Dear Friends,
It seems to me, to have a civilized society we must civilize our children. Those who raise barbarians have barbarism as the wage. This should be pretty obvious, but most of philosophy, if you think about it, is merely pointing out the obvious. To that end, raising civilized children and not barbarians, we as a society, culture and religions, must strive for. Those that seek to undermine the education and civilization of the youth act to bring about the end of our civilization. How can they be thought of any other way? Those that would prefer children be raised as barbarians must seek a barbarous society, if they seek a barbarous society then they seek, by definition, the downfall of ours. Those of us that seek a civilized society where difference is tolerated, and not only by one side, where people are polite, in as close to universal prosperity there can be, and where our churches, Temples, Synagogues, Mosques, and cemeteries are safe from fire and vandalism, not because of laws that force, but because we are civilized. We must point out the truth, call a barbarian what he or she is.
By civilized, I don’t mean bricks turned out from government monopoly schools, I mean stones as turned out by rivers and streams. There is an old saying, proverb or whatever, it goes; A teacher stands at the foot of a large tree, at the base are, a parrot, ape, elephant, porpoise, snake and fish. The teacher says, “The first to the top will get the best grade, then next will get the next lower grade. You will all be graded by this scale.” Clearly this scale is insufficient to capture the diversity of abilities in that group, nor scale them as individuals either within their own area of talent, but even as their talent compares to the others. This is the fundamental failure of nationalized systems of education. They make the teacher stand at the base of a large tree…
Think of what a barbarian is, a loutish person who has little self control, seeks primarily hedonistic pleasures, and is prone to violence. Isn’t that pretty much what you picture in your mind’s eye when you imagine a barbarian? Now look at what our schools teach our children, that God is fiction, the strong should take from the weak, it is better to appear good while being bad than to just be good, that honest gain is bad while dishonest gain is good… the list goes on and on. Not one of these lessons lead to civilized people, they must lead to hedonistic people, immoral, lacking utterly in self control, with a total ignorance of the social graces, such as courtesy, in short, people who are egoistic and therefore prone to violence…
To civilize a child is to teach them not only how to read, do math, understand science, know history, and write, but why they need to know these things. Grammar should be called philosophy and the reason for this explained to children. There is a whole arm of philosophy that deals in the failure of language to be a perfect deliverer of philosophical ideas. Kung Sung Lung for example. Once early philosophy (grammar) is done, then philosophy should talk about the ideas of the moral philosophers like, Plato, Socrates, Confucius, Buddha, Hsun Ching, Jesus, Abraham and Moses. The stories children should read need to have the theme of overcoming diversity, while striving to be good, like the ones written by Horatio Alger. Much can be taught by games, war games like, Russian Campaign, Panzergruppe Guderian, France 1940, Desert Fox, Saipan, ETC… teach basic math, geography, and history long with strategic thinking and an appreciation for the reality of war, where the numbers of men each unit represents is stressed. This is how I would set up an education system.
These innovations can only be done in small experimental schools, the good ones will be rewarded by the market and the bad ones will be punished by the same market. A market set up by the voucher system. Making the voucher system the means to civilizing children, since it is the only way educationally diverse opportunities would be available to children, who would potentially shine in them. To educate a child is to knock off the rough edges, but keep the eccentricities, to teach a child is to cut everything that doesn’t benefit the State off a child, fabricating them into equal rectangles, eliminating all political eccentricities. The first is strong inside but oddly shaped, the second weak inside but regular outside.
Our government is making more and more of our children into little barbarians, and when they act as government taught them, barbarous, government points to them as reason to limit all of our Rights. It is almost like those in our government want crime, poverty and strife, to justify the enhancement of their power over us, as shown by their actions IE, turning out barbarians from the government factory schools, instead of allowing us to civilize them. Be it for the sake of the Teacher’s union, political expediency or simply egoistic self interest, these are the actions of people who seek the downfall of civilization, with all that implies. We are the ones who must take action, demanding the voucher system be fully implemented everywhere in the US, with no religious exclusions. Pry our children from the trap of government factory schools, where they are being turned into mindless barbarians, and get them into schools where they can be civilized. The elite in government, media and culture are against us, but God is with us. With the scale tipped so far in our favor how can we but win?
Sincerely,
John Pepin
