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by fennecfoxen
4534 days ago
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To be clear, I haven't attempted to argue against public education existing. (If it seems that way, it's a failure of communication on my part.) The State is not a contaminant whose influence on small children should be avoided at all costs. But they're not an unmitigated blessing whose opinions should supplant those of parents in all cases either. So I think that it's really good that people have the option to send their children somewhere that isn't a public school system (including a private school or homeschool, possibly even with vouchers). That's a simple, useful check on its power -- and explicitly seeking to remove that check with the goal of changing the way children think is Kinda Creepy or worse. We don't need no thought control... |
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I know you haven't; that's why I took the trouble to point out the implications of taking freedom of thought to its logical conclusion. Most people (including you, it appears) don't like that conclusion; but that necessarily implies that freedom of thought must have limitations. Any system of public schooling must violate freedom of thought in some respects.
Personally, I would be fine with abolishing the existing system of public schooling altogether, and replacing it with something like this: take the money that used to be spent on public schools and divide up among parents as vouchers. The parents can use the vouchers to send their kids to private schools, religious schools, whatever, or they can use them to acquire the resources to enable home schooling. (For example, the voucher money could eliminate the need for both parents to work, so one of them could stay home to home school the children.) But I don't see any realistic chance of a system like this happening in the US.
Also, to be fair, there are arguments on the other side as well. For example, someone upthread pointed out that public schools can help to equalize opportunities for children whose parents simply don't care about whether they get a good education.