Monday 6 June 2016

WHEN DID YOU BECOME A PATRIOT?

If you love your country, can you remember when or where you learned that? Chances are that you learned your patriotism in school. I learned my patriotism in school. I learned about American History and sang American songs. I had holidays off of school to honor Abraham Lincoln and George Washington. I learned to admire the leadership that brought us our Constitution and Declaration of Independence. My parents worked and they had more than their parents had had, just as their parents had more than their grandparents. America was a great country admired around the world. We were lucky to live here. Today children protest with signs "America Was Never Great". How did this happen? What makes these children so knowledgeable that they would question the value of their own country?

The news reports that students at Yale are demanding that the college change the required reading in their English classes. Seriously? The students are now telling the faculty what they should be reading? My goodness, why are these geniuses even going to school? They already know everything- they know more than Shakespeare, Milton, and Chaucer among all the others. These authors of the classics are unqualified, according to the students, because they are male and white. Not that these brilliant students are narrow minded or prejudiced. Where did these students get the idea that they were so brilliant?

You need look no further than the new Common Core Curriculum to see how it is done. You might have been taught to love your country in school. Today, if the Common Core Curriculum is taught, children are taught to criticize and disdain their country. Common Core creators and cheerleaders call this "higher level thinking". What they are actually teaching is not even critical thinking much less higher level thinking. If the Common Core creators could do critical thinking they might wonder why when they have their remedial classes they do stand up and teach- while they are encouraging project learning in the regular classrooms? Why they encourage computer programs which are drill and practice while they are forcing teachers to create chaos and teach hit or miss teaching in projects.These creators of Common Core can't even think clearly much less do "higher level thinking".

A whole generation of students has been taught that counter culture is "higher level thinking". The professor says it, the students accept it, and everyone goes away thinking they are geniuses!! This must be why they won't allow dissent on campus - they might have their illusion of being so smart shattered!! Their whole self identity is to just accept things and feel smart. Actually reading Chaucer and Milton and understanding them is hard- just criticizing them as white males is a breeze. Actually studying American History and really knowing it is hard - just dissing the country is really simple.

There are people who have good educations and know history and literature. These people are actually qualified to do higher level thinking. Kindergartners, grade school students, and high school students are not these people. The professors who write their Common Core aligned textbooks are not these people either. I'm afraid that the people who really think are not allowed to write textbooks- they may question something.

The mental health industry has a new research center in Bozeman. As the  head of the local NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) not for profit in Helena says " We find that when we have a research facility close we get more programs in".  In other words, the "research" facility is to promote programs. This is not deep thinking, this is program promotion!!

Our children are being taught to think knowing counter culture thought is being smart or intellectual. It most definitely is not. Becoming intellectual takes years and years and years of reading and studying. It is hard work.

The counter culture crowd that have written the new Common Core aligned textbooks, and the liberal teachers who are feeding them to our youth, do not know anything but counterculture. They can not run the schools much less the health care system or the country. They do not do the work or put in the effort to do anything well. They have taken power and the country is on the brink of collapse- from foreign policy to national debt to the state of the culture and the schools.

To those who say "Well what would you do?" to conservatives, I will tell you. We never thought we were so smart that we would destroy everything. We respected our founders and our heritage. We ran the schools that built this very successful nation that you are on the brink of destroying. We respected our culture. We knew that changes came slowly. We respected what came before us and let changes evolve. We were able to adjust and discard because we went forward with respect for our country and what it stood for. We respected our religion and our culture- we did not think we were God and could control everything.

I learned to be a patriot in school, and you probably did too, unless you went to school lately. Our children will not grow up safe, and our country will not remain strong, if we continue to let these counterculture individuals, who can't even think straight much less higher level, feed their garbage to our youth. It was a very sad day for me when I heard that youngsters were chanting "America was Never Great".