January 11, 2019

"Is the President Making Middle School Worse?"

Asks Michelle Goldberg at the NYT, where I'm afraid if anything's worse, they'll say it's worse because of Trump. But I recommend clicking if only to see the photograph of the T-shirt covered in Trump faces.

From the article:
Cornell and Huang’s peer-reviewed paper, “School Teasing and Bullying After the Presidential Election,” [doesn't] claim to have discovered that a region’s backing for Trump causes an uptick...
Pause a moment for a dance of joy from The Up Tick...


Back to the article:
... in reports of bullying, only that the two are correlated. Still, it’s not hard to imagine that kids who spend their time around Trump enthusiasts might be getting the message that picking on racial minorities, and those who deviate from traditional gender norms, is O.K.
No, it's not hard to imagine.  It's easy to imagine that every damned thing that wrong is wrong because of Trump. It's like a game you can play. Play it with your kids: Player 1 identifies something bad. Player 2 must state a way in which it can be considered to be Trump's fault. Builds their creativity and — come on! — it's fun.
 “The adults that voted for Trump are much more likely to emulate Trump and be supportive of attitudes that we saw turned into bullying and teasing in middle school,” said Cornell. “I suspect it’s an indirect effect of the social environment that kids are in. It may be their parents, it may be other adults, it may be the adults in schools.”...
And what is science but guessing at what's more likely and entertaining suspicions about indirect effects?

ADDED: Okay, kids, ready to play It's Trump's Fault? I'm Player 1 and the bad thing I'm identifying is: People are losing their powers of critical thinking.

94 comments:

Seeing Red said...

The adults that voted for Trump are much more likely to emulate Trump and be supportive of attitudes that we saw turned into bullying and teasing in middle school,” said Cornell. “I suspect it’s an indirect effect of the social environment that kids are in. It may be their parents, it may be other adults, it may be the adults in schools.”...


What a liar.

Project much?

M Jordan said...

I was bullied as a kid. Made me stronger. Maybe more bullying is what we need.

(I’m only half kidding.)

Seeing Red said...

Or they were used to being the entitled and now someone’s called them on it they consider that bullying.

Ann Althouse said...

Trademark on The Democrat Tick.

Meade said...

The Up Tick stickers — soon available!

Ann Althouse said...

I'll have to draw that later.

Amadeus 48 said...

This is so cool. It’s science!

These people including Michelle Goldberg are such sad specimens.

Expat(ish) said...

Nothing can make middle school worse. Satan is sitting over it in the inner circle of Dante's hell because he's too kind hearted to make people go through it again.

-XC

Henry said...

Did Trump's election magically create the voters that elected Trump? Or did they, and all of their bad attitudes, pre-exist?

Nonapod said...

kids who spend their time around Trump enthusiasts might be getting the message that picking on racial minorities, and those who deviate from traditional gender norms, is O.K.

I seriously doubt this lady has actually ever talked to an actual "Trump enthusiast". Although it must be nice to imagine that all the evil in the world flows out from one man. In such a world nothing bad that happens is anyone's else's fault other than this font of wrongness.

Amadeus 48 said...

Alhouse and Meade— you can do ancillary stickers too for added sales.

Try “Best uptick dance instructor in the country. First lesson free.”

Wince said...

Still, it’s not hard to imagine that kids who spend their time around Trump enthusiasts might be getting the message that picking on racial minorities, and those who deviate from traditional gender norms, is O.K.

Likewise, is it hard to imagine that kids who spend time in public school might be getting the message directly from the schools and faculty that picking on white males and those who follow traditional gender norms is O.K.?

Tim said...

I'm still stuck on everything being Bushs' fault

Darrell said...

The Trump kids end discrimination in their clubs--like Trump did with his.
And they recruit the best kids for the jobs, regardless of race, color, or creed.

Eleanor said...

Do you know what caused an uptick in bullying in middle school (and high school)? Social media and cellphones. It used to be if a kid wanted to bully another kid, he (or she) had to be brave enough to do it face to face. Now the kids can hide behind their phones and other screens. Want to insult Vinnie Barbarino's mother? You don't have to tell him she wears army boots to his face. You can make a nasty meme and put it out there on the internet for the world to see, and if you have any computer skills at all, Vinnie won't know who did it. Anything Trump has to say, he says it, and takes full credit for it. For today's kids, that would be an improvement.

rehajm said...

I feel bullied by this analysis.

Ingachuck'stoothlessARM said...

Ticks and Ratons
Can break my Bones,
But names will never hurt me

Darrell said...

The "mmm,mmmm, mmm" kids are always looking for kids to exclude when they don't march in lockstep.

rcocean said...

So, Althouse are you ever upset that a Dumbo like Goldberg gets a NYT OP ed page position and you don't?

Really, she's 10X of stupid.

Jersey Fled said...

I had a Junior High math teacher in one of my MBA classes. She was a very bright young lady. She was trying to get out of teaching and get into the business world.

She said that most of her 7th graders couldn't pass the 4th grade math proficiency test. It's become almost a joke that Millenials can't do math. They don't seem to feel any remorse about that. They almost seem proud of it.

Maybe that's what "educators" should be worried about.

robother said...

"[Michelle Goldberg and other p]eople are losing their powers of critical thinking." Assumes a fact not in evidence.

Rick.T. said...

Nah, we Trumpsters pick on ticks, not kids and minorities. Just ask Brad Paisley:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OctrGD4JW8U

gilbar said...

Isn't (in Fact,) MOST of the bullying that happening, happening TO Trump enthusiasts, not FROM Trump enthusiasts?

Who's smashing people's heads in with bike locks?
Who's vandalizing people's cars with bumper stickers?
Who's stealing yard signs?

Bob Boyd said...

Technically, a tick is not an insect, but it's pretty close. Maybe there should be an insect politics tag.

gilbar said...

Jersy Fled said...
Millenials can't do math. They don't seem to feel any remorse about that. They almost seem proud of it.

https://wrif.com/2019/01/08/people-cant-believe-one-18-inch-pizza-is-more-than-two-12-inch-pizzas/

Are you ready for a mindblowing revelation?
"Here's a useful counterintuitive fact: one 18 inch pizza has more 'pizza' than two 12 inch pizzas"!

Darrell said...

Ticks are small arachnids-- Parasitiformes. Along with mites, they constitute the subclass Acari.

gilbar said...

of course, you get 16 (8*2) (smaller) slices with the 12's vs Only 8 with the 16.

(old joke, that Now is considered FACT): do you want me to cut this in 6, or 8 pieces?
better make it 6, i couldn't eat 8

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

Thank you for pointing out the tireless forward march of these assholes in media determined to imagine a dystopian orange future for us. Who knew Chuck worked at a kindergarten!

campy said...

What's that rule that says all questions in headlines can be answered with "no"?

Darrell said...

I always found one six-foot-tall girlfriend to be better than two four-foot girlfriends, too.

Ingachuck'stoothlessARM said...

Double A, can you draw a 'Democ' ?

to go with your Rat & Tick pics?

Darrell said...

The left always tries to drag kids into their narratives.
Remember when the Left said that kids are freaking out because George Bush is destroying the planet? There were saying this after two months in office. Why were kids freaking out? Because their teachers were telling them that they are all going to die and Bush doesn't care. John Stossel covered that for 20/20.

Jim Gust said...

People are not losing their powers of critical thinking, because you can't lose something you never had.

Big Mike said...

People are losing their powers of critical thinking.

Point of information — people lost their powers of critical thinking in November 2008. Writing about it over a decade later in the present tense a decade later is a mistake.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

The only Bullies are the leftwing bullies who bully Trump supporters.

That's it.

Anyone bullying Hillary voters? I doubt it.

Big Mike said...

So is over-emphasizing the “decade later” part. Oops

Chuck said...

ADDED: Okay, kids, ready to play It's Trump's Fault? I'm Player 1 and the bad thing I'm identifying is: People are losing their powers of critical thinking.



I was thinking much the same when I tried to recall how many times Althouse has examined the fundamental notions that Donald Trump has been a Truther, a Birther, and a Vaxxer. And that he appeared as "John Miller" in an interview to talk about Donald Trump in the third person.


Henry said...

reports of bullying (my emphasis)

Seriously, every middle school should see an increase in reports of bullying because every middle school runs anti-bullying programs in which reporting is a key component.

If the reporting went down, Trump would be to blame for making kids afraid to speak up.

tim maguire said...

People are losing their powers of critical thinking because Trump has them all reading Twitter more and everybody knows you can't express an intelligent thought on Twitter.

gahrie said...

I was thinking much the same ... talk about Donald Trump in the third person.

Now who can argue with that? I think we're all indebt to Chuckles for stating what needed to be said. I am particulary glad that these lovely children are here today to read that post. Not only was it authentic Establishment gibberish, it expressed the derangement often seen in this day and age.

Trumpit said...

The erection of a deplorable person in Schlump as president has unleashed the subhuman deplorables, including the Trumptard rednecks "Sing along with" bitchy Mitch McConnell, and lap poodle Linseed Graham Cracker. This can be traced to the failure to destroy the South after the Civil War. NOW, A WALL must to be built...along the Mason-Dixon Line to preserve our way of life from the ascent of rednecks and other deplorables.

William said...

i make the following predictions for the coming year: An illegal immigrant will kill someone. A Muslim extremist will kill someone. A white man will kill someone who is not white........In the first two cases, some effort will be made to explain how these murderers are atypical of immigrants and Muslims. The day after the story will be dropped. The white murderer willl be presented as someone enabled by Trump's rhetoric. Toxic masculinity, plus white supremacy leanings, plus Trump's rhetoric inevitably leads to such cases. There will be lots of discussion about this murder and maybe a major motion picture,

Michael said...

What you are witnessing is the transformation of academic research into a click farm. Time was when you could conduct perfectly boring research on esoteric topics, get published in a few obscure journals and carve out a pretty nice existence on campus. No longer. Publish Or Perish has morphed into Likes, Shares and Retweets or Perish.

In other words, academics are now little more than attention whores. Hence a perfectly mundane study on bullying has to be tarted up with references to Trump.

trump didn't create this environment in academia, he just helped drag it into the sunlight so we could all see the rot that has infected the college ranks.

Darrell said...

Trump was known to have cable news shows on all the time in the background, and he heard all their programs on vaccinations, the World Trade Center, Global Warming, etc. He often talked about those programs asking people what they thought. Like many, if not most people, he half-thought there must be something to these stories if CNN, NBC, MSNBC, ABC, CBS, et. al., put them out. He now knows absolutely better. Like Chuck, they make shit up. He was never a Truther and a Vaxxer. The most he ever said is that we have to do the research, and keep on doing the research, and not accept quick or easy explanations.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

See Fem-Trumpit for example of what a leftwing bully looks like.

Would you like Trumpit to teach your children to think?


Frightening.

William said...

Why is right wing rhetoric reminiscent of Hitler whilst left wing rhetoric never has the air of Stalin, Mao, Hoxha, Milosovic, Pol Pot, Castro, Maduro, and Ortega?

Ambrose said...

Such a narrow minded stereotype of 63 million Americans - bigots who spend all their time mouthing insults of minorities in front of their children.

viator said...

The worst part about Trump is that he hides under children's beds at night and scares the hell out of them.

PM said...

Michele Goldberg is a tireless worker for Trump's re-election.

Freeman Hunt said...

"ADDED: Okay, kids, ready to play It's Trump's Fault? I'm Player 1 and the bad thing I'm identifying is: People are losing their powers of critical thinking."

It's not hard to imagine how the emotional trauma of Trump's election might make people's expressions of feeling not conform to the privilege-driven norms of discourse within the social sciences. However, we must ask ourselves if, in this frightening and uncertain age of Trump, should we be more concerned about being precisely, factually, and semantically correct than about being morally right?

buwaya said...

You continue to assume that all this stuff is organic, that writers just decide to write according to their inspiration, and so it shows up as a personal opinion, or a skewed set of them, which may seem bizarre or mad, and that these faults are those of the writers.

These problems are not the fault of the writers. Writers deliver what they are told to write or what they think editors will buy.

This material is commissioned or selected by editors, under orders to push a message, a propaganda line. They are given these by their management, who get them from their higher management, who also run a coordination system between MSM entities.

You are seeing the output of a machine, a machine with human components but still a machine. You cannot argue with this as you would an actual human. You cannot argue with it even while you are reading it, because that is a route to madness, crediting the machine with sense. But there is no sense, nor even an expectation of sense. It amounts to shouting at a wall, even if it is only in your head. And that is a weakness whereby one gets worn down by the propaganda.

In a war-propaganda situation, which is what you've got, the only useful thing to do against propaganda is counter-propaganda. And the only metric is volume, not cleverness or good sense. The content of enemy propaganda is always a trap, no matter its plausibility or otherwise.

The only healthy approaches to war-propaganda are avoidance, or as an analysis of enemy behavior - the sort of attitude towards or the questions one would ask about an artillery bombardment.

I realize that this paradigm-shift is difficult, against the learned habits of a lifetime, but in the end it is necessary.

buwaya said...

There is no emotional trauma wrt Trump, as a phenomenon in its own right.

This all is the effect of a deliberate propaganda campaign. It is a created thing, not organic.

It is enemy action, or the deliberate if to a degree unfortunate effect of your own sides propaganda, depending on the side you are on.

Qwinn said...

Simply more evidence that:

SJWs always lie.
SJWs always double down.
SJWs always project.

wildswan said...

Trump caused back holes to appear in the universe and they are sucking all the bright stars into WORMHOLES. If you look down a wormhole I imagine you'll see the light of the lost stars which are being bullied down there by, I suspect, Trump supporters.

Sebastian said...

"People are losing their powers of critical thinking."

Sorry, not playing.

"People" aren't losing anything.

Even progs are only posturing for effect, promoting The Narrative to win the culture war, and of course to seize power. They will invoke "critical thinking" when it suits them, otherwise not.

hombre said...

Trumpster bullies: The ones who won’t put bumper stickers on their cars for fear of vandalism. The ones who won’t allow their children to wear Trump paraphernalia in public for fear of anti-Trump aggressors. The ones who tell their children not to speak positively about Trump in school for fear of punitive action by teachers and administrators. Those Trumpster bullies?

Any time you want to learn what’s up with the lefties look to see what they are accusing others of doing. It’s all about projection for them.

Bay Area Guy said...

"Is the President Making Middle School Worse?""

Dunno, but Michele Goldberg is definitely making the NYT worse.

buwaya said...

It comes down to an expectation of civilized good faith.

The habits of a lifetime of civilized intetaction are simply wrong for what you have now. War, which you already have, on the level of your media climate and civic disunity, is the opposite of this condition. There should be absolutely no assumption of good faith.

It is hard to move to this world-view, I know, but its where you all actually are.

Rick said...

It wouldn't surprise me if bullying is up among kids. Left wingers have normalized the philosophy that differences in politics justify hate and bullying. It wouldn't surprise me to discover their children act this out.

Ann Althouse said...

"So, Althouse are you ever upset that a Dumbo like Goldberg gets a NYT OP ed page position and you don't?"

No. I've written op-eds. It's hell. I can't do what I do in op-ed form. I'm right where I want to be. This is what I do, and I feel extremely fortunate to get away with it on the level I have.

The 15th anniversary of this blog is Monday and, for me, it overshadows my birthday, which is tomorrow.

tcrosse said...

"Is the President Making Middle School Worse?"

Is it possible for Middle School to be even worse?

buwaya said...

It is unsafe to assume that the absurdity of enemy propaganda makes it ineffective or counterproductive.

What counts is volume, and the consequent drowning-out of opposing propaganda. The pervasiveness of media carrying a single message, with no opposing message.

This is a different mental world now.

stevew said...

"And what is science but guessing at what's more likely and entertaining suspicions about indirect effects?"

Quite rightly noted as NOT SCIENCE. Amiright?

Fernandinande said...

The chart on page 11 seems to indicate that white kids were very slightly more bullied in 2017 than in 2015, and very slightly more in Rep voting districts, but fewer kids thought bullying was a problem in 2017 because of all the slightness.

Yancey Ward said...

I look forward to the "Tick-Infested Cafe" later today.

Yancey Ward said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Yancey Ward said...

Eleanor above nails it- the rise in bullying is that it can be done from the distance provided by today's consumer electronics. When I was growing up, bullies had to be brave enough to do it face to face, but today even cowards can be bullies.

Skeptical Voter said...

Our rescue dog sleeps in a crate in our bedroom. When I got into bed last night I realized that the dog had really bad gas. That didn't happen before Trump was elected. It's all Trump's fault.

hombre said...

Critical thinking is not a “power of.” Some people may have a propensity for it, but in most it is a learned, or at least nurtured, skill. It is neither valued nor encouraged by our educators who prefer indoctrination to reason. Hence, it is disappearing.

Sebastian (10:47) is mistaken. The lefties will not be able to “invoke” critical thinking at will. Sarah Hoyt says they are “idiots or evil people.” If they were merely evil, he would be right, but they are both.

rehajm said...

With Twitter everyone's in middle school.

Bay Area Guy said...

Althouse sez:

"No. I've written op-eds. It's hell. I can't do what I do in op-ed form. I'm right where I want to be. This is what I do, and I feel extremely fortunate to get away with it on the level I have."

And we are fortunate to have you. Your commitment to the free exchange of ideas is outstanding.

"The 15th anniversary of this blog is Monday and, for me, it overshadows my birthday, which is tomorrow."

Well, happy birthday, and more importantly, happy blogiversary!

Rick67 said...

Still, it’s not hard to imagine that kids who spend their time around Trump enthusiasts might be getting the message that picking on racial minorities, and those who deviate from traditional gender norms, is O.K.

*Might* be getting the message. So first we are trying hard to *imagine* something (because it's not already true or something) that *might* be the case. Getting it from where? from whom? Do these people have any earthly idea what they are talking about? I think we are dealing with the apotheosis of solipsism. Progressives imagine all sorts of things, project them onto their cultural-political opponents, and then proceed as if everything they *imagine* is somehow true.

These people are literally two steps from reality.

bagoh20 said...

"The Democrat Tick." should have an open mouth and tears flowing.

Sam L. said...

People are losing their powers of critical thinking. That's because they're Dems/libs/progs.

Sigivald said...

I've seen a lot more evidence for kids traumatized by adults telling them Trump is Gonna Get Them than of "supporters" deciding to "be racist because Trump".

(Most of the "Trump is racist and supports racism!" seems to be people Deciding It Must Be, and doubling down, not anything he actually does or says [in context, at least - but out of context finger-pointing is the order of the day].

The man's a shit, but I see no reason to believe he's a *bigoted* shit.)

Skippy Tisdale said...

Ann needs to create a Critical Thinking Bullshit tag.

henge2243 said...

ADDED: Okay, kids, ready to play It's Trump's Fault? I'm Player 1 and the bad thing I'm identifying is: People are losing their powers of critical thinking.

Blinding anger and toddler with a full diaper style tantrums cause liberals to lose their power of critical thinking. President Trump causes liberals to experience blinding anger and toddler with a full diaper tantrums. Thus President Trump is responsible for causing liberals to lose their powers of critical thinking.

A false sense of moral superiority and the voyeuristic pleasure of watching a Republican President stand up to the establishment cause conservatives to lose their power of critical thinking. President Trump gives conservatives a false sense of moral superiority and the voyeuristic pleasure of watching a Republican President stand up to the establishment. Thus, President Trump is responsible for causing conservatives to lose their powers of critical thinking.

An excessive use of crack cocaine and heroin causes everyone to lose their powers of critical thinking. Having to live in a society dominated by politics because conservatives and liberals have politicized every aspect of our lives drives everyone who does not consider themselves to be a conservative or a liberal to excessive use of crack cocaine and heroin. President Trump has driven conservatives and liberals to politicize every aspect of our daily lives and thus driven everyone else to excessive crack cocaine and heroin use so President Trump is responsible for everyone's loss of the powers of critical thinking.

iowan2 said...

A couple of things. Via the insty man, submitting your children to public education is child abuse. Next, over 70% of peer reviewed submissions are later proven to be wrong. That includes the hard science journals.

Parenting is the solution to bullying. Verbal stuff is easy to put away, since they should already know they are important and loved. The physical. That involves direct parental presence.
Trump? I am waiting for the first thing the President has done from the Oval office that has caused any citizen any discomfort. A perfect example of fake news.

Molly said...

(eaglebeak)

Trumpit:

This can be traced to the failure to destroy the South after the Civil War. NOW, A WALL must to be built...along the Mason-Dixon Line to preserve our way of life from the ascent of rednecks and other deplorables.

Abraham Lincoln:

With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.

mikee said...

Trumpists aren't members of Antifa, last I checked.
Nor are they the academics from pre-K to university who defend censorship and shunning and shaming of conservatives.

Leftist pot, you are calling a really nice, clean crystal Trump goblet a black kettle.

Jim at said...

I'm sorry, but are Trump voters doxxing people? Are Trump voters hounding leftists in restaurants, coffee shops and all parts of the public square? Are Trump voters running around in masks and trashing our cities?

No?

Then STFU about Trump voters, their kids and their imaginary bullying.

Renee said...

My assumption is that the areas that voted for Hillary Clinton were NOT swing areas, and upwards of 75-90% voted for her. I know I live in that type of area. Even if you were for Trump in an area like this, you do NOT make yourself noticed.

The places where Trump won were the 'swing areas', due to the diverse political environment there was an opportunity that exists unlike Clinton areas.

RichardJohnson said...

"Is the President Making Middle School Worse?"

Democrats are definitely making it worse for kids wearing Trump paraphernalia.

There was the city council member in University Place in the Houston area who yelled obscenities at a middle school student wearing a Trump T-shirt.Councilwoman who berated teens about Trump T-shirt is charged with disorderly conduct, The teenage girls were waiting in line at a Houston area cookie shop Saturday night when the woman one father described as a tall, short-haired blond woman approached.

“Grab ’em by the [expletive], girls!” she yelled at them, according to KPRC.

One of the girls was wearing a “Trump: Make America Great Again” T-shirt.

“Then, she yells it again!” the father, who wanted to remain anonymous to keep his daughter’s name out of the news, told the station. “At that point the girls were getting kind of scared, and then the woman starts, you, know, going, ‘MAGA! MAGA! MAGA!’ while shaking her fist.”



Man accused of stealing teen's MAGA hat indicted by grand jury.
A grand jury has indicted a Texas man who was arrested in July for allegedly stealing a teen’s “Make America Great Again” hat before throwing a drink in his face at a Whataburger restaurant — an incident that went viral and caught the attention of the Trump family....
“You ain’t supporting s---, n----!” a man identified as Jimenez is heard saying on camera after tossing a large drink in the direction of the teen filming the video. He then walks away with the hat while muttering "b---- a-- motherf------" as one of the other teens sitting at the table appears stunned.

Authorities identified Jimenez from the video and arrested him at his home July 6 on a warrant for theft of person. He was booked and released later that day on $5,000 bond.


But attack Trump- who is the cause of those Democrat-affiliated adults going off their rockers when they see minors wearing Trump paraphernalia.

BUMBLE BEE said...

I would like to point out that a recount in Michigan (blue and blue again) was called off due to unsealed vote containers being ruled disqualified. Metro Detroit got caught cheating. That state and other's recalls, Wisconsin I believe, were dropped. Abandoned cold. No questions. "Swing areas" of Michigan and Wisconsin? How about Hilary's lifetime Felony score beating Al Capone's being a deciding factor in these blue states?

tim in vermont said...

The Trump situation is far to scary to think about it rationally. We don’t have the time to question ourselves! Of course he is making middle school worse. We have news reports daily of MAGA hatted thugs using PLASTIC STRAWS to assault right thinking blue nosed goody two shoes with spitwads. You think this is a joke, but you have no idea of the calibre of spitwat that can be shot from a slurpy straw!

Hyphenated American said...

Half of all murders in USA are committed by blacks, who overwhelmingly vote for democrats....

Meade said...

Only if you don't count self-murder as murder. Which I do.

Michael McNeil said...

Good to see buwaya in the new year. I wish he'd put a link in his profile, or otherwise inform us as to how we can stay in touch with him, and see what he's saying, during those seemingly long moments — like at the end of last year — when he's not posting here.

Can't have everything, I guess. But there is another highly insightful individual — whom like buwaya I almost always like to follow — like him, a foreigner, but in this case he lives overseas (in Australia) to boot — and that is: Richard Fernandez; who (though sometimes writing under the pen name “Wretchard the [or ‘T.’] Cat”) one can follow under the “Belmont Club” rubric and his own name over at PjMedia.com.

Wretchard/Fernandez's postings are always worth perusing. However, late last year Wretchard came out with a jaw-droppingly great piece titled “We need a bigger world.” His article begins by sympathetically treating Andrew Sullivan's (itself impressive) article many of you have seen, wondering how the country and civilization itself can possibly continue when its institutional structures were composed during a cultural milieu (Christianity) which now is mostly in a shambles.

Richard goes on from there to consider the meaning of John Lennon's “Imagine” — and beyond that, finally arrives at a most fascinating discussion of myth in the capable hands of J.R.R. Tolkien (and Hugo Dyson) as presented during a night-long bull session with C.S. Lewis — shaking the latter's whole outlook on life. Only days later would Lewis realize that — without really noticing or thinking much about the change — he was now a Christian, no longer an atheist.

Read the whole thing.

mikesixes said...

It's also not hard to imagine that people who agree with Trump about immigration, taxation, or anything else are run out of public places or even physically attacked and beaten by Democrat thugs, because it's something we see all the time.

alanc709 said...

Let's see, which side is employing thugs...... hmm, is antifa a pro-Trump group?

buwaya said...

Richard Fernandez has a lot more to say. He went to Harvard after all.
I am just a simple engineer.
I only have a few conclusions, and on those points I am sadly repetitive.
If I had a blog it would be boring.

walter said...

iowan2 relayed "over 70% of peer reviewed submissions are later proven to be wrong. That includes the hard science journals."
--
Sure....but many are morally correct.
In part because becoming a "peer" often requires it.

walter said...

Just a li'l flashback to more wholesome times when teachers held the marionette strings a bit tighter:(note the facts(s) politifact failed to pursue)

https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2009/sep/25/michael-steele/gop-claims-video-shows-b-bernice-young-elementary-/

The fact we wanted to check was the question that immediately popped into our head when we saw the video, "Did this really happen at a public school?"

The short answer is yes. It happened at B. Bernice Young Elementary School in Burlington Township, N.J. That's a public school in the Burlington Township School District. In the video, about 18 second-graders are in an auditorium singing two songs about Obama.

Here are some lyrics to the first song:

"Mm, mmm, mmm!

Barack Hussein Obama

He said that all must lend a hand

To make this country strong again

Mmm, mmm, mm!

Barack Hussein Obama

He said we must be fair today

Equal work means equal pay

Mmm, mmm, mmm!"

The second song is set to the tune of The Battle Hymn of the Republic .

"Hello, Mr. President we honor you today!

For all your great accomplishments, we all doth say "hooray!"

Hooray, Mr. President! You're number one!

The first black American to lead this great nation!

Hooray, Mr. President we honor your great plans

To make this country's economy No. 1 again!"

According to school district officials, the video was shot in February 2009 and was part of a program to recognize famous and accomplished African-Americans during Black History Month.

"There was no intention to indoctrinate children," District Superintendent Christopher Manno said in a released statement. "There was no political agenda underlying the activity."

The New Jersey Department of Education also responded via prepared statement.

"The commissioner has directed the superintendent to conduct a thorough review of what happened to ensure students can celebrate the achievements of African-Americans during Black History Month without inappropriate partisan politics in the classroom, as well as ensuring the privacy of children is not violated," said Beth Auerswald, a spokeswoman for the district. "In addition, it is our understanding the teacher in question retired at the end of the last school year."

It's unclear who wrote the lyrics or shot the video. In a note to parents and the media on Sept. 24, Superintendent Manno said "the recording and distribution of the class activity were unauthorized." Fox News reported that the video was originally posted on the Internet by Charisse Carney-Nunes, author of the children's book I Am Barack Obama. We sent an e-mail to the address on Carney-Nunes' Web site and received a response that, "At this time, Charisse has no comment for press."
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So..they had no way to determine who the teacher was and get a little info? Apparently what's important is who posted it online.




Maillard Reactionary said...

OK, if that's an Up Tick, what does a Three-Toed Slump look like?