School boards or parents?
I saw a poll in Virginia that found something like 70% of Democrats believe schools boards should have more say about children’s education than parents… Does anyone really think 70% of Virginia Democrats believe that?
Do Virginia Democrats with children actually think school boards know better than they do? Do even childless Virginia Democrats actually think school boards know better than they do? If those school boards suddenly mandated a GOP-friendly curriculum, would Virginia Democrats simply nod, smile, and go along?
To elaborate on that – I think that at least 70% of Virginia Democrats do believe that at this moment.
There are several reasons. The first is that their party leaders have told them recently to believe it. The second is that there is indeed a current tendency for Democrats to believe that “experts” know better, and in this case the school boards would supposedly be the experts.
But the third and probably most important is – as MBunge implies – that they realize that school boards lean to the left, and that the people opposing them tend (or reportedly tend) to be on the right. Therefore many Democrats would be likely to believe that school boards are implementing the correct policies – that is, ones with which they agree – and that the boards’decisions are being fought by troglodytes on the right who should not be allowed to control anything.
Do most people follow what actually is being done by school boards in terms of the policies they are promoting and defending? I doubt it, although lately with all the brouhaha around school boards I think that more people are starting to follow these developments more closely than before. But one of the biggest reasons school boards and teachers’ unions and schools of education have been able to turn the schooling of so many children into leftist indoctrination is that they have been counting on the busyness and inattention of many parents and voters.
They are also counting, of course, on Democratic politicians backing them up – McAuliffe of Virginia being a good example when he said that parents shouldn’t tell school boards what to teach. They are also counting on the MSM defending school boards and arguing in their favor.
Those same parents might change their minds despite all of that if some school board decision comes to hurt them or their children very personally. Perhaps, anyway. But unless and until that were to happen, I think they will believe what they’re told to believe.
So many on School Boards don’t really know anything about education and how to educate kids. They aren’t experts at all.
The first is that their party leaders have told them recently to believe it. The second is that there is indeed a current tendency for Democrats to believe that “experts” know better, and in this case the school boards would supposedly be the experts.
This is a disturbing but somewhat inescapable conclusion that I have felt about a lot of (D) voters. They seem to be shockingly incurious about any policy put forth by the party. As long as that policy is diametrically opposed to whatever the Right’s position is, it must be good and there’s no need for any further analysis. It’s the only thing that seems to fully explain the incredible radical lurch left that the Dems have taken in the past few years. The moderates in the party are asleep at the wheel while the loons are driving the car.
The reliance on “experts” is a big part of this, I believe. On the subject of “climate change,” for instance, a friend of mine, one of the premier physics researchers of our generation, believes that the IPCC are “the experts” and therefore we should accept what they say — even when we point out that the political summary in many ways contradicts the underlying technical reports. It’s “experts!” They must be right!
Once we examine what the “education experts” really study in education schools, we know they’ve got no expertise at all.
For over 200 years here in our great USA progressive thinkers have been trying to figure out how to create the perfect community with equality, each person living in peace achieving their most effective potential and never getting it right. I have been reading about communities, many of the people being sponsored by wealthy Europeans, coming to the US to show the way for all people for a better wonderful life. During the 1820’s their were a number of these communities and the ones that lasted more than a few years were based on religious principals and even those had problems.
The real great Age of Reason progressives wrote about three main obstacles for good communal life, the first and worst was family because the children should be raised to owe all allegiance to the community and not the family, the next was Religion because that hindered developing close personal relationships with your fellow communists (some used that exact word) and last of all was the ownership of personal property including their clothing. Eating in communal halls, sleeping in large communal bed facilities and having the children raised in communal nurseries was a goal and way of life that did not last long. The next step before every would leave was to give each family shares in the communal property and then allow them to own their own parcel of land which tended to cause the community to fall on apart.
In the 1840’s the communal ventures took on more of a religious tone with some exceptions and they discovered that when you had a bunch or brilliant thinkers who had no idea how to work the land or in factories free loaders were booted out which made life much better.
A little note about our town: “Early German immigrants to Boerne were determined to keep the influence of religion away from their town. They had left the oppression of their home country and were leery of religious or political groups which might try to establish authority over them. In 1852, the southern city limits of Boerne were south of Cibolo Creek; about where Evergreen St. is today. Citizens posted a warning sign which read, “Priests and Ministers, don’t let the sundown catch you in this town.” It was almost 30 years later before a church was allowed within the city limits.”
I guess I kind of had to throw in that bit of local trivia on a lovely day in the Texas Hill Country.
1) to Shirehome’s comment: how many people on school boards have actually taught in a classroom? I bet the percentage is low based on who served on the local school board in the town I used to live in. SB’s are usually a first step in a political career.
2) Kate, such a response from a physicist is sad, but being a researcher I can guess what is happening: he/she is too busy with their own career to bother looking closer. Physicists tend to give each other a huge benefit of the doubt especially outside their own area of expertise. To give some of my own history: I was asked to create a new course call Energy and the Environment. It was a course focused on energy sources and the 2nd Law consequences. As part of the prep I thought maybe I should bone up on this “global warming” business. I hadn’t really questioned any of it as, I again, had other priorities for my time. Well, was I in for a shock once I started delving into the data! None of it supported anything the GW/CC “experts” were saying. That was 12 years ago, and it’s even worse now as all the “predictions” have failed to materialize. As Einstein said (paraphrasing), it only takes once piece of data to prove him wrong.
Yes, physicsguy, I think that describes my friend. Immersed in her own field of research, and one which is so far not politicized because of what it is, she gives a huge benefit of the doubt to other fields, and she has never taken the time to look at the data.
Kate. I have written a short monograph that lays out the salient data. Maybe Neo could connect us somehow and I could send it to you to pass on to her.
Neo, you have my permission to give Kate my email.
Physicsguy, perhaps she could post the monograph here, for you. I should like to read it, as well.
Any school board member who supports leftist indoctrination is unfit for their position.
Kate and physicsguy,
I trust it’s true that some are simply highly focused in their field.
But I suspect far more simply ‘trust’ the experts regardless of how compelling the contrary evidence..
Regardless of intelligence, an inordinately large percentage of people are entirely susceptible to the logical fallacy of “an appeal to authority”.
Physicsguy: I would love to see your monograph if you’re willing to share. CAGW has been a hobbyhorse of mine for almost two decades and, while I am no physicist (lawyer with software and pharma clients), I can do simple math and understand Stefan-Boltzmann basics, infrared radiative window, chaotic systems, convective heat transport, negative feedback, etc. Also I can see even in Wiki that sea level rise is stuck at 2-3 mm/yr while Antarctica and Greenland are as ice-bound as ever. Etc.
Thanks if you are OK with sharing; Neo could facilitate?
Santa Cruz California ,
(from)Santa Cruz office of Education:
Calling all students! You’ve bushed up on LGBTQ+ history all month, now join us this Wednesday and put your knowledge to the test .
Plus, there will be prizes! Best for students ages 10 to 18.
Register for LGBTQ+ History Month Trivia Night at sccoe.link/lgbtqhistory2021
Polls, unless you have the underlying data, are pretty sketchy…
Dillbert “I didn’t have any accurate numbers so I just made this one up”. This definitely applies to polls…
https://dilbert.com/strip/2008-05-08
physicsguy, and others, I am considering sending my friend this article by Richard Lindzen:
https://www.nas.org/academic-questions/30/4/straight_talk_about_climate_change
Lindzen taught and researched atmospheric physics at MIT for many years, which gives him more credibility than my own opinion.
physicsguy, if you would send your monograph, will it have your name and credentials? She’s more likely to listen to physicists than to her liberal arts college roommate. Give it a title that will catch my eye when I look at my spam filter. khhegyi – at – earthlink – dot – net
Yet another vote for physicsguy to post his monograph here. CAGW is a hobbyhorse of mine as well.
OldTexan —
Those communal settlements had a variety of founding principles, but somehow most of them ended up with “the leader (and sometimes his lieutenants) gets to sleep with other mens’ wives”.
Kipling knew what he was doing when he wrote this:
On the first Feminian Sandstones we were promised the Fuller Life
(Which started by loving our neighbour and ended by loving his wife)
Till our women had no more children and the men lost reason and faith,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: “The Wages of Sin is Death.”
As a taxpayer, when I, through the public school system, hire a volleyball coach, I expect him or her to teach volleyball to students. As a taxpayer, when I, through the public school system, hire a baseball coach, I expect him or her to teach baseball to students. As a taxpayer, when I, through the public school system, hire an elementary school teacher, I expect him or her to teach readin’, ‘ritin’ and ‘rithmetic to students. And, I expect, as a taxpayer, to have a say in what is being taught in the public schools supported by my tax dollars. Even without a child in school, that’s what I expect.
By the way, I was dismayed when my daughter, during her junior year at an expensive private high school, told me that unseasonably cold weather was evidence of global warming. I would have been fine with her telling me that she had learned that unseasonably cold weather was not necessarily inconsistent with global warming, but citing it as evidence of warming was, to me, evidence that I was wasting money on that private education.
I suspect the issue is that opposing the left is, automatically, incorrect. Whatever the left’s position is…opposing it is wrong.
Ira M. Siegel,
Did you stop wasting your money?
Richard Aubrey,
I do believe you’ve correctly identified the very basis of their position.
Someone will always rule and impose a morality and an ideology. Just a question of who does it.
If you just have ‘Principles’… you’ll lose every time to the fanatics.
You’re going to have to get Medieval on these people. And stay Guardedly Medieval. That’s the hard part.
Find a better fanaticism that fits. And then go burn some of THEIR books. Until you can get your heads around the necessity of making some topics not up for debate, gonna keep losing. Got about 5 years max before pederasty and bestiality lessons start for K-6 kids. You’ve lost every battle up until now by talking about Principles. Principles be damned!
Geoffrey—Alas, no.
^^ Schools are the perfect attack vector because to really stand up to them invites intra-family strife plus in some cases potential Loss of Caste.
It’s no accident that the Deplorables making noises now have little to lose and their children are being directly physically victimised in their Public Schools. That changes the calculus. Leftist Overreach has its advantages in the long run. Tragic for victims in short run.
Frankly, should stop referring to them as Public Schools. They are not the Public’s Schools: they are the Government’s Schools.
Trans-social male rapes and sodomizes a girl. This reminds me of the trans/homo males who sodomized males in the southwest, churches, scouts, etc. Conflation of sex and gender. political congruence (“=”) #NoJudgment #NoLabels
Diversity [dogma] (i.e. color judgment), inequity, and exclusion (DIE). Diversity breeds adversity.
There is no mystery… #HateLovesAbortion
Religion (e.g. moral philosophy) for people… persons capable of self-moderation. Competing interests to mitigate the progress of others running amuck.
“***Competing interests*** to mitigate the progress of others running amuck.”
What is this? Some vestigial Libertarian / Heritage Foundation Mumbo Jumbo Voodoo?
Whips and Goads and Penal Laws. Moderate to taste. But without them: Forgeddaboudit.
n.n – dogma breeds adversity – FIFY
There is nothing inherently good or bad about diversity. Neither with the concepts of black lives mattering, blue lives matter, or all lives matter, tolerance, violence, name your poison.
It’s the COERCION used to ENFORCE diversity, or whatever such DOGMA the STATE (or SOCIETY through the STATE) is trying out this year, that is INIMICAL to a LIFE OF LIBERTY…
LIVE AND LET LIVE
Kate,
Sending anything by Lindzen is a good thing. I’ll send the paper later to day to you.
Zaphod @ 12:10am,
Absolutely right on the terminology, “Government schools.” “Truant Officers.” “School Superintendent.” “School yard.” A lot of overlap with prison terminology. Hmmm…
Thanks, physicsguy!
Actually, diversity has been known to work (i.e., if we all live in a zoo)!
https://www.theepochtimes.com/video-orphaned-baby-grizzly-meets-polar-bear-cub-companion-after-arriving-at-detroit-zoo_4044502.html
(…Which living arrangements appears to be precisely “Biden”‘s overarching strategy….)
And since zoos are expensive to maintain—and already trillions of dollars in debt—then get ready to fork over…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xKLBne1CoI
What people believe is less important than why.
I just read something from a guy who once almost boasted of voting for McCain and Romney over Obama and now he’s the kind of person who calls Dave Chappelle “cisgender” and says Dave might become unemployable if he isn’t more deferential to transgender people. As little as 10 or even five years ago, this guy would have scoffed at the idea of using that terminology or expressing that attitude.
I don’t think that poll actually shows what Virginia Democrats think because I’d bet money most of the people who said “Yes, school boards should have more control than parents” are the exact same people who raise holy hell if their child gets a bad grade on a test or is left off the honor society.
This is all about some white people trying to elevate themselves above other white people.
Mike
“…if he isn’t more deferential to transgender people…”
Hmmm. Not sure that fellow is taking into account some of the possible ramifications of such oh-so-considerate—and truly humane(!)—“openness”… (But then, why should he?…)
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-10132549/Lesbian-claims-shes-seen-people-identify-trans-women-bully-young-girls-relationship.html
(I see now that n.n. has already referred to this above…)
Who said that child abusers don’t have any values?…
‘Pennsylvania school district (Tredyffrin/Easttown) saying you can’t view their Critical Race Theory policies, training, and what they are teaching students because it would be a “copyright violation.” ‘
https://twitter.com/ConceptualJames/status/1453204786187276288
H/T Ron Coleman twitter feed.
File under: Parents should be seen but NOT heard.
I hear echoes of evolution and school prayer in the current discussions. Those were school issues one upon a time, where liberals pushed evolution into schools and clawed prayer back, while conservatives resisted visa-versa.
I wonder if some Democrat parents assume that CRT and TG are like evolution and prayer in schools.
I’m old enough to remember saying the Lord’s Prayer along with the Pledge first thing in the morning.
I know where I stand on the covert efforts to move CRT and TG into schools. The covertness is clearly wrong.
However, there is a general issue of how and what to teach when the citizens are deeply divided.
Sad, sad non-excuse for authoritarian aloofness.
Assuming only for the sake of argument that anything in the school district’s “Critical Race Theory policies, training, and what they are teaching students” is in any way entitled to copyright protection, viewing those materials is not among the actions that is considered a copyright violation. Per U.S.C. § 106, only doing the following without consent of the copyright owner is prohibited:
Thus, a single copy of a book can be passed around for reading (i.e., viewing) by any number of people.
And, per 17 U.S.C. § 107 (emphasis added):
“…sad non-excuse…”
Indeed.
(Actually, it’s a flat-out lie. Shocking, I know, coming as it does from such paragons who are entrusted with, etc., etc….)
File under: Truth abuse in the schools? (AKA, What do they NEED to hide…)
And from the “Serving-With-Distinction” files:
“California school board president is caught on mic saying ‘f**k you’ to ‘concerned’ parent who questioned vaccines for children and masks in classrooms”
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10139645/California-school-board-president-caught-mic-saying-f-k-concerned-parent.html
Merrick Garland has unleashed the whirlwind…
“Merrick Garland has unleashed the whirlwind…”
So, that tool just might inadvertently have served some good (as in every cloud supposedly has a silver lining).
Sad.