- Never mind homeschooling; now there’s a cult of “unschooling”;
- Nascent thoughts about conservative morality, children, MAGA, and the return to a simpler past — which would be, childhood;
- How Oklahoma is letting right-wing figures (including David Barton) run its social studies curriculum;
- And how William Gibson’s quote about “The future is already here — it’s just not evenly distributed” applies very broadly.
Here’s yet another idea new to me!
The Week, Theara Coleman, 10 Jul 2024: Unschooling: the radical education trend raising eyebrows, subtitled “Some parents are letting their children lead their education”
Since the pandemic, there has been a noticeable surge in homeschooling. Now, a different pedagogical trend called “unschooling” is gaining momentum, sparking controversy and debate online.
In June, spiritual influencer Mami Onami went viral after discussing unschooling or “free schooling” her children. “We don’t teach our children anything,” she said in a TikTok video. “Everything that they learn is in response to either their interest or their questions.” With no set curriculum or school hours, she and her partner “just respond whenever [her kids] wanna know something and do our best to make sure they really get it.” Mami Onami’s declaration has led to backlash on social media, with many commenters questioning her parenting. However, she is not alone in pursuing this alternative route to educating her children.
I have not heard of this before! And it strikes me as daft. Do these parents want to live isolated out in the woods, and never interact with all the rest of us, who’ve learned how to live in our modern, technological society?
Like homeschooling, the unschooling community used to be largely comprised of white conservative Christians. … Contrary to popular belief that only middle- and upper-class families can afford to homeschool their children, unschooling families tend to be on the lower end of the socioeconomic spectrum, he added. People who choose this route have “values other than material value,” and are “not as oriented towards high achievement in the usual sense.”
Indeed. I almost wonder if this is a spoof. Is it April 1?
Others worry that unschooling will prevent children from having the social interactions that will teach them to fit into broader society. But Onami told Rolling Stone that’s intentional. “In so many different ways, people are saying the system is broken,” she said. “And school is the institution that prepares people to live in that world.”
So, this is a bit like embracing anarchy, since there might be flaws in democracy.
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There is indeed a charity organization called Save the Children. Which is humanitarian, not religious.
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Here’s a nascent thought from recent days that I don’t have any particular news item or essay to pin on — though it certainly relates to the general theme I’ve been developing in recent weeks (at least since May 11), of how conservative morality relates to the primal instincts for survival by families and tribes, as opposed to the more worldly morality that addresses the concerns of society at large. (We touched on this theme in yesterday’s post.)
This is about children. Conservatives are obsessed with protecting children from both real and imagined threats in the world. On the one hand, concern for children is an obvious requirement for all species, to ensure survival; on the other hand, conservatives take this concern to such extremes that they would cripple adult society, rendering everyone permanently childlike, to protect their progeny.
Thus certain books may not be sold or allowed into libraries; certain kinds of people must be shunned and shielded from existence, lest children’s supposed inherent heterosexuality become compromised; certain branches of history must be suppressed so as not to diminish the story of the nation or tribe as the best ever. Examples of all these things abound (just no current one at the moment).
But what occurs to me lately is how this concern for the purity of childhood is analogous to the idea of MAGA — a return to a simpler, purer past, one in which fewer of these modern ‘threats’ existed, in those small rural towns the conservatives venerate.
It’s almost as if MAGA itself is about a return to childhood, without any of the concerns or troubles of being an adult. Or taking responsibility for the outside world.
I’ll ponder this.
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More ‘traditional’ conservatives tend to embrace the stories of Christian mythology over actual science and history, as we’ve seen lately. (Apparently also willing to sit out the 21st century.) It’s not getting any better; here is David Barton again.
JMG, 10 Jul 2024: OK Schools Chief Hires Raft Of Christian Nationalists To Overhaul Social Studies Classes In The Name Of Jesus
Also here: Media Matters, 10 Jul 2024: Oklahoma is having right-wing media figures rewrite its social studies curriculum. Here’s what you need to know about them.
This piece has a selection of remarks from the various right-wing media figures involved, including Dennis Prager, David Barton, and others.
David Barton, who has repeatedly misrepresented his academic credentials and personal history, had his book on Thomas Jefferson pulled by his own publisher in 2012 after it concluded that “basic truths just were not there.”
Undaunted, Barton has soldiered on, repeatedly declaring that Christians who share his far-right worldview are supposed to be choosing our elected leaders and ruling the world because everything must operate according to biblical principles.
Barton falsely insists that our Constitution and entire system of government are based on the Bible and thus asserts that everything from the minimum wage to the income tax to the teaching of evolution are unconstitutional because they supposedly violate Biblical teachings.
Barton also believes that there should be literally no limits on the Second Amendment, meaning that average citizens are entitled to own tanks, fighter jets, and even nuclear weapons..
They are sealing themselves in a bubble against the real world.
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William Gibson said this way back in 2003:
GoodReads: William Gibson Quotes: “The future is already here – it’s just not evenly distributed.
Indeed, one can extend this. The general principle is that there is no level of civilization that is evenly distributed, and there never has been. The Enlightenment came hundreds of years ago, bringing ideas of science and democracy; much of the world remains innocent of those concepts, except indirectly through the global dominance of science-derived technology. And even our modern societies are slipping back on those concepts, as I’ve discussed. What about basic concepts about the nature of the world? Well, there are still primitive tribes in Borneo, and that tribe in the Indian Ocean that murdered a Christian missionary who went there, who have no conception of the world beyond their horizons. Just as the folks who wrote the Bible did not.
