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The incredible dumbing down of the education system continues to wreak havoc.
There are some bright spots. My children go to one of the top 200 public school systems in the country, but even then you really have to pay attention to the reading lists and keep them from assigning dreck. Case in point? The Firm was on my son's 9th Grade reading list. But my 10th Grader was having to spend her summer reading Anna Karenina and Sense and Sensibility.
But, lest you start the finger pointing at the pointy headed bureaucrats, let me ask you a direct question. How are you contributing to the decline of what was once a great country? In the past year, have you...
Read any work from Modern Library's list of 100 Greatest Novels?
Attended a play or a musical concert that didn't involve electric guitars?
Visited a museum?
Averaged more than an hour of television a night?
Discussed books, music, and current events at the dinner table with your children?
When you are in a group of other adults, and other people say, "Gosh, who the heck watches a movie with subtitles," do you just say something noncommittal and change the subject?
And the list goes on and on. I'm not sure why we blame the public education system in this country for the utter debasement of culture when we do not do our best ourselves to prop it up.
We all have a duty to our culture. It's worth fighting for. Not just by writing screeds on a message board, mind you, but with our attendance, our attention, and our money.
Honestly, i could care less what the capital if Iran is
Well, if you can't be bothered to know anything about a country that will be inextricably linked with our future foreign policy debate, then why on earth should we let you in the voting booth?
Here's a good quote about our current state, it compares George Orwell's 1984 with Huxley's Brave New World:
Looks like Huxley got it right.
One example from Orwell, was the TV screen with Big Brother on it, but it had no off-switch. Well, now everybody has the TV screen, and Big Brother is on it 24/7, and it has an off-switch, but nobody uses it.
Actually, Huxley was far more accurate than Orwell. Orwell posited that people could be effectively controlled by inflicting pain and fear, while Huxley believed that people could be more effectively controlled by depriving them of pleasure.
I think the preservation of "American culture" is relative to how far back a family has been in this country, and where they came from. We must also include the acknowlegde the experiences of different Americans throughout the centuries, and decades. Specifically, what do you find that is missing? Americans in the 19 century will differ from those of the 20 century, and those will differ from present day Americans. Yes, some Americans have lost their values, morals, and sense of humunity... But no more than any other developed nations.
Kind of like the unity it promoted the last time we had a draft during an unpopular, optional Asian war?
I don't think some form of required service would be a bad thing. I would specifically make military service an option, but one which must be voluntarily chosen. One which could not be mandated. Other choices would be to work with the homeless, disabled kids, food banks and other deserving people. It woud be placed after high school and before college. You'd have a break in the usual to grow up so when college came up you'd have had a chance to be on your own and grow up. Or mabye discover that you don't want to go. If you fail to finish high school as part of the program you'd study and get your ged.
The choice of what to do is left to the kid. But none of it is fun stuff or glamorous. All of it connects to people. There are those who would choose the military. At the end, you'd go home with some idea who you were and what you wanted out of life, or at least some appreciation of what life was without games and phones and playing. You'd have to see the other side if you grew up with everything.
I sure wish this did exist because my 19 year old kid could sure benefit from it.
One example from Orwell, was the TV screen with Big Brother on it, but it had no off-switch. Well, now everybody has the TV screen, and Big Brother is on it 24/7, and it has an off-switch, but nobody uses it.
I was sick last winter and didn't much feel like reading or writing or that kind of thing and discovered that the dvr had a huge buildup of Twilight Zone episodes on it. Watched every one of them over and over. I have since gotten better and spend more time online, reading and writing stories than with the tv on. But the sad thing is the channels I want, History and Discovery, especially their spinoffs where the good stuff is going, is not available online. So I may be stuck with a bill for satalite so I can watch a few channels.
But honestly, I don't turn it on much anymore. I find that there are many other things which are more interesting to do. I used to use it for background noise but play music for that now.
I am very much looking forward to when we can select exactly what we want to see alone and skip all the mindless drivel. In the meanwhile Amazon books is getting a lot of business from me.
But I was really happy that my son, who is one of those dunno what I want to do 19 year olds, was really delighted with a BOOK for his birthday.
From what I've studied in U.S. History, I think culture during the 1920's, the 1950's, and the 1980's were it was golden. In the 1920's, we had a booming economy following World War I. This opened up to a world of new possibilities. This is where the radio was introduced. Also, F. Scott Fitzgerald was a popular novelist at the time. Then in the 1930's, our economy collapses forcing many Americans out of work. And the attack on Pearl Harbor which led us into World War II. In the 1950's, culture also boomed. This is where America invented rock and roll. Finally in the 1980's, we had awesome movies (E.T., Ghostbusters, The Terminator) and the quality of pop music had gone up. In this post 9/11 world, our confidence has been shaken due to the tragic events that day. Almost 10 years has passed since then, and I think we can improve our society.
I don't think some form of required service would be a bad thing. I would specifically make military service an option, but one which must be voluntarily chosen. One which could not be mandated. Other choices would be to work with the homeless, disabled kids, food banks and other deserving people. It woud be placed after high school and before college. You'd have a break in the usual to grow up so when college came up you'd have had a chance to be on your own and grow up. Or mabye discover that you don't want to go. If you fail to finish high school as part of the program you'd study and get your ged.
The choice of what to do is left to the kid. But none of it is fun stuff or glamorous. All of it connects to people. There are those who would choose the military. At the end, you'd go home with some idea who you were and what you wanted out of life, or at least some appreciation of what life was without games and phones and playing. You'd have to see the other side if you grew up with everything.
I sure wish this did exist because my 19 year old kid could sure benefit from it.
Oh, I don't think it would be a bad thing at all. I have formulated an idea much like this myself. What I challenge is the idea that this would promote unity. I don't think it would; it might promote other good things, but the only thing that I can imagine promoting unity in the United States, absent a wildly popular armed revolution, would be a national cultural decision to stop being such a$$holes to one another about politics (and religion, while we are at it), and to begin to care more about the overall benefit to the nation than having one's own crew able to ram through one's own agenda. And we will not get that--the culture of political a$$holosity is too deeply rooted in our thought now. There is not only no sincere sense of bipartisanship, but the side with less power is prone to view any attempt at same as a show of weakness, to be pounced on without mercy.
If you and I are neighbors, and we don't get along too well and have very differing desires for how things should go along our fence and in matters that affect one another, if every time you try and compromise with me, all I ever do is assume you must be weakening and that this is my moment to strike for everything I can squeeze from you, you will stop trying to compromise with me. And any time I'm the initiator of the compromise, you will likely distrust my motives and negotiate strictly for your own benefit, because that's how I treated you. The cycle defends itself against ever ending--and meanwhile, whatever matters required some sort of adult discussion to resolve will go unaddressed, because neither of us were capable of adult discussion. And even when one of us tried to be, the other torpedoed it. America 2010: the culture of political a$$holosity.
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