Religionists to blame for destroying public education

Twenty-some years ago in a discussion about education in Oregon, someone involved in legislation development spoke with regret about the attitudes of many parents in rural southwest Oregon. In his view, there were parents who opposed efforts to promote K-12 education because they did not want their children to surpass them. Some might find that view cynical, but a moment's reflection on the quality of much of the parenting we can all see around us makes the possibility extremely tenable.

In other words, there are a lot of asshats serving as parents out there. That a number of them would be willing to keep their kids down to justify their own limited achievements in life seems entirely plausible to me. This does not, however, seem to explain fully why the United States seems intent on destroying the educational opportunities for so many of its young people:

There’s no mystery about what’s going on: education is mainly the responsibility of state and local governments, which are in dire fiscal straits. Adequate federal aid could have made a big difference. But while some aid has been provided, it has made up only a fraction of the shortfall. In part, that’s because back in February centrist senators insisted on stripping much of that aid from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, a k a the stimulus bill.

As a result, education is on the chopping block. And laid-off teachers are only part of the story. Even more important is the way that we’re shutting off opportunities.

That's Prof Paul Krugman lamenting the disinvestment in American public education over the past three decades. Federal aid has been slashed "by the penny-wise, pound-foolish behavior that passes for “fiscal responsibility” in Washington". He puts this in terms of the current economic crisis, but this has been happening for much longer than this. And while no one probably thinks of cutting education in terms of keeping young people down and with minimal future prospects, I do not doubt this: For many conservatives, public education is something that is used by liberals. Public schools are breeding grounds for liberal, anti-American, anti-Christian thought. Funding public schools is, for them, a means of undermining the nation's greatness.

God calls upon them to destroy public education as much as possible.

No, I have no citations for this. I can, if you need it, find you plenty of citations about the need for Christians, as some see it, to obey God's law and leave the sinful and heathen to reap their harvest of evil. New Testament passages such as "be not part of the world" and so on serve as justification for stripping the public sector of as much money as possible. "Render unto Caesar" gets run through an entirely different filter, of course; religionists have their excuses and justifications and there is no rationality or reason behind it. They are simply finding ways to justify what they want to believe is God's truth.

I have no doubt that a strong education, either in the liberal arts or science, will make it more difficult for someone to relinquish their mind to religious fanaticism. Not impossible, but certainly more difficult. The religionists believe the same thing. Much of the cultural divide in this nation is based in religion, more than we usually acknowledge, I think. I've lived on that side of the fanaticism divide; there is no compromise for true believers and fundamentalists. There is only right and wrong, and since God tells "us" what is Right and True, compromise with the proponents of falsehoods is a sin that cannot be tolerated.

Krugman fails to ask why our nation has allowed public education to be eroded so badly. There are a lot of reasons, but I think much of it lies in this: Public education is seen as anti-Christian. The duty of those who hold fast to the literal word of the Bible is to oppose public education that does not put the Bible at the center of curriculum. As long as we do not acknowledge this basic tenet of many of those who oppose public education, we'll be unable to address this problem properly.

Teach adults that religious fanatics are destroying their children's futures, and I think we'll be able to teach their children in properly funded school systems.