“The aim of public education is not to fill the young of the species with knowledge and awaken their intelligence. . . . Nothing could be further from the truth. The aim . . . is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed and train a standardized citizenry, to put down dissent and originality. That is its aim in the United States. . . . “ Henry Mencken, The American Mercury, April 1924.
Shortly after the Supreme Court laid the foundation for the persecution of Christians, the ACLU announced that they would no longer defend the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. Not to be outdone, the National Education Association (NEA) announced that they too would take a stand against religious freedom in America.
Continuing their tradition of social justice advancements, in 2015, the NEA announced plans to “develop education materials” about the “potential dangers of so-called religion freedom restoration acts,” whether federal or state, which “license” individuals and corporations to “discriminate on the theory that their religious beliefs require such action,” in an attempt to modify or terminate and/or discredit the use of such laws.
Verne P. Kaub in his 1953 book Communist-Socialist Propaganda in American Schools writes that the so-called and self-styled progressive educators occupying policy-forming positions within the National Education Association, and its divisions and departments, have not hesitated to use the exact language of the Communist-Socialist movement in describing their social-economic aims, and in urging teachers to indoctrinate youth of the land for acceptance of socialistic ideology and programs. The aims of these false leaders, of course, are identical with the immediate program of Communism-Socialism. Kaub’s book can be downloaded as a pdf file for reading at this link.
The NEA, as America’s largest socialist teacher’s union, provides financial support to leftwing organizations and the Democratic Party to advocate leftist positions on abortion, sex education, teen pregnancy, homosexuality, socialized medicine, social justice, redistribution, prisoner rights, illegal alien rights, global warming, disarmament, global government and the elimination of anything Christian from America’s schools. The only thing they do not seem to be concerned with is the real education of America’s children.
Under the leadership of socialist John Dewey, who taught the professors who trained America’s teachers, the NEA adopted the Frankfort School social theory and philosophy of education. Dewey had traveled to Russia in 1928 with other NEA officials to study the communist educational system. The “father of modern education” considered Marxism pretty important, even going so far as to say that it was “one of the greatest modern syntheses of humane values.”
In Dupes and the Religious Left, Dr. Paul Kengor writes that the Bolsheviks rolled out the red carpet for Dewey . When he came back praising their development of progressive education ideas, he did exactly what Stalin had hoped he would do – promote the ‘new world’ he discovered in the USSR.” In one account, Dewey hailed the “restoration” of Russia’s churches when everyone knew the Bolsheviks were demolishing churches.
Dewey’s romance with Marxism was apparent in the 1933 Humanist Manifesto. Humanism is a type of ‘religion’ focusing on humans while denying God. Dewey promoted the teaching of evolution, which in itself denounces any existence of God, in public schools just to popularize humanism. Dewey was adamantly opposed to anything that supported the Christian faith. He believed the children needed to be re-educated away from the traditional values of the parent to make them better citizens for the new world order. He also believed in the redistribution of wealth and called for universal socialism.
Dewey had an alarming philosophy: “You can’t make socialists out of individualists. Children who know how to think for themselves spoil the harmony of the collective society, which is coming, where everyone is interdependent.”
Under Dewey, the primary goal of the NEA became indoctrination to Marxism and Humanism as the predominant philosophies of America’s education establishment. Instead of education, the NEA’s goal was now to give children an anarchic “self-esteem,” deprive them of any sense of what’s right or wrong, and alienate them from parental guidance.
Common Core, even worse than No Child Left Behind, is nationalized education – a federal, top-down approach based on Collectivism rather than individual achievement, sold as a set of rigorous internationally benchmarked standards to bring uniformity to education. Knowledge, understanding, critical thinking, and comprehension under Common Core standards give way to socialist global values, beliefs, feelings and behaviors. After all comrade, one of the requirements of a good ‘global citizenship’ is, of course, the concept of ‘shared responsibility’ and ‘shared sacrifice’ in creating a ‘sustainable’ world, or as Obama once called it a “collective salvation,” that revolves around his socialist goals of redistribution of wealth and the Marxian definition of equality and fairness.
Let’s face it, knowledge creates power. An educated, well-informed population would be a detriment to those seeking power, money and control. Only with an illiterate, uneducated American citizenry, unable to understand what’s happening in the world, could America succumb to tyranny.
“Every child in America entering school at the age of five is mentally ill because he comes to school with certain allegiances to our Founding Fathers, toward our elected officials, toward his parents, toward a belief in a supernatural being, and toward the sovereignty of this nation as a separate entity. It’s up to you as teachers to make all these sick children well – by creating the international child of the future.” Chester M. Pierce, MD, professor of education and psychiatry, Harvard
In addition, Red State governors need to take back their el-hi public schools, colleges and universities. Public school curricula need to focus on the basics (reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, history, science, technology, foreign languages/cultures, economics, civics, group and individual problem solving, critical thinking, concept of lifelong learning and relevant vocational fields). Curricula should prepare our youth to address the emerging needs/issues/challenges of the future that they will inherit, improve and survive. Everything else, including athletics, social programs, and arts needs to be the domain of the child, his family, church, community civic groups, youth programs, and structured and unstructured self-pursuits. As to school curricula, it needs to be closely and routinely scrutinized by responsible appointees to ensure that it is not allowed to stray into the realm of social/political programming. Educational principles should adhere to the following premises: If something is worthy of being placed in the curriculum and thus to be taught and learned, it should be vigorously, skillfully, and patiently taught. It should be reinforced. It should be acquired (LEARNED). Learning should be verified through feedback and observation, practical application and testing. Each class year’s learning should be precursory to the next year’s curriculum, its learning goals and objectives. Everything else is a waste of the teacher’s time and the student’s time and the taxpayers’ money. Education’s purpose should be to impart relevant knowledge, skills and abilities (focused on those projected to be needed for future success in the world the child will grow into); it should insure that that knowledge is acquired and based on need assessments that project the needs in the career fields and vocations of the near future.