the conservative woman understands this impulse, though she might describe it differently from the way I have, and because she has the support of philosophy, religion and manners to act against this impulse, she can stand up to that dangerous creature, a male intent on violence, and tell him to go stand in the corner until he can behave.
Almost all teachers have renounced the supports that would have made this possible, so they are left with the instinctive response of a female chimpanzee to a bunch of male chimpanzees who are running around throwing things, hooting loudly, and assaulting other chimps: to yield to them and curry favor with them. Even the companion behavior, also nearly universal in schoolteachers, of punishing girls or smaller boys foolish enough to protest to being battered by the little alpha males, also makes sense in an evolutionary context: when new men came into the village and killed all the men of the tribe, if some females objected to providing food and sex to the men who had murdered their fathers and brothers, the wrath of the conquering males could well mean several dead females. These teachers are punishing the girls who complain about being bullied by boys while letting the boys wreak havoc unchecked in an effort to defend the tribe from annihilation.
There are other examples as well. Female jurors are significantly more likely to acquit violent criminals. Only a few decades ago, most states sensibly did not permit women to serve on murder juries. Since this has changed, the degree of violent crime in America and Europe has gone from "almost none" to "off the charts".
There are dozens of books and hundreds of articles speculating on why Japanese schools are so much better and less dangerous than ours, but all of them carefully avoid mentioning the true reason: 80% of Japanese schoolteachers are men. As long as we leave education in the control of women, schools will remain hotbeds of violence where little if any learning takes place.
What makes humans different from apes is that we are capable of rising above our instincts. What makes civilization different from barbarism is the systems that help us to do so in large numbers. But the instincts will never go away. Communism was based on the premise that humans don't have instincts and that all those impulses can be programmed away. It doesn't work. The instincts have to be channelled. My desire for a shiny bauble like my neighbor's can't be wiped out, but it can be channelled into me working hard enough to make enough money to have a bauble of my own.
Pretty much all males have an urge to bonk each other over the head and steal each other's women and shiny things, but I presume most of you has never clobbered another guy for an iPod, though you might have thought about it. The urges aren't going to go away. But if you're not a liberal, you don't have to act on them.
Well, I looked at your “about page” and since we have some things in common, I read the article in full. I think it’s pretty much poppycock (my female tends ask me to ‘bop’ any aggressive male that threatens our domain rather than quivering and submitting to them as the article suggests is natural, for example — I keep various weapons around for this purpose). I’ve also seen plenty of female school teachers put the kabosh on kids (isn’t that a big part of what mothering is about?). Anyway, maybe it would get through to a left-wing secularist with the “male and female he created them concept” but I still think I was right in my basic and quick judgment that the article had little to offer me since it is written from an incorrect secular perspective and is poorly thought out even within that context.
- Disciple - In Christianity, the disciples were the students of Jesus during his ministry. The gospels refer to varying numbers of disciples. The term disciple is derived from the New Testament Greek word μαθἡτἡς., coming to English by way of the Latin discipulus. Disciple should not be confused with apostle, meaning "messenger, he that is sent". While a disciple is one who learns from a teacher, a student, an apostle is sent to deliver those teachings to others.
- a branch of knowledge; "in what discipline is his doctorate?"; "teachers should be well trained in their subject"; "anthropology is the study of ...
- a system of rules of conduct or method of practice; "he quickly learned the discipline of prison routine"; "for such a plan to work requires discipline";
- the trait of being well behaved; "he insisted on discipline among the troops"
- training to improve strength or self-control
- train by instruction and practice; especially to teach self-control; "Parents must discipline their children"; "Is this dog trained?"
- the act of punishing; "the offenders deserved the harsh discipline they received"
- punish in order to gain control or enforce obedience; "The teacher disciplined the pupils rather frequently"
What a steaming pile of horse excrement. My mother is a teacher. She discourages violence and has broken up more fights in the hallway than most of you have even witnessed. I dare say she’s more effective at keeping kids from fighting than anyone I’ve ever seen, male or female.
Just an aside, but I think that writer’s that are going to talk about religious concepts should have someone they trust (like their priest or pastor, or if they are not religious, an intelligent Christian friend) to run the article by to make sure they are making sense theologically.
True enough, but I think the article was directed at secularists.
A wise old teacher once said,
“Never hit a child in anger, in front of witnesses.”
bump
What did you expect? It was written by a girl! :-)
My wife is a school administrator and spent 9 years in a classroom prior. There is a large amount of truth in what the writer suggests. Since the schools are largely staffed by women (administrators, teachers, and aids) they tend to view discipline as the enemy of enthusiasm for learning. My wife complains of weak teachers who easily lose control of their classrooms and do not have the desire/ability to mete out appropriate discipline to regain control. They want to be liked by the students and many are afraid of indignant parents who object when their little angel is disciplined for bad behavior. Part of that is the pattern of weak administrators (again, mostly women) who allow parents to run roughshod over them about punishments for their little devils.
The situation is very complicated but there is a pervasive pattern of weak willed people who gravitate towards the education field who fail to grasp the magnitude of not standing firm when little junior gets in a rage. This applies to teachers as well as administrators.
The liberal leanings of those who are attracted to education is undeniable. Teachers complain that they are underpaid for someone with a master’s degree. But consider that most schools are in session for 180 days. The average private sector worker works 260 days. At $300 per day the teacher makes $55k. $300 x 260 = $78K. That is right in line with what the private sector pays for mid-level experience master’s degreed professional.
The schools are closed shop unionized. The education establishment from the schools who teach future educators or staffed by some of the weakest among us. It is provable that the education departments of any university have the highest GPA and the lowest overall IQ, where schools of hard sciences and engineering have the lowest overall GPA and the highest IQ’s. These institutions set up filters to weed out undesirables (read conservatives) from gaining credentials to teach. Men may very well go into education, but most of the male teachers and administrators with whom my wife works are de-balled liberal eunuchs who couldn’t think their way out of a wet paper bag.
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