George Carlin has what I consider a healthy contempt for what he calls a "child fetish" endemic in American culture. Everything we do is
for the children! He summarizes with an amusing snear to the American Parent: "I've got news for you folks: You've got a few winners -- a whoooole lotta losers!"
The good news, he offers, are kids who swallow marbles don't grow up to have kids of their own.
Not having raised a child, of course, allows me the luxury of empathy for the sentiment, particularly when I view the extremists in our culture as justifying every affront to our collective intelligence on behalf of how they would want their children to be protected, i.e., from truth and concurrent information that would undermine their perception thereof.
Best example I can think of was while riding home on the subway last spring. Sitting down next to me was a girl, approximately 14 years of age. She was a tourist with her family, who were sitting on the opposite side of the car, her slightly younger brother standing between us.
The conversation was congenial and as one might expect from one seeing the nation's capital for the first time in her life. She was sweet, excited and upbeat. I asked where they were from, Oklahoma; what grade she was in, a freshman in high school - or the equivalent thereof; what she was studying... She was "home-schooled," she said.
It was a long ride to our respective destinations; in their case, at the end of the line. The conversation faded in periods, then picked up again. We spoke about playing softball, and then it diverged into
verboten territory: Evolution. I don't remember the thread.
"I don't believe in Evolution," she volunteered.
I wasn't surprised, given her being home-schooled -- in
Oklahoma, but was nonetheless astonished. To see and hear, right in front of me, that which I absorbed only peripherially from television and the internet, that which goes on only in distant lands called
Red States: the resultant and very malignant dumbing-down of our youth. And I am realizing, my territory is being overrun by ignoramouses.
I looked at her, this otherwise intelligent-looking waif, and wondered aloud if she was being taught any of the sciences. Her look was that of lacking recognition. "Biology? Physical Science? Anthropology? Not even Astronomy?" She shook her head each time.
Well of course not. Anybody made to suffer through schoolbook-learning, classroom lectures, quizzes, tests, paper-writings and presentations, for even a semester, are, by definition, made to think. And if you
think about Evolution, and the inevitable conclusions brought to bear by, yes,
natural selection, then belief doesn't enter into the equation. You reach a point in imperical study where you say, "Here's what I know" and "Here's what I have yet to learn". . . "What I believe," in this context, is immaterial.
I thought about this for some time after. And it made me angry. I mean who
are these people to interfere with the growth of a human mind? Yes, they have rights as parents to influence the form and shape of their child's learning -- yadda -- but only to a point; say, turning off the T.V. and making 'em go upstairs and crack a textbook. But
this girl was entering high school (or, again, the equivalency thereof), and she hadn't touched a science book in her life?? To call it an outrage is to grossly understate it.
So I am made to wonder: Is this not
de facto child-abuse? I would say that it is, but far too many of those with far too much power in this country only encourage it. This, the moronification of America. And taken to the Nth degree,
you have this:
Lynx and Lamb have been nurtured on racist beliefs since birth by their mother April. "They need to have the background to understand why certain things are happening," said April, a stay-at-home mom who no longer lives with the twins' father. "I'm going to give them, give them my opinion just like any, any parent would."
April home-schools the girls, teaching them her own unique perspective on everything from current to historical events. In addition, April's father surrounds the family with symbols of his beliefs — specifically the Nazi swastika. It appears on his belt buckle, on the side of his pick-up truck and he's even registered it as his cattle brand with the Bureau of Livestock Identification.
Back on the subway, I looked over at her parents. On the surface, they looked to be rather decent. Very nice, clean-cut, attractive and smiling middle-American. They had to be stopped. And my time was short.
I turned back to the girl. "Evolution is not something to be believed. It is to be studied and either understood or plausibly refuted." She furrowed her brow.
"For example," I continued, "when you were born, were you this big or did you enter the world as a baby." The latter, she acknowledged, of course. "And you grew for over 14 years, until you became
this big, right?" Right again, she nodded. "And you'll continue to grow in size until you become an adult, and then you'll continue to grow older, right?" More nodding.
"
That's an evolutionary process.
That's evolution!" She looked up at me as though experiencing a revelation.
It was then her brother sat down behind us. He leaned forward, elbows along the roll-bar atop our seats. His grin was mischievous and inches from my face. At first I thought he was sent by Mom & Dad to disrupt my heresy. No, it turned out he was just grooving on the conversation. I looked over at the parents. They were still smiling but with far less enthusiasm.
The subway came to my stop. I got up, turned to the kids, and stated in my most authoritative but reassuring voice: "The more I learn, the more I realize how little I know."
I didn't look back, feeling like Johnny Appleseed as subversive.
It felt gooood.
