The Folk Prophet

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No, I don't disagree with the statistics. It's the implied idea that the particular statistics he discussed are problematic (for the most part), and the conclusions and interpretations he draws accordingly. The only real implied problem I did agree with is the fatherless homes, but then the conclusion/proposal....boy howdy did I disagree. I did agree with the idea that trades should be more emphasized...but not that it will solve the poison in the system. Girls surpassing boys in education is not a problem with the education system. Nor will redshirting the boys do much to fix what the problem is. But hey...I'm an old-school sexist, apparently. Because I think girls prioritizing education and career is one of the problems from the get go. So...you know.

On a side note: I've been a professional programmer for nigh unto 10 years now. I may not be a particularly expert programmer...but I'm pretty decent I guess. But I have never, ever, in my entire career, EVER, written a while loop.

I didn't get the original joke until you posted this. Then I went back and read it and...haha.

Hmm. I don't agree with, pretty much, anything he says here. That surprised me. But at the core, it feels like a lot of philosophies out there...when you remove God and eternal truths from the mix you're just not going to get it right. Bad data in means bad data out.

My point is that I think an important principle to understand and embrace is that we need to put aside what we want in favor of what the Lord wants for us -- the natural man being an enemy to God and all that. Of course there's some semantics involved in the idea of "want" that makes such an idea debatable. At some level, we have to want to put aside what we want in favor of what the Lord wants. So, yeah...not totally irrelevant. But what I'm getting at is that if one accepts that the Lord knows better, then it behooves one to put aside natural desires in favor of whatever the Lord sees fit for us. It's an extremely important principle. Perhaps the most important one in life. I mean the very idea in the OP where she says, "He didn't serve a mission, but I didn't care..." implies a problem from the get go. Whether she cares or not shouldn't be relative. Whether the Lord cares or not should be. Which, of course, leads to the question of why didn't he serve a mission. The implication seems to be that he simply didn't want to. That's a pretty big red flag. Her not caring about it shouldn't matter, because her understanding, clearly, is shortsighted. She needs to put her trust in things that are not shortsighted instead. Specifically...in God and the core principles of the gospel. I guess in my mind, "equally yoked" doesn't matter much if the result is hell. And I dislike the premise that equally yoked is somehow viewed in certain cases as a priority over and above humility, faith and obedience. It's the same issue I take with people discussing "being one" or "unity" in the church as if that principle somehow outranks others. We are not meant to be one, equally yoked, or unified in evil. The how of these things must always be in and through Christ and obedience to Him.

My take: Break up. Immediately and permanently! If you do not you will either live to severely regret it, or you will destroy your own testimony and abandon all that truly matters. And, I'll add for the record, YOU ALREADY KNOW THIS.

I don't think that ought to be the decision making paradigm here.

I see both sides of the matter and why they did it. The idea was fine. The execution was....less so.

Now you have.

I'm not disrespecting your view. It's yours and valid. But as a personal p.o.v., if this were the issue I had with public school, I wouldn't have much of an issue with public school. I'll grant it's an issue...but not one that warrants much concern, in my opinion. Learning to deal with being bored, after all, is as important a thing to learn as any other lesson. Being a disgruntled kid is, really, about equivalent to being a kid, after all. I hated cleaning my room too. As I said, I respect the view though. If a parent considers this an important reason to not put their kid in public school then I'm supportive. For me, however, it's not really the issue.

I KNEW there was a reason I didn't like you!!

I may not have been fully clear. Sometimes it's trying to convey a sense of something that one hasn't ever fully interpreted into concrete terms. I'm not anti-advanced degrees. I've just known some who have them that seem to have gotten nothing but a swollen head and inflexible thoughtless views from it. That has put a distaste in my mouth in the past. And you probably need to put my specific expertise into the mix to really understand my point of view. That is to say...music. I know my stuff when it comes to music. But my hands-on (and educated) experience, combined with my unique way of thinking, has led me to some unconventional viewpoints on the matter. And boy howdy, if you think the conflicts I've had on this forum have been something, you should see the debates I've had with music Ph.D. folk. Garr! Freaking closed-minded trained-monkeys! Not an original thought in their collective brains. They cannot see past their "education" to actually THINK! And, of course, they all treat me like I'm the idiot and I just don't understand. And their degrees gives them the weight of authority in the matter, so of course they aren't going to consider someone's view who doesn't have that advanced degree. Maybe I'm bitter.

I'm not dismissive. If I were hiring for certain jobs I'd demand it. I just have a strong "It depends" point of view on the matter. The degree, in and of itself, isn't fully persuasive.

I think, partially, that the pendulum that needs to swing is the nature of formal education itself. The attitude against it stems from what it has become.

I guess I haven't seen that culturally. I'll take your word on it. My view on Ph.Ds comes from interacting with people who have them, rather than a cultural thing. I'm not actually down on Ph.Ds They just don't, in and of themselves, impress me as much any longer.

I'm sure you have a point, but I'm not entirely sure what it is. People with advanced education might know more than us. Sure. But they might not. Is there more to what you're trying to say than that? Because I agree that they "might". But a person with no formal education might know more than us too. And in these days of information overload, it's entirely possible the latter is just as true as the former. It also strikes me that in these days of misinformation overload that people with advanced educations are just as likely to be off their rockers on their studied subjects as those without formal education. Do you sense from me that I don't carry a ton of respect for higher degrees? Why yes. Yes you do. (To be fair, I do respect the work, time, and effort it takes to acquire them.)

Maybe. I just can't help but think that "education" isn't the problem here. Idiots are gonna idiot. Some of the most educated people in the world do the same. I see a different solution. I think you'll generally agree. What we can hope to do is help people turn to Jesus Christ in humility and faith.

I'm not sure public school's job is or should be to teach deep thinking. Moreover, I'm not fully convinced deep thinking can be taught or learned. I'm also not sure that's the job of homeschooling. Nor am I really convinced that deep thinking is individually important. I mean in the aggregate it is, but individually, there are an awful lot of people who don't think deeply who are, have been, and will be just fine. School is to teach useful skills. That's the point as I see it. People need to know how to read and write. Beyond that, specialization in any given thing needs paths for people to go down. We need ('need' being a relative word) doctors and philosophers and scientists and engineers. But, honestly, without more important and meaningful core ideals, deep thinking is likely more dangerous than helpful. Another way to put it....wisdom matters a whole lot more. But we need deep thinkers, of course -- wise ones. But we do need them. And public school should have resources for those who are so inclined. But the idea that every kid needs to come out of public school able to think deeply doesn't quite work out in a variety of ways to my thinking. My goal in homeschooling my children is useful education. I'd like it if my kids can think deeply too...but honestly it's way down the priority list. If I can instill in my kids humility, faith, love, patience, kindness, long-suffering, a work-ethic, and the basic useful skills they need for life, I'm going to consider myself pretty darned successful. Additionally I kind of think whether they end up being deep thinkers or not isn't really up to me. Don't get me wrong...I'll talk deep thoughts with them. Obviously. I never shut up about my philosophies. You can bet my kids will get an earful. But whether they learn to think deeply or not.... As I said, I don't know if that really can be taught or learned. Keep in mind.... I don't know what I'm talking about. This is just my view.

No need to be sad. I was just making efforts to ensure clarity.

Just to be clear, this is not what I was suggesting. My point was there are more failings than just "homeschooling" going on.

I've been surprised at how much my daughter learns without us as parents actually teaching her. Granted, she seems to be a little genius in a lot of ways. But it's constantly amazing to me. As an example, years back before we had ever even thought about starting to teach her how to write we came across a drawing she'd done on her own where she'd written the word "CAT" on it. What's my point? Well... I cannot help but wonder about the variables that go into how and why a child learns or does not. My daughter clearly learned to write the word CAT from television and board books. That combined with her intelligence and she just worked it out. I am, in many ways, confident that we, as parents, could never teach her a thing and she'd end up being functionally literate. (Note: we're not going to put that to the test. It's just something I believe.) That being said...we did provide her with resources to learn how to write CAT. She had board books with words in them that we read to her before bed. She watched a lot of TV/Internet shows that were learning based. So from a certain perspective, it WAS our parenting that taught her to write the word CAT. It just wasn't direct. It was moderately intentional though. We read to her because we knew reading to kids was important. We turned on educational type shows intentionally. When I see a story about a 17-year-old who can barely read above a 4th grade level though....there's something else going on besides just "homeschooling". There are other factors at play...some of which may well be intentional restriction, parental apathy, innate intelligence, genetics, etc., etc. The point being.... stupid, lazy, weird parents have stupid, lazy, weird kids. Homeschooled or not. It is interesting to think about, for sure.

I was thinking about my comment to @LDSGator last night and thought I actually needed to clarify it a bit. First, I wanted to state that the idea of the 3 Rs being important and everything else being icing is only theoretically the case for an individual, but it is NOT the case for society at large. If no one ever learned anything but reading, writing and arithmetic that would not be a better state than diversity of knowledge and learning. Second, the comment that everything else is icing isn't meant to imply that icing isn't good. What, after all, is cake without icing? Unappealing. Icing makes the cake. Third, in discussing it with my wife I had stated something along the lines of your point above... The important things to teach are actually 4 fold. Reading, writing, arithmetic, and.........wait for it........ a love of learning. Yep. That's exactly what I said to my wife. Well, it was that and how to learn sort of rolled up into a single concept. Learning to learn. So I appreciate what you've shared here. As it relates to the, which is better homeschooling or public schooling, question.... well I don't think there's an answer to that because the question isn't actually meaningful. It's the variables within either state that make either better or worse. Making the broader argument that one is better than the other is an argument about those variables. It's an argument that the overall variables involved in the public arena have changed or corrupted for the worse, making public schooling overall more dangerous, and that the variables involved in homeschooling have changed and improved, making homeschooling overall safer. That argument can never be applied individually without looking at the specific variables in the specific instance.

Seriously though. I don't recall a thing about high school chemistry. And yet I'm a functioning adult. Reading, writing, arithmetic. That's important. If you can't give your kids that you've got a problem. The rest is icing.

So what? A... who needs high school chemistry? and B... Google and Wikipedia have mastered it. 😀