The Law as Public School Teacher

You'd think our Glorious Union has had enough of laws seeking to dictate what is or is not taught in public schools.  The infamous Butler Act, adopted by the State of Tennessee nearly 100 years ago, led to the Scopes Trial, which led to the humiliation of William Jennings Bryan (and possibly his death mere days after the trial concluded) by Clarence Darrow, to some blistering articles by H.L. Mencken, and made the United States the laughing-stock of a good portion of the Western World, is perhaps the most notable law which sought to do so in modern times.  Or at least it was, until recently. 

The Butler Act at least had the virtue of clarity.  That law stated in pertinent part "[t]hat it shall be unlawful for any teacher in any of the universities, normals and all other public schools of the State which are supported, in whole or in part, by the public school funds of the state, to teach any theory that denies the story of the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach instead that man has descended from a lower order of animals."  I know, the use of the word "story" in the law is amusing.  The legislators of Tennessee were apparently unaware of the implications of that word.

But now the State of Florida has adopted a law which similarly seeks to regulate what takes place in classrooms, which not only lacks clarity but seems to flaunt its vagueness.  This is the so-called "Don't Say Gay" law, officially Florida SB 1834."  It states, also in pertinent part:

 "A school district may not encourage classroom discussion about sexual orientation or gender identity in primary grade levels or in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students.  A parent of a student may bring an action against a school district to obtain a declaratory judgment that a school district procedure or practice violates this paragraph and seek injunctive relief. A court may award damages and shall award reasonable attorney fees and court costs to a parent who receives declaratory or injunctive relief."

Defenders of the law like to point out that it provides that discussion of sexual orientation or gender identity is only contrary to the law in kindergarden to third grade, according to its terms ("primary grade levels").  Who would object to that, really?  I doubt anyone does.  But that's not all the law says.  It also says discussion of such topics may not be encouraged "in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students."  So, the law clearly applies to students of other grade levels.

A reading of the law raises several serious questions:

How does one encourage classroom discussion?  Must the discussion take place in a classroom for the law to be violated, and a cause of action arise?  What is "sexual orientation or gender identity"?  Does the fact that the law refers to a "school district procedure or practice" indicate that encouragement (whatever that may be) by a single, "rogue" teacher or other school district employee (a janitor?) wouldn't be actionable? Is it necessary that a policy or procedure, sanctioned by the school district expressly or by implication, as an entity, exist? What do "age appropriate or developmentally appropriate" mean? Is that left to the courts and the lawyers who litigate claims to decide?  Just what kind of damages are available to a parent in the action created by this law? 

What is "age appropriate or developmentally appropriate" is clearly subjective, and would vary from student to student.  Florida's legislature probably gave parents the right to sue under the law in an effort to avoid enforcement of the law being considered "state action" for constitutional purposes.  But that would leave interpretation of the law undetermined until precedent could be established through the courts, and that won't happen anytime soon.  In the interim, school districts and teachers will be justly terrified of being sued by some parent or another who thinks wrong words are being spoken in classrooms.  They may therefore be inclined to take fairly drastic steps to avoid litigation, e.g. refusing to require the reading of any books the subject matter of which involve sexual relations, prohibiting the use of certain words in classrooms, disciplining teachers, etc.

In short, it's a shoddy law, and will be difficult and expensive to implement.  The cynic in me wonders if the law was adopted purely to discourage talk of sex in the classroom, especially talk of particular kinds of sex.  Sex is something which has always frightened Americans, especially when it comes to the task of making children aware of it.  I think most of them would like if others had that task.  It may even be, ultimately, a form of posturing by politicians, always interested in obtaining popular support (at least when it doesn't interfere with monetary gain).

The law is alleged to be one protecting parental rights.  But do parents have a legitimate interest in making certain their children under the age of majority don't hear certain words of learn what other people are in terms of gender or sexual orientation?  Is it possible, indeed, that they think students won't otherwise learn of such things or speak about them unless they're "encouraged" to do so by teachers?  Only a fool would think that.

For my part, I think most parents are detriments to education, generally speaking.  They recognize that basic skills such as reading, writing and 'rithmatic (as the old song goes) must be acquired, though they probably would prefer that the use of the legendary "hickory stick" be reserved to themselves.  But otherwise, I think the preference of most is that their children think like them, be like them, talk like them and act like them until they become adults, at which time parents can claim that they're beyond their control and influence.  The sad fact is that most parents would prefer that their children not learn more than their parents have, at least in cultural or social matters in my opinion, and it may be that this law is an expression of that fact.

Justice itself isn't blind, but the law is, in the sense that the law may be good or bad, wise or stupid.  This particular law is stupid.  But it is a law nonetheless, just as the Butler Act was law, and may wreck all the havoc it did, and more.  

Mere Thuggery is Loosed Upon the World

In the drawing above, Senator Charles Sumner is shown in the course of being assaulted with a cane by Preston Brooks, a member of the House of Representatives.  It's an interesting moment in the history of Congress, and that of the United States.  Not all that long after Sumner was beaten unconscious, the Civil War began.  It's not completely clear whether Brooks was motivated to cane Sumner because of the latter's stance against slavery, or because the Senator vilified a fellow Senator who was Brooks' kinsman.  I think it's likely that Brooks felt his kin was being dishonored, as Sumner and others made their anti-slavery stance clear long before the incident.  Brooks evidently didn't challenge Sumner to a duel because he didn't consider Sumner to be a gentlemen.  So, he resorted to beating him as he would a dog or, likely, a slave.

"Thuggery" is variously defined as rough, violent or anti-social behavior by criminals or bullies.  I'd call the caning of one member of Congress by another an act of thuggery.  Happily, actual violence between members of Congress is relatively rare.  But thuggery of one kind or another is becoming commonplace, or so thinks your less than humble servant, Ciceronianus.

Why is this?  Consider those who have commonly been described as thugs.  There were of course the bandits in India from whom the word is derived.  Unfortunately, the word has become associated with some rap or hip-hop sorts who apparently find being considered a thug to be attractive.  But it's also been associated commonly with, e.g., mafiosos, low-level but brutal criminals, bullies, muggers, and even some political regimes, like the ever-repulsive Nazis (unless of course you're a devotee of Heidegger, the Nazi so esteemed by intellectuals, the good Nazi).

Thuggery by a political regime is most recently on display with the Russian invasion of the Ukraine.  The reasons given for the invasion have been baseless, and even obviously so.  Some are absurd.  There is some truth in the assertion that Russia and the Soviet Union has for a very long time always wanted and claimed the Ukraine, but though that may be a fact it's hardly grounds for an invasion, unless it is simply a means by which territory may be obtained that is claimed by a recognized, sovereign nation by another stronger nation through the use of force, which is to say by thuggery.

But thuggery is evident in other respects as well, though perhaps in a smaller and less violent way.  Here in our Great Republic, it seems to be increasingly characteristic of our politics and many of our people.  The person formerly known as the president was and is in several ways a kind of thug-wannabe--an admirer of real thugs on the world stage, and a (thus far) failed thug in his efforts to overturn a legal election.  This is not to mention the manner in which he ran his (often failed) businesses, blithely avoiding debts through the bankruptcy courts and, apparently, spreading unsubstantiated claims regarding their financial soundness.

It can also be maintained that he and his minions encourage thuggery.  As a friend recently said, through them an "ugly door" has been opened and several kinds of bullies, boors, bigots and others have flowed through it to run amuck in our society in a kind of celebration or festival of thuggery, sometimes of a low, mean kind and sometimes by those pretending to a grand manner in politics, media and culture.  Rudeness and the flaunting of ignorance and prejudice are seen as admirable; some people seem to think they're entitled to be louts.  It's become something of an honor.

We may be becoming a nation of Jonathan Swift's Yahoos, without Houyhnhmns to guide us. 

O Fortuna

You've all heard  O Fortuna, though you may not know that you have.  This medieval poem was set to music by Carl Off in the 1930s.  The poem itself is a rather grim, even angry, description of the goddess Fortune.  Set to music, it is an ominous, and then thundering, condemnation of the vagaries of cruel Fate and the life we're made to live while on Earth.

The pagan goddess Fortune was, no doubt, cursed from time to time, though my guess is more effort was devoted to placating her than cursing her.  In this poem, though, we have what I think is a very Christian work, consumed as it seems to be by hate and despair of Fate in the kingdom of this world.  Life on earth, after all, is almost by definition inclined to evil, as are we, or so it was thought by the Church when this poem was written.

You've probably heard it in various movies and perhaps even during a TV show, used to render a scene portentous, or comical when heard during something silly and it's used to mock.  I remember thinking it might be something of Wagner's when it was played during the movie Excalibur along with Siegfried's Funeral March and bits of Parsifal and Tristan and Isolde.  Oddly, it was played during a scene when Arthur and his knights road out to face Mordred, and the country was coming alive in spring blossoms with the return of the king.

We might think it appropriate as part of the soundtrack of our times, when everyone weeps with us.  A Stoic of the ancient past might think life, however changeable and hurtful, was only seemingly so, and evil only in the limited view allowed us as the kind of creatures that we are.  What the Universal Reason dictates is beyond us, but necessarily good.  A more modern version of a Stoic might have no trust in a spirit of intelligence motivating the universe, but would aspire as would the ancient Stoic to recognize that it is foolish to allow what is beyond our control to disturb us and be content to govern ourselves if not events.

Governing ourselves, thinking of us as a group of any kind, seems beyond our power these days, however.  The tendency is not to do so, in fact, but to leave that to someone else, provided only that our governor seem to be not only powerful but a panderer, playing up to us and gratifying our increasingly material and simple, meaning baser, desires.  It seems we'd be content with very little, really.  Perhaps it's always been so, in the end.  Food, shelter, entertainment and the sense that we're better than others are all that are needed to make us content, Fortune be damned.  

Those of medieval times may have felt that they were responsible for the evils inflicted on them by the world, or God.  Many of us no longer think that way.  We're more inclined to blame others, not Fortune or Fate. Others make us angry, and are much more easily punished than Fate, or Fortune or God.  We don't bemoan our fate, we make others bemoan their fate.  But the soundtrack of our angry, vengeful time may still include O Fortuna for its effect if not its meaning.

Read No Evil

What could be more satisfying than prohibiting that certain thoughts be thought, words be said, and books be read?  Prohibiting that certain persons be born or live near to us might be more satisfying to some of us, I suppose, but here we don't dream of unlimited power, but consider power that may be exercised by ordinary humans, especially parents.

There have been reports of school districts banning, or being asked to ban, certain books, or perhaps more properly the teaching and reading of certain books in schools.  Perhaps they may not even be mentioned by teachers or be present in school libraries, or their titles displayed; I'm not sure.  Neither am I sure how widespread and significant the bans or demands for banning are at this time.  But given our long history of prohibiting so many things, and destroying them when we're able to do so, the imposition of bans on the written word should raise concerns.

It's said that all parents hope their children will be "better" than they are.  Better in what sense, though?  I think that "better off" is what's hoped for; better in a material sense.  That may mean that children must be better educated in the sense that education may facilitate economic prosperity.  But it doesn't necessarily mean that parents hope their children will be smarter than they are, or "better" than they are in morals or wisdom.  I suspect that most parents think themselves smart enough, wise enough, moral enough to satisfy if not please everyone.  To them, the thought of their children being better than they are in those senses may not even arise. They may not consider it to be a possibility.

The thought of someone else thinking themselves better than they are, and telling that to their children either expressly or by implication, would be horrifying.  It would even be intolerable.  But teachers are in a position to do just that.  Teachers see children more than parents, in some cases.  Teachers have the authority not only to suggest that children read certain books but require them to do so.  

Certain books suggest, or state outright, that parents aren't wise, or moral, or smart.  They may also suggest or expressly state that things parents hold dear or believe to be the case are unworthy, even evil.

So it's not all that surprising that some parents and school districts have taken it upon themselves to ban certain books from school.  I can think of some I'd like to see banned, frankly.  But what I'd like to see banned aren't necessarily those other parents would like to see banned.  Here is the danger in banning.

There was a time when conservatives were leery of government control in general.  Now, it seems, they support government control of what is taught in schools, provided that means that what is taught in schools is that which they believe should be taught, and not what they believe should not be taught.  This isn't necessarily only a conservative concern.  Books like Huckleberry Finn and Of Mice and Men are considered racist or demeaning to the disabled by those who aren't conservatives, politically or socially or culturally.  

I think that banning, as a rule, isn't effective.  Students will find a way to read and see and hear things of all kinds, and will be especially eager to do so when they know their parents will disapprove.  They probably will be eager to accept what their parents don't accept or even hate or fear.  For good or ill, this is a part of growing up.  In any case, eventually, someone should think for themselves.  

And I suggest that should be the goal of schools.  It's obviously necessary that children learn to read and write, know basic math and science.  It's also appropriate that they know something about history.  Beyond that, they should be taught how to think critically.  Knowing how to do so, they're in a position to exercise their own judgment on what to read.  That would be ideal, in my humble or not so humble opinion.  Schools, and parents, shouldn't be in the business of determining or proscribing what students should or should not read.

This wouldn't necessarily be acceptable to parents, however.  It would require that students be taught the basics of logic and rhetoric, learn to analyze claims and opinions, test them to the extent possible.  That may be more frightening to some parents than learning their children are reading about critical race theory.  Personally, I think that learning to think critically would have the result that critical race theory wouldn't be accepted without question in its entirety and its wilder conclusions and inferences questioned.  That would be the case for other theories, conclusions and inferences as well, however.

And as that would be the case there are no doubt parents who would want critical thinking to be banned.  Well, there's a choice to be made.  Presumably most of us want our children to be able to think.  Then it becomes a question of whether they should think well or not.  If there are parents who are against their children being taught how to think logically and clearly, it would seem appropriate to disregard them when it comes to regulating schooling.

 

Aging and Perspective

 

The Sphinx (not the one in Egypt) sat outside Thebes, perched like a cat on a short pillar if the illustration above is representative.  It would eat people if they were unable to solve a riddle it would pose to them.  I'm not sure why.

One day, the otherwise unfortunate Oedipus encountered it.  He answered the riddle which, as we know, asked what goes on four feet in the morning, two feet at noon and three feet in the evening.

I've always thought the riddle misleading, as it refers to something done in a day, not a human lifetime.  But sphinxes must eat, I suppose.  It didn't get to eat Oedipus as he guessed rightly that the riddle describes a man.  His good luck didn't last, however.

The third foot mentioned in the riddle is a cane.  In the evening of our lives, we're supposed to walk through use of a cane, it seems.  I don't use one yet, but probably may be said to be in the evening of my life.

We change with time.  That's the way of it.  The universe is change, as Marcus Aurelius wrote.  We hope that there are changes which offset the steady decline of our abilities.  It's usual to claim that age brings wisdom.  I think it can fairly be said that what we know increases as we accumulate experiences over time, but I don't know that it can be said that we become wise over time.  We may know a good deal, have experienced a good deal, but it doesn't follow that we have good judgment or good sense.  I think wisdom would require those characteristics.

Nonetheless, something should change as we age, regardless of whether we become wise, and I think that to be perspective.  Concerns change with time; circumstances do as well.  What the older believe significant is different from what the younger feel is significant.  That's as should be.  If it isn't, there's something wrong.  The change in perspective which I think should take place is the realization, too long avoided sometimes, that was has been of such concern to us over the course of our lives, for the most part was unimportant.  The problem is, that change of perspective may not do us, or anyone, any good as it comes too late.

Those said to be wise have remarked that we should treat every day as if it is the last for us.  We may die at any time.  "Memento mori" is supposedly what was whispered in the ear of someone awarded a triumph in ancient Rome-perhaps the greatest public recognition of glory ever given any Roman.  At the height of his glory the triumphant general was told to remember he must die.  He remained merely a mortal.  

It's a useful reminder for us all, but though we're aware of our mortality it isn't much of a concern even when we're reminded of it in one way or another.  Other concerns get in the way of it.  What aging does, inevitably, implacably, is bring us closer to death.  Being closer to it, we see it "better."  If we're lucky--and wise--we know we approach the end of all we've done, thought, felt, and said, and the end, for us, of all felt, thought, done and said by others.

This should alter our perspective, because it should make all that's excited, angered, outraged and disturbed us feel small.  Even silly and vain.  It should become difficult to understand and to accept what we hear, see and read, now, day after day.  The self-righteousness, hatred, crassness, cowardice, avarice, hypocrisy that is spewed from TVs, social media, pundits, politicians is mere noise, sound and fury signifying nothing, to paraphrase the Scottish play as we're supposed to call it.  We more and more resemble chattering monkeys. 

Some as the end approaches become concerned with the afterlife which may await us, and in that sense turn their heads from the absurd antics of others.  Too often, that's an expression of fear and regret.  Efforts are made to placate God, to repent of misdeeds.  Suddenly, the self-love and self-infatuation that's characterized us for so many years is concerning; it may do us harm.  

It's unfortunate that our self-regard dissipates only then, if it does at all.  Fear of judgment in the afterlife has done nothing to temper our conduct, if our history is any indication, as we're quite content to be selfish, bigoted and hateful until that possibility draws close.  As it is, we do nothing to rectify what's been done; we merely regret it, uselessly.

If it's wisdom we acquire with age, it doesn't seem to do us, or anyone, any good.  It's a sad kind of wisdom, knowing that we've been unwise for the greater part of our lives, and that others are and will be unwise as well.

But though we can't change the past, we can impact the present, and the future of others if not ourselves.  Or we can try to do so, at least.  We can make others feel good, we can provide them with comfort, material and spiritual, we can teach by conduct and in speech or the written word, we can exemplify the life of virtue, we may even inspire.  It may be that the effort will have no significant result.  Living life an accordance with nature is worthwhile in itself, however.