What not to do when you drive off base in uniform.

[SlickAg]

Teachers catch my blame because they are shaping the minds and common sense traits of future generations, and therefore I believe they have a lofty obligation it to students, parents, and taxpayers to provide a setting that acknowledges and approves of a diverse variety of viewpoints being tolerated.

I’m just going to leave this here...

 

[Brett327]

I didn’t say the left. I said teachers and the news media. I actually think the right and left news media are equally to blame. They’re all shit. Where are the Walter Cronkites or Peter Jennings who just reported the facts without spin, and let the viewers decide?

Teachers catch my blame because they are shaping the minds and common sense traits of future generations, and therefore I believe they have a lofty obligation it to students, parents, and taxpayers to provide a setting that acknowledges and approves of a diverse variety of viewpoints being tolerated.

I absolve you of your inadvertent bias. ?

 

[wlawr005]

Wanna see information bias? Read the actual demands from the teachers union website. I wonder where all the rest of the demands, like defunding police, are written.

 

[wlawr005]

Even here, the "defunding" of police is two sentences in a 17 page paper. Rather than a formal list of demands, this is a point paper that outlines what the union believes to be an ideal situation.

 

[wlawr005]

The problem is media, both left and right, speaks in hyperbole and buzz words. The truth, like it has been for 3,000 years, is always somewhere in the middle. Our institutions of higher learning need to promote the ability for someone to derive a thought from a presentation of unbiased facts rather than agenda based propaganda.

More sadly, the representatives of the union are polarizing and politicizing the COVID issue. A tactic of which both parties are extremely guilty.

 

[exNavyOffRec]

I think it’s sort of silly to not admit that there is a significant lack of conservative voices in American higher education. I understand that some professions tend to sway one way or another, but to say that education overall doesn’t have a clear bias is willful ignorance.

We don’t need to exist in an echo chamber where we’re all aggressively agreeing with each other. But these seeds that are sown in classrooms grow up into our current situation, which is what @Hair Warrior described earlier. By saying “that’s just partisan rhetoric“ and dismissing his viewpoint offhand, you’re continuing the cycle.

Also, the fact that a high school teacher can get fired for tweeting a fact (Donald Trump IS our President) should tell you everything you need to know about the current state of American politics.

Michigan teacher and coach says he was fired for tweeting 'Trump is our President'

"I felt a lot of people were rooting against our president and I just felt like we should be rooting for him to succeed," Kucera said. "Because when he succeeds. we all succeed."

www.google.com

The problem with all those liberal professors

University faculties need not be expected to mirror their societies, but students and teachers ought not live in the information cocoons created by the overabundance of liberal professors in U.S. higher education.

www.google.com

Williams: Political bias and anti-Americanism on college campuses

A recent Pew Research Center survey finds that only half of American adults think colleges and universities are having a positive effect on our nation. The leftward political bias, held

www.winchesterstar.com

I know several teachers who are conservative and they have plain told me they keep their views on politics to themselves, if they were more liberal they could pretty much say what they want, voice support for GWB or Trump they would get looked down on, voice support for Obama and they are celebrated, the lack of tolerance to other peoples views starts in our schools.

 

[SlickAg]

The problem is media, both left and right, speaks in hyperbole and buzz words. The truth, like it has been for 3,000 years, is always somewhere in the middle. Our institutions of higher learning need to promote the ability for someone to derive a thought from a presentation of unbiased facts rather than agenda based propaganda.

More sadly, the representatives of the union are polarizing and politicizing the COVID issue. A tactic of which both parties are extremely guilty.

Politicians politicize things. You might as well get upset at a dog for humping a fire hydrant. It’s in their nature.

I think as a society we’ve always thought of certain professions sort of “rising above” the fray and, by and large, remaining apolitical. Teachers, the military, policemen, etc. Not to say they shouldn’t have opinions or vote, but I would say people in those fields, and some others, have always sort of gone out of their way to not be overtly political.

I find the fact that some teachers are politicizing this situation to be especially distasteful. Having spoken to several teachers where I live, they’re all eager to go back to work and have their kids back to school as well. Our district superintendent was fighting very hard to provide an option for in-person education until our county judge decided to make one large sweeping decision for every child in our (rather large) county, rather than leaving it up to districts to do what is best for their constituency. So I don’t think this situation is universal by any stretch of the imagination, but I’ve not seen a lot of coverage from teachers FOR opening up schools.

 

[exNavyOffRec]

Politicians politicize things. You might as well get upset at a dog for humping a fire hydrant. It’s in their nature.

I think as a society we’ve always thought of certain professions sort of “rising above” the fray and, by and large, remaining apolitical. Teachers, the military, policemen, etc. Not to say they shouldn’t have opinions or vote, but I would say people in those fields, and some others, have always sort of gone out of their way to not be overtly political.

I find the fact that some teachers are politicizing this situation to be especially distasteful. Having spoken to several teachers where I live, they’re all eager to go back to work and have their kids back to school as well. Our district superintendent was fighting very hard to provide an option for in-person education until our county judge decided to make one large sweeping decision for every child in our (rather large) county, rather than leaving it up to districts to do what is best for their constituency. So I don’t think this situation is universal by any stretch of the imagination, but I’ve not seen a lot of coverage from teachers FOR opening up schools.

I know many of the teachers I had growing up were more liberal and some that were more on the conservative side, most of this was found out after I had left high school as they projected a very middle of the road attitude in the classroom, they wanted us to make our own decisions, I wish they did that now.

 

[wink]

I think the notion of "brainwashing" is a bit silly. If people get exposed to ideas that you don't like and find them attractive that doesnt necessarily mean theyve been brainwashed. People can use their own critical thought and explore ideas and come to their own conclusions.

The problem here is we are lacking good critical thinking skills in our society. And it is getting very much worse in our schools, in part because many teachers have not developed that skill themselves. I don't really know why this is. I think one reason is that people are just too lazy and with so much info available in media and the web, it would appear to take forever to analyze it all. People today can't be bothered to read a book. Movies and TV have to move at a rapid pace to keep people engaged. Attention spans are notoriously short especially for young people. Who has time to THINK about an issue or read three or four different articles on the same subject? It is easier to look to what happens to be a biased media or error ridden web for what to believe.

Saw competing protests on a street corner in Kanab UT Friday. Neither side had a true grasp of the issues they took the time to make signs for and stand on a corner to promote. It was laughable.

 

[Pags]

I know many of the teachers I had growing up were more liberal and some that were more on the conservative side, most of this was found out after I had left high school as they projected a very middle of the road attitude in the classroom, they wanted us to make our own decisions, I wish they did that now.

What is the basis of your final statement? Does anyone here have actual personal experience with teachers projecting a personal bias? My kids are still younger so we haven't got too far in to complex ideallogic discussions from school but, in general, my kids seem to be getting a fine education that covers the basics. Sure, the topics are covered slightly differently than they were 30yrs ago but none of it would appear to be "brainwashing." Unless we consider the acknowledgement of cultures other than ours and experiences of non-white Americans as brainwashing...

 

[Swanee]

I think it’s sort of silly to not admit that there is a significant lack of conservative voices in American higher education. I understand that some professions tend to sway one way or another, but to say that education overall doesn’t have a clear bias is willful ignorance.

You're not wrong. But... The US military has a significant lack of liberal voices and has a clear institutional conservative bias that I'd argue is about as far right as you think education is left (though the American scale vs the world scale on what is right vs left is... wonky). Yet all military members spend at least 12 years in the education system, and officers have to have an additional 4 year degree from the even more liberal biased higher education system. So how does that happen?

Teachers catch my blame because they are shaping the minds and common sense traits of future generations, and therefore I believe they have a lofty obligation it to students, parents, and taxpayers to provide a setting that acknowledges and approves of a diverse variety of viewpoints being tolerated.

I generally see/hear from the teachers in my family, (yes, they are more liberal) going the route of simply leaving all types of politics and religion out of the classroom- it's the ones that want to bring it in who tend to get in trouble for it, and they're pretty vocal about getting in trouble.

Most every teacher I know is more worried about getting kids to pass their standardized tests that anything else (which I believe to be the wrong approach to education, but that's where we are now...)

 

[Pags]

The problem here is we are lacking good critical thinking skills in our society. And it is getting very much worse in our schools, in part because many teachers have not developed that skill themselves. I don't really know why this is. I think one reason is that people are just too lazy and with so much info available in media and the web, it would appear to take forever to analyze it all. People today can't be bothered to read a book. Movies and TV have to move at a rapid pace to keep people engaged. Attention spans are notoriously short especially for young people. Who has time to THINK about an issue or read three or four different articles on the same subject? It is easier to look to what happens to be a biased media or error ridden web for what to believe.

Saw competing protests on a street corner in Kanab UT Friday. Neither side had a true grasp of the issues they took the time to make signs for and stand on a corner to promote. It was laughable.

I dont necessarily disagree. But because people have come to their own conclusions or have come to conclusions that lack the nuance that others may have come to doesn't mean there's brainwashing going on.

At some point we shouldn't be surprised that "the kids" have come up with ideas that older folks don't agree with. That's how life works. And kids coming home from school with their own notions is part of them developing their own ideas and a likely result of them developing critical thinking. If we think our school should be thought factories that make kids that agree with mom and dad then maybe we are in favor of brainwashing.

 

[Swanee]

The problem here is we are lacking good critical thinking skills in our society. And it is getting very much worse in our schools, in part because many teachers have not developed that skill themselves. I don't really know why this is. I think one reason is that people are just too lazy and with so much info available in media and the web, it would appear to take forever to analyze it all. People today can't be bothered to read a book. Movies and TV have to move at a rapid pace to keep people engaged. Attention spans are notoriously short especially for young people. Who has time to THINK about an issue or read three or four different articles on the same subject? It is easier to look to what happens to be a biased media or error ridden web for what to believe.

Saw competing protests on a street corner in Kanab UT Friday. Neither side had a true grasp of the issues they took the time to make signs for and stand on a corner to promote. It was laughable.

It's not the teachers.

Standardized testing. There is no critical thinking when there is one definite right answer and 3 wrong answers that you choose from.

Attention spans haven't gotten shorter, life has become flashier and more things are competing for our attention now- advertisers created that for us. Scenes in plays have always been about 8 minutes, with action beats occuring every... 2 - 2.5 or so, since the days of Sophocles.

But when you have things that lack advertisers and flashy things competing for your attention, (like Netflix) you start to realize that people will binge watch a 10 hour season of Ozark like it's a movie. (Which is what the producers are now doing BTW, filming a 10 hour movie and breaking it up into 1 or 2 act episodes).

 

[Treetop Flyer]

I’ll give an example of the media’s non-partisanship.

The New York Times published an op-ed by Senator Tom Cotton.

And then they fired the editor who allowed it a few days later because of the woke outrage at daring to publish a conservative Republican’s point of view.

So yeah, the newspaper of record will definitely publish contrarian viewpoints. (It only fires the people responsible afterwards.)

The irony here is that Brett probably has you on ignore because your opinions trigger him.

 

[Griz882]

What is the basis of your final statement? Does anyone here have actual personal experience with teachers projecting a personal bias? My kids are still younger so we haven't got too far in to complex ideallogic discussions from school but, in general, my kids seem to be getting a fine education that covers the basics. Sure, the topics are covered slightly differently than they were 30yrs ago but none of it would appear to be "brainwashing." Unless we consider the acknowledgement of cultures other than ours and experiences of non-white Americans as brainwashing...

I wonder if some aren’t confusing political bias in higher education with that in elementary and secondary education? I have two nieces that teach at the K to 12 level and while both are, politically, mildly left-of-center neither has the time to introduce politics into their classes. They are too busy dealing with the common core requirements.

With reference to post-secondary education (college and university) there is substantial bias and I do have personal experience. The bias is mostly centered in the arts and humanities side of the house (Science guys probably don’t have the time). This bias is genuinely noticeable, leans very hard to the left (read as actual “higher socialism”) and is entirely meant to take an indoctrination approach. I have personally watched students present a centrist-to-right thesis in class and get excoriated by their professors for not using the “right language,” for being “hate-filled and illogical,” and once actually calling a student a “Nazi” (that person was invited to leave the faculty). I once got a letter signed by four members of my department who noted that they were upset that I didn’t spend enough time talking about American expansionism and racism in a World War II course I taught. The issue in higher ed is real enough that some states are struggling with what to do to get some “diversity of thought” back into the classrooms. Where it will end up I can’t say, but tenure is on the way out and young people are coming to higher ed looking for something other than what is offered now (simplistically...more training, less “education”).