Sugar Makes You Dumb

[Tenet Nosce]

I would add, right. Kids are not taught to think.

One way I have phrased that is... kids are taught what to think, not how to think.

So, right vs. wrong is not a sensible way to view things.

It's interesting, and disturbing, to see how this type of thinking infiltrates every aspect of our lives! I think part of it stems from the patronizing attitude toward children: "Oh, they're just kids. We can't expect them to..." oh I dunno, eat a vegetable? But even more than this children are certainly capable of complex thought beyond simple "right or wrong". They understand human emotion (they are, after all, human!) and are endowed with all kinds of creativity which, frankly, is lacking in most adults.

And, kids are resilient because they are flexible. They can take a lot of stress, and actually require it in order to thrive. Obviously, a traumatic level of stress is not a good idea, but for the most part, it is adults who are inflexible and brittle. And rather than accept it within themselves, most would rather project it out onto their children, those "poor, helpless, little children" who need to be coddled like codgers at every opportunity. Children may be little, but they are neither poor nor helpless.

But that is what kids are taught, and as adults it plays right into our egos and the human resistance to change.

It didn't used to be like that. Even growing up in the eighties and nineties there were a lot of changes I noticed going on with the educational system. It used to be- one could graduate high school without having to develop their cognitive skills. But forget college. Nowadays we've got Dr. So-and-so's all over the place who really haven't ever grown beyond an adolescent level of reasoning ability.

Then, to top it off, we have these Dr. So-and-so's dictating our children's curriculum, if not teaching it themselves. And now that we are going on the second generation since these changes, the majority of people don't even see anything wrong with this. (Wrong being relative to the intention to develop and empower people.) In fact, as you alluded, many will actively seek to interfere with any sort of improvements.

A corollary to this is the attitude that "Everybody is a winner!" and pandering to the lowest common denominator so nobody's "feelings get hurt." I might catch some slack for this, but I feel like that is as every bit a fake form of "compassion", just like the fake form of "love" that our society breeds. Personally, I don't see any problem with identifying that a particular child happens to be a dolt when it comes to math, and instead seeing if they have better grasp of colors or music. Or if neither of those hand them a mechanical or electrical toolkit and send them off to a workshop of some kind.

I think it's more compassionate to tell the child that he is a dolt at math, and better to try some other avenues of learning early on. It's hardly "compassionate" to lie to children about their talents and capabilities under the aegis of "we're all the same and equal!" and to encourage, implore, or in some cases force them, to keep on a path which is essentially setting them up to miserably fail, just at that time in their lives when it is most important (from a developmental standpoint) for them to be building self-esteem and a strong sense of identity.

Instead, we decide to spend more time and energy teaching kids math at earlier and earlier ages. And then standardizing the testing and all the hullabaloo which goes along with that. And oh, by the way, we ran out of time and money, so the arts and music programs will have to be cut. Brilliant thinking, docs!

But of course- there is always sports. Sports are sacrosanct. God forbid anybody criticizes the value of a bunch of people organized into two "teams" and then fighting over some kind of object or territory in order to "score points" while onlookers from each side pump emotional energy into the players, and becoming more and more fanatical and personally invested in the outcome. Gee, I wonder why they didn't cut the sports out?

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This is kind of a tangent, but I think relevant. Most people- especially Americans- would be surprised to learn that much of this behavior is based on a presupposition of tabula rasa- the idea that every soul is created anew at conception, and thus is essentially a "blank slate" upon which it is the duty of adults in society to write upon.

Surprising perhaps, because this idea was brought to the mass consciousness by a Muslim philosopher named Avicenna. I wonder how many Americans would be shocked and appalled to learn that their most sacred "American values" have their roots in Islam, not Christianity.