What I meant in the article was that the Progressives understood the psychology in creating an environment that “molded” the child into the model that the Progressives wanted. They created forced public schooling and lowered the ages for indoctrination of children to get them away from the influence of family because their minds were more “plastic”.
Parents, even very religious ones, did not understand the covert psychological conditioning that was put into the Prussian school models of single grades which used humiliation as a way to get children to conform to the “one way of thinking”.
Skinner, Freud, and Pavlov, etc... were just coming out with their theories and most people had never heard of them while their ideas were incorporated into schools by the elites who had infiltrated the Universities.
True, there was a moral vacuum which was very evident in the roaring 20’s, but with the Great Depression, people populated the churches again. What they didn’t realize at the time was that schools were undermining their values for six hours, five days a week. The schools were increasing the time that children had to be held captive in the schools so that parental influence would be less pervasive.
I think you are discounting the incredible influence that teachers (esp. when using psychology) have over captive children who seek approval and are among peers. Even adults in group situations can be manipulated. Children are much, much easier to mold.
If I inadvertently gave you that impression, I am sorry. Most certainly, I agree with you. But there is still a different (and harder) question, who let those teachers in, who opened the door to them?
You say, for instance, that "with the Great Depression, people populated the churches again. What they didn’t realize at the time was that schools were undermining their values for six hours, five days a week." Very true. But that applies, as you point out, to their children. Those parents, however, voted for FDR who promulgated fascist policies (control of the industry, rather than ownership, as communists prefer) that were in fashion at the time in the West. (You may like "FDR's folly," if you have not read it already). They voted in the "progressive" Wilson even before WW I. What teachers are responsible for that?
When I tried to answer such questions, I go back in time in order to find those "teachers of teachers," and end up at a point I mentioned in the previous post: the Enlightenment. Religion started to retreat, and each "enlightened" generation served as teachers for even more "enlightened" children. The more vacuum was left, the more it was filled, generation after generation, by various forms of the ideology to which we now refer as "leftism." When looking at the current situation, therefore, I cannot help but feel as if I am looking at the tip of an iceberg, merely the latest stage of a long, long process. McCarty probably felt the same: it could not be allowed to get any worse, that process must be stopped at any cost. But it did get worse.
Having said this, I realized that this too has roots in psychology. Some Germans felt similarly during the rise of Hitler: it cannot get any worse. But it did. The purges and other atrocities perpetrated by Stalin have also left some Russians (even the initial believers in Marxism) wonder: can it possibly get any worse. And it still did. "It's not the worst of times if we can say it is," said Shakespeare (in King Lear, I think, but I am not sure).
I have faith in this country and think that a revival is possible. It may take, however, some unimaginable catastrophe --- a civil war, a dictatorship or some such thing that now seems so remote.
"Praised be he who permits the forbidden..."---Tsvi Sabbatai, circa 1666