Saturday, March 06, 2004
Censorship stupifies; Education atrophies
OpinionJournal - Taste: "A college professor informed me that a new textbook in human development includes the following statement: 'As a folksinger once sang, how many roads must an individual walk down before you can call them an adult.' The professor was stupified that someone had made the line gender-neutral and ungrammatical by rewriting Bob Dylan's folk song 'Blowin' in the Wind,' which had simply asked: 'How many roads must a man walk down before you call him a man?'"
This in an article about the editing of books to be politically correct in various ways. My fellow citizens are undoubtedly ignorant of history, their political system, and are most likely quite ignorant and stupid (words that are themselves politically incorrect) because of such works. It's too bad that most people learn about the world through such moderated sources such as textbooks and the newspaper (or through even lesser sources such as pop culture) and fail to have the initiative to learn on their own.
Maybe I can change that; at least the foreign policy society (which I should be attending this week) is working to further discourse (although among the already educated).
UPDATE: Here's an interesting piece that discusses parents demanding that their children be given a free pass to an A in school.
"I've had many depressing conferences on such subjects as why a particular student didn't earn a better grade and on why the course must include some content to be learned at home (i.e., doing the assigned readings). I've even had to explain to parents that yes, copying during a test constitutes cheating, and so does plagiarism. The common denominator in almost all of my parent contacts is this: whatever the issue is, they blame the school and the teacher. If a student's grade is low, it's because the content is too hard (funny, nobody has ever said that the content was reasonable but that I wasn't skilled at teaching it). If the student can't be bothered to do any homework, I'm told that all learning and practice should happen during school hours. If the student cheats, it's because I made it so hard that they had to. Two parents have even claimed that I told the students to cheat, and then punished them for it (i.e., they claimed entrapment)."
*Shudder* Oh, I hope that I find a professorship at a decent institution should I choose to pursue a Ph.D in history. It's a pitty that most people are stupid (at least the parents in that article are). Yeah, stupid. I'm sticking by that word. It has a simple, blunt effect that I like.
This in an article about the editing of books to be politically correct in various ways. My fellow citizens are undoubtedly ignorant of history, their political system, and are most likely quite ignorant and stupid (words that are themselves politically incorrect) because of such works. It's too bad that most people learn about the world through such moderated sources such as textbooks and the newspaper (or through even lesser sources such as pop culture) and fail to have the initiative to learn on their own.
Maybe I can change that; at least the foreign policy society (which I should be attending this week) is working to further discourse (although among the already educated).
UPDATE: Here's an interesting piece that discusses parents demanding that their children be given a free pass to an A in school.
"I've had many depressing conferences on such subjects as why a particular student didn't earn a better grade and on why the course must include some content to be learned at home (i.e., doing the assigned readings). I've even had to explain to parents that yes, copying during a test constitutes cheating, and so does plagiarism. The common denominator in almost all of my parent contacts is this: whatever the issue is, they blame the school and the teacher. If a student's grade is low, it's because the content is too hard (funny, nobody has ever said that the content was reasonable but that I wasn't skilled at teaching it). If the student can't be bothered to do any homework, I'm told that all learning and practice should happen during school hours. If the student cheats, it's because I made it so hard that they had to. Two parents have even claimed that I told the students to cheat, and then punished them for it (i.e., they claimed entrapment)."
*Shudder* Oh, I hope that I find a professorship at a decent institution should I choose to pursue a Ph.D in history. It's a pitty that most people are stupid (at least the parents in that article are). Yeah, stupid. I'm sticking by that word. It has a simple, blunt effect that I like.
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