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School Daze
by A.X. Perez
[email protected]

Attribute to The Libertarian Enterprise

A new school year is beginning. Hundreds of thousands of students will be sent into a propaganda machine designed to turn them into productive and happy members of the collective. Many will experience great psychic harm in the process.

To be honest some will be expected to succeed at tasks they are not intellectually capable of handling. Others will have the IQ, but suffer from Dyslexia, ADD, ADHD,and /or SODA (some other damn acronym) and not be properly diagnosed. Others will be correctly diagnosed then put in programs that lead them to label themselves as "dummies." Forget about what is happening to those suffering from mild undiagnosed bipolar disorder or other borderline illnesses.

Some will be the freaks and geeks—the kids that just don't fit in. They have their own agenda, one that isn't the school system's. They will be made to feel like losers and failures or pushed into becoming outlaw rebels. Again, sometimes both. Many, perhaps too many, will be crush fitted into the mold. A fortunate group will manage to take away the knowledge and skills they need to educate themselves. Too many will incorrectly think they did.

Social Studies and English teachers will have to face a problem. The state enjoys a monopoly for all practical purposes in education. If y'wanna teach y'gotta work for da Man. For too many of us that becomes a moral dilemma and the beginning of other dilemmas. The fact is you can be replaced by someone that will toe the line, hell the new guy will be starting his first lesson before the ink is dry on your transfer/resignation papers. So you stay in the job, telling yourself that someone who will teach the "official version" and only the "official version" will take over if you leave.

And you get to see how far you can go challenging the party line, teaching the truth instead of the official lie. You also have to not simply pound "the truth" into your students head, intellectual honesty requires that you get these kids to seek the truth for themselves, comparing the official version to any alternate version (including yours) and reaching their own conclusions.

But if you can stomach it and can figure out how to promote freedom from inside "the belly of the beast" without getting digested it's a good job to use to fight against tyranny. If you can stomach being in the system. If you can keep from getting fired. If you can keep from being brought over to the official side. And if putting up with other people's bratty kids doesn't drive you insane and inane.

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