I have learned a lot this year, I have to sit in on a 4th grade social studies class every week and I have learned about the great state of Colorado, the exploring travels of Lewis and Clarke and a lot about the Native Americans that lived here before the white man came and took over.
In our school, an elementary public school in south central Colorado we have one hour of social studies per week and one hour of science per week. The rest of the time is vastly spent on creative writing, reading and math.
I know we as Americans are steadily creeping toward the bottom of the education scale in the western world, and when it comes to the subjects of history, geography and civics we’re so far behind to that we are about to fall off the chart all together.
When it comes to science I think it all has to do with the religious agenda, there is really no need for science, right? If we "know" that the bible is true to the very last letter, God created earth in 6 days about 12,300 years ago. Science tells us different, teh dinosaurs were here millions of years ago, for example, then why teach and try to understand science at all since it's obviously false?
When we lived in Arkansas and I was researching homeschooling for my then 5 year old son, I got in contact with a homeschool group that strongly opposed any kind of teaching that went against what the bible said.
One lady told me with great disgust in her voice that her 7 year old had been facing evolution in class in 1st grade and because of that the parents had immidiatly taken their little girl out of that god forsaken public school and she warned me of all horrible things my son could be facing. That’s about the same time I said thanks but no thanks and left that meeting.
When it comes to social studies the reason for not teaching it is not as obvious or clear, but I think it’s considered better for the next generation not knowing what ass holes we're recoviering from beeing. The history is not pretty, we don’t look good…. at all.
As we demand people around the world to do what we tell them to do it might be better if we as a nation stay unaware of our own trespasses.
While the Union fought the Confederates to get rid of slavery during the civil war, the rest of soldiers not fighting that war, were busy breaking treaties, and killing the Native Americans out west in hunger for land and gold.
While we were busy saving the Jews from the horrible concentrations camps in Europe during WWII, the south had laws prohibiting African Americans the same rights the white population had, and lynchings and KKK was a fear facing blacks living in the south.
While the human right’s organizations condemn torture interogation methods used(I truly believe it’s a war crime that should be prosecuted and the responsible officials be put away), the drone attacks against innocent Pakistani civilians happens every day without a peep of complaints from the human rights organizations.
There are 100,000’s of people around the world suffering from our policies , our protection and support of evil dictators and our never ending hunger for cheap goods and oil, and by not knowing anything about the rest of the world, the rest of the world stay anonomous and less worthy of our concern.
