[Vision2020] Offensive Cartoon (in my opinion)

[Chasuk]

On Thu, Feb 19, 2009 at 12:02, Sue Hovey <suehovey at moscow.com> wrote:

> I think its miraculous you were somehow genetically encoded to think
> reflectively, critically, and analytically inasmuch as your parents and your
> teachers appear to have had  no role in the development of those traits.
> Perhaps it was we who taught you to generalize.

I was the only reader in my family.  My father didn't read his first
book until he was 35, and then he didn't read another for decades.  I
learned the alphabet from my mother (huge kudos to her), but I largely
taught myself to read by doggedly tackling Hans Christian Anderson and
Nancy Drew.  Oddly, I've never seen my mother read a book.

In school, I learned what it was like to be bullied.  I learned a
censored, jingoistic version of US history, and i learned that my
parents were poor.  Everything of intellectual worth I taught myself.
I taught my sisters how to read, and my own children.  I have been
thinking reflectively, critically, and analytically since I was 10
years old, or earlier.  Yes, genetics probably had something to do
with it.

I was lucky.  Learning has always been important to me, but this was
not something that was encouraged at home.  I was constantly
criticized for my voracious reading.  My parents never expressed any
slightest interest in my education, and considered going to college a
waste of time.  They think that it is funny that I am going now.  I
was forced to drop out of high school in the 10th grade because it was
frivolous.

In the 9th grade, I was tutoring 12th graders in things that they
should have known in the 5st grade.

When I came back from living in England for many years, I had adults
ask me why I returned to the US only twice in all that time.  I
replied that it was expensive to fly.  Do you know what they asked me?
 They asked why I didn't DRIVE back.  And do you know what?  I've
related that story dozens of times, and on at least 20 occasions I've
had adults look at me, puzzled, and ask, "But why DIDN'T you drive?"

When I put my kids in school in the US for the first time, they were
two years ahead of their peers, when in the UK they were only mediocre
students.

The schools fail our children miserably.  How many know how to write
when they leave High School?  How many know how to read with any
comprehension?  How many know a logical fallacy when they encounter
it, or even understand what a logical fallacy is?  How many can quote
verbatim from many episodes of The Simpsons?

I don't know the solution, but many countries in the world are
academically outpacing us, and by large margins.  We are doing
something wrong.  Anti-intellectualism is rife.  I'm not recommending
the movie Idiocracy, but watch it if you want to see a
not-too-farcical view of where the US is heading.

Millions of USians waste time on astrology, books by Shirley MacLaine,
books by Carlos Castaneda, angelology, numerology, feng shui,
channeling, color therapy, tarot, and crystal healing.  Sadly, I've
likely just described several Visioneers.  They believe that Ouija
boards allow them to speak to the dead.  They believe that they can
speak to the dead!  They believe in ghosts, demons, and the Loch Ness
monster, yet they prevent their children from being vaccinated and
believe anything they have been forwarded via email, no matter how
ridiculous.

Anyway, I think I've ranted enough.

Chas