Naomi Wolf: Why No Investigation?

I'd have to disagree with your statement that being "educated" means being indoctrinated. You must gather information from as many sources as you can including the ones that would attempt to indoctrinate you. It is up to you as an individual to process and use that knowledge as you see fit. Knowledge can be gained from many different sources. Alex Jones and the Secretary of the Treasury both put forth ideas with little or no evidence to back it up. Ron Paul helped educate most of us on this website... would you say we have been indoctrinated? I would say we've taken knowledge from many different sources, analyzed it independently, and came to a conclusion which is what education is to me. Pure self-education, not taking any information from any "authority" on the subject, breeds a narrow view of the world and world issues driven by self-interest and personal likes and dislikes which is part of the problem in informing the masses as a whole about the issues which we think is important.

The fault for being indoctrinated does not fall on any "authority" as much as it falls on the individual for not critically analyzing the information and coming to their own conclusions. If I tell people the Fed is not a government agency, that the Declaration of Independence outlined our reasons for separation with England, or that the stock market crashed in 1929 there is no indoctrination as these are facts. With that said, there are some definite biases out there as our conventional education (k-12) system is for the most part run by the feds through the almighty dollar. I used to teach 9th grade Civics but the course was dropped as we are preparing for a "No Child Left Behind" social studies test of which funding will be attached to. (By the way, I have NEVER met a teacher who believes NCLB is working... ever.) Programs such as "No Place for Hate," which attempts to indoctrinate children to certain beliefs that they believe will end racism and hate is not only ridiculous but many of the ideas introduced actually push the students farther from any real academic pursuit by indifferentiating between these opinions and the facts we're trying to teach them. Additionally, this program further highlights the differences between us and not the similarities and it does not create the want and curiousity to learn about other cultures that might actually foster tolerance or acceptance. We can't force people to like each other. But I digress...

The indocrtination that you speak of, in my opinion, is the fault of apathetic people simply storing anything and everything they hear with no real interest in learning. As a teacher myself, we are often taught to inspire critical thinking within our students but I have to be very careful using it myself when applying it to history. I can't tell the kids, "the Fed is central economic planning, a staple of a command economy," or "the second amendment in part is there to forcibly remove a tryrannical government," or "the Civil War severely stunted the strength of our Republic," but allowing them to work through the problems on their own often produces even better results!!! I believe education is the facilitation of learning through providing the knowledge (facts and varying philosophies) and allowing students (with unbiased guidance) to critically think about the situation. But I guess few teachers think this way... too many just want their paycheck.

(Rant about various teaching issues removed for your benefit. You are welcome...)

This is also what we must do to bring more people to our movement. People will forcibly resist what they see as "indocrtination" or forcing your opinions on them. We need to give them the facts and facilitate learning within them... plant the seed, let it grow. We can't yell at them and overload them with opinions and facts, pretending there is no difference between the two. As an example, just tell people what the Fed is and what they do. Don't follow up immediately with a dissertation on why we think it is killing the economy, let them come up with that. We all know it is "bad" for the economy and in reality once given full and complete information on the subject few could intelligently disagree.

Well... I think I've vented enough and now it's time to go tear down some paneling in my new house which I'm paying the bank more money in interest back than they originally even loaned me. These people really don't know why all the foreclosures? Sigh... sounds like a current events topic to me!

"Information is the currency of democracy."
-- Thomas Jefferson