Crosbycat-
So, I’m back. Miss me? Another long one--I’m afraid it will require several consecutive posts due to the character limit.
And here I thought we cleared this up last year since you never responded to my last post. In fact, the last thing you DID say in response to my first post was “Just wait, I am reading last year’s essays…” I’m still waiting for this bombshell to drop. Surely you remember, this is the same post in which you put words in my mouth and insinuated that I had nothing substantial or thoughtful to say, so I “will just use the tried and true liberal adage to avoid a real discussion”. But then I gave you what you wanted, thoughtful AND substantial, as grounds for a further discussion and you…never responded. So which one of us is avoiding a real discussion? Fine, let’s see it for what it really is: you didn’t want to really discuss much of anything, you just wanted to spew your baseless accusations in the hopes of riling up some base of support among parents and lead a crusade against certain elements or individuals in the school system.
And here you are, at it again. This time, however, we find you slinging ad hominem attacks like hot cakes. Administrators, teachers, and even parents themselves are on the receiving end of your insults. Pretty much everyone associated with education in Pine-Richland is doing something wrong here—fortunately, they have you to tell them (and the world) about it.
To be honest, I oscillated for a bit with respect to responding this time around: as the old adage goes, you can’t really reason with crazy. I wrote last year in an attempt to get you to think about some of your blatant mischaracterizations of certain thinkers and your inappropriate application of bias, or at the very least, to hear your explanation for how you came to such characterizations (hoping it went beyond, “hey, I found this on the internet”). I tried to be reasonably professional, discussing the works used and pointing out many of the contradictions throughout your “argument”. (See what I did there? You are really onto something with these thinly-veiled, air-quote insults). I don’t really have a personal stake in this as I do not work for the district nor do my kids attend PRHS; I assume yours do and that’s why you are so upset about this. But I just find it impossible to read your misinformed, patronizing, vitriolic, insulting rant against hard-working educators without saying something in their defense.
I really wanted to play on your level here, get down there in the mud and start slinging insults and maligning your character the way you do to everyone you perceive as not agreeing with you. I even went so far as to write a response modeled on your way of doing things—it was not pretty. But then I thought: is this really the kind of example we should be setting for the kids? Do we really want them to think that all discussion and disagreement should be insulting, derogatory, and unabashedly negative? (Not that Pine-Richland students are lining up around the block to read your blog but, let’s say, for the principle of it, we should act as though they are watching). If it’s not obvious to everyone else, it is very clear to me that this is how you operate, that is, through the technique better known as the “politics of fear”. We might have excused last year’s blog as misdirected passion but the evidence of your obstinate refusal to engage in a rational conversation about it at that time combined with more of the same in this new post provides us with the easy conclusion that this is an abiding habit for you. You aren’t really interested in a reasonable debate or discussion that may make for positive change, you are interested in playing on the fears of parents to scare them into doing what you want.
Let’s at least be honest about this: it is, after all, obvious to anyone with half a brain that there is a very sharp disparity between your charged rhetoric and any semblance of a rational argument made in support of your conclusions. You are more interested in inspiring a reaction by using fear-inspiring words or established tag lines of terror like “brainwashing”, “Marxist”, and “extreme liberal progressive indoctrination” than you are in attempting to illustrate that the Symposium actually is any of these things or part of this greater conspiracy you seem to indicate exists. Now, if I were to engage in your chosen technique, mobilizing fear as a motivator for action, I might be inclined to point out that Hitler stands as one of history’s greatest executors of just this kind of rhetoric. But attempting to paint you as a fascist or even a Nazi (you aren’t, right?) by drawing a comparison between you and Hitler based upon this similarity seems to me to be neither accurate nor intellectually honest but it sure as hell stands a very good chance of being effective in causing people to revile you, assuming the reader is simple-minded enough to accept obvious leaps in inference.
But let’s take a closer look at your approach here and see if we can highlight the problem. So your claim is essentially twofold: first, that the Symposium constitutes a form of liberal indoctrination mobilized by the district’s leaders and perpetuated at all levels, and that this year’s theme of “Global Issues and Awareness” and the requisite readings and speakers essentially constitute a continuation of this indoctrination.
Now, it is obvious that my attempt last year to get you to think about the nature of indoctrination, which is at the very heart of your claim, either flew right over your head or you simply refused to acknowledge it. Since you are super fond of looking things up on the internet (rather than reading directly from various sources or thinkers), let’s go to the Wikipedia page on indoctrination, shall we? There we find indoctrination defined as “the process of inculcating ideas, attitudes, cognitive strategies or a professional methodology. It is often distinguished from education by the fact that the indoctrinated person is expected not to question or critically examine the doctrine they have learned.” So indoctrination as a process, as opposed to education, would seem to necessitate a consistent message about how this particular doctrine, or way of looking at the world to extend it to the way in which you use it, is the right one. It would then not be effective to present alternative viewpoints for critical analysis, as this would be counterproductive to the goal, and we certainly would never ask those being indoctrinated to ask too many questions or develop their own viewpoint. There are no viewpoints in indoctrination—there is the right way, our way, and everything else is wrong and dangerous.
And in fact this seems to be precisely your point! The Symposium apparently falls into this form of indoctrination precisely because it only presents one viewpoint and, of course, students would never be expected to critically examine or question the things they have read or the things the speakers have to say. Now let’s pretend you actually articulated what this viewpoint is beyond your tag phrase and proceeded to demonstrate how all the works the students read, the teachers, the speakers, administrators, and even the students all supported this vision either in word or deed and that dissent was not tolerated, then you would have a potentially persuasive argument. Of course, you would need to be this comprehensive to show that what is going on is really indoctrination (and not education) and that it is as pervasive and top-driven as you claim here.
But now, setting pretense aside, let’s take a look at what you’ve actually done. Your investigative reporting has revealed some potentially troubling things about one speaker and then we have a series of cut-and-pasted mission statements from a few of the other speakers. But where is your evidence of rampant indoctrination? Forget evidence, where is there any kind of argument? We are meant to assume that these mission statements are indications of liberal indoctrination in the Symposium because they promote global awareness and discussion regarding issues which transcend national borders? Perhaps we could draw this conclusion ourselves if you in any way explained how being concerned about issues which people in both the United States and other countries face is a part of liberal progressiveness? We get a clue in one of your last sentences when you say, “And having a couple of speakers who do not seem to be complete Progressive, one-world-order types does not make up for all of this” (I’ve inserted some punctuation to make this sentence readable). So, being concerned with global problems and finding solutions means you automatically subscribe to the notion of one-world-order? And THIS is what the district is pushing via this brainwashing of the students?
But wait, what’s that noise? Oh no, it’s the Red Alert Contradiction Alarm. Remember how we established that your point was that the district was indoctrinating students by only presenting them with one viewpoint? Now you admit that there were speakers there who did NOT subscribe to this particular ideology. Does this mean they presented other perspectives? Because this would be a big no-no in Indoctrinationland. It could lead to students questioning the one viewpoint we are trying to get them to adopt, maybe even (gasp) being critical of it. This sounds, oddly enough, more like education than indoctrination. You have rather obviously contradicted yourself.
Let’s take it a step further. Surely, there is more to this story. You mentioned that the Symposium is open to the public (which seems a rather dangerous thing to do if there are indoctrination watchdogs about), and you are obviously deeply concerned about the goings-on in the district. So I am wondering, which sessions did you attend? Which speakers or discussions did you find to be most disturbing? It is clear from your post that you were aware of this in advance, so much so that you had time to Google search various presenters. Surely if this is that important (and what could be more important than the indoctrination of our children) you found the time to go and see for yourself how this was all unfolding. It would be worth a vacation day from work to blow the lid off this conspiracy and save the children. So, please, regale us with the treacherous behind-the-scenes tales of brainwashing. Because, I have to tell you, if the extent of your evidence is a few generic mission statements, it is rather difficult to see how any good administrator or reputable news outlet is going to take your claims very seriously.
But we should more closely address your claim about the topic and these troubling mission statements that point toward the establishment of an evil, Progressive world order. As I indicated earlier, it is rather difficult to see how you could jump from these mission statements about global problems, awareness, and potential solutions to a conspiracy to enact this single world order. Is it not possible for me to be very patriotic and still believe that there are such problems and that cooperation between nations is necessary to solving them? Why should the fact that we acknowledge the existence of such issues instantly qualify us as subscribing to this notion of one-world-order? Presenting it as you have seems to indicate that you adopt either the isolationist view or the unilateral one. So, either we shouldn’t acknowledge world problems unless they directly affect us or we can acknowledge them and just do whatever we want. It is very difficult to tell because you have given us no indication of the proper worldview with respect to this question. You seem to presume, however, that there is some kind of either/or at play here. What are the other perspectives on international relations or global issues which you found lacking in the reading or speaker selection? This is what I mean about attempting to make positive change. What recommendations for readings or thinkers did you present to those members of the school board who approve such things?
Given your comments in the past and your veiled insult of Dr. Bucci as being a disingenuous conservative Christian, let’s assume for a moment that this is the perspective you wish to see presented. Side-stepping the obvious problem I mentioned last year about the separation of church and state, let’s consider what Jesus might say about global issues. The ethics of the New Testament is one of enduring compassion with respect to our fellow man. Jesus himself exemplifies this compassion, which is specifically mentioned many times, but perhaps, most appropriately for us in the stories about healing the sick or feeding the multitudes with small amounts of bread and fish (I’m thinking here of MT 14:13 and 15:29). In fact, Jesus himself is deeply concerned about the welfare of others and about human relations. Jesus’ dedication to alleviating the problems of the sick, the poor, the hungry, the suffering serves as the shining example of Christian ethics. Nowhere in the various descriptions of Jesus’ words or actions do we find him placing a limitation on this compassion due to national borders or any other qualification. Love your enemy (unless he lives over there); treat others as you wish to be treated (except if they are gay or liberal or that thing you really don’t like about them); sell your possessions and give to the poor (unless those poor are starving children in Africa). I’m really pretty sure Jesus doesn’t say anything about giving to only those poor you feel like giving to, or am I wrong here? So we can see that Jesus is concerned with issues facing humanity, not those facing any particular segment of the world’s population. Really then, it would be exceedingly difficult to argue that Jesus would say we should not be concerned about global issues as they relate to human interaction. Neighbors aren’t just the people who live on your street so it seems you can’t really hold Christian ethics together with an isolationism which would absolve us from examining global issues of suffering and looking for solutions.
Now I have no idea what issues the students’ discussed with the speakers; I was not there. Perhaps they did not discuss issues of human suffering—things like genocide, or abject poverty, rampant medical epidemics, and starvation in third world countries. Perhaps they were discussing things more in line with the environment or the economy. Again, perhaps you can enlighten me as I am sure you were there and took copious notes. My point here is that what I presume to be your particular system of belief does not necessarily de facto preclude a discussion of global issues. If anything Jesus’ example invites us to further dialogue about the problems and possible solutions to the problems facing us as human beings not just as Americans. It should make us ask ourselves: how can I do more? You make it sound as though ANY discussion of these issues is immediately prejudicial. This parallels my explanation of your misrepresentation of the idea of bias last year (one you intentionally continue in your blatant mischaracterization of last year’s “central theme” at the beginning of this year’s post as well as in your response post regarding the teachers). You can argue that the readings or the speakers constituted a single view on these issues and that this is inherently prejudicial to that viewpoint because it does not admit of other perspectives. But you cannot argue that general topics like “Ethical Considerations in the 21st Century” or “Global Issues and Awareness” are prejudicial unless you want to maintain that these don’t really exist, which is an absurd proposition even if you are a moral nihilist.
Let me close by reiterating (even though I’m sure you stopped reading awhile ago) that my primary purpose here has been to defend those who for one reason or another don’t defend themselves against your accusations and insults here. In a response post you indicated that you “have an abundance of reasons to criticize the Symposium”, and these are: the teachers, the Superintendent, and the School Board members mentioned. Here is a newsflash: these are people not reasons and your critique of them is not a critique of the Symposium. It is my hope that Dr. Bucci, those members of the School Board you called out by name in a response post, and the teachers, parents, and administrators whom you have insulted are all able to take the higher road than you and I have and to see your post for what it truly is. We all know the saying that the squeaky wheel gets the grease and I have been in organizations where leaders reacted to outlandish accusations, devoid of any strong argument or evidence, by taking it out on their subordinates. Let us hope that Pine-Richland School District has leaders strong enough to rise above your vicious rhetoric and recognize the Symposium for what it truly is: a significant educational advantage for the students. If you want a little lesson on international relations, here’s a fundamental tenet of American foreign policy that I’m certain you’ll agree with: we do not negotiate with terrorists. The officials in the school district would do well to adopt such a policy when dealing with people who utilize fear speech to inflame the sentiments of a particular portion of the population. Rather than trying to scare people into action, perhaps you should present a compelling argument and offer realistic solutions rather than just raging into the wind.
And if you find yourself incapable of being rational, civil, and in general acting like a mature adult, might I suggest finding some producer to heckle about the future of reality TV: “Bored Housewives of Western PA”. You could be a star.
