I Support Public Schools
How else will I force my agenda on the next generation.
As we noted last month, a number of states have been considering laws that, under the guise of “academic freedom,” single out evolution for special criticism. Most of them haven’t made it out of the state legislatures, and one that did was promptly vetoed. But the last of these bills under consideration, the Louisiana Science Education Act (LSEA), was enacted by the signature of Governor Bobby Jindal yesterday. The bill would allow local school boards to approve supplemental classroom materials specifically for the critique of scientific theories, allowing poorly-informed board members to stick their communities with Dover-sized legal fees.
I’m sure those that lean to left are ecstatic to see the people express their political will on this topic. Better this than privatizing education.
July 1st, 2008 at 9:53 am
If we privitized education, of course, the majority of students would be learning creationism, so it’s not much of an improvement on this point.
July 1st, 2008 at 10:07 am
Darwin:
“The current system is better because people can force their agenda down the next generation’s throat, even if I disagree with that agenda. It’s better to keep access open to the children even if it comes at the cost of them being taught things I think are asinine then let parents make their own decision regarding what their children should be taught. God forbid people have a choice.”
As a side note, this makes for an excellent example of showing how free markets would offer more choice than democracy. You have argued on many occasions that you prefer democracy over corporations because you have more control over government. If you live in Louisiana you have no choice thanks to this legislation. If education was more privatized one could easily see two competing corporation specializing in education in which one teache intelligent design and the other ignores it. This gives you the choice, in other words, the control to determine what curriculum you children are taught. The system you advocate for in point of fact does not offer you such a choice. This is mainly because you have much less control over the state than you do corporations.
July 2nd, 2008 at 1:46 am
This gives more choice to the parents, yes; it doesn’t give any choice to the children, who I actually care about. As I’ve said, I think free markets work really well when consumers buy things for themselves, and pretty poorly when they try to buy things for others. This includes things like charities and protecting the environment/third world child labor, and probably schools as well.
Are you arguing that all schools should be privitized, and their should be absolutely no restrictions or oversight on what is taught?