congressman writes tell-all and slams 'nation of naive, self-absorbed sheep'

a reply to: bigfatfurrytexan

Does learning about the arts somehow make people less intelligent? Shakespeare is the most influential author of the English language. Anatomy and Psychology are rooted in the works of Renaissance masters. Matte Painters are one of the most important positions to any piece of visual entertainment and they start at 6 figures a year.

Art is all about creating logic systems, and then conveying that logic system to others. It involves reasoning, communication, and aesthetics. Are those bad things to learn?

originally posted by: Aazadan
a reply to: bigfatfurrytexan

Does learning about the arts somehow make people less intelligent?

That's not what I said.

But everyone learns differently, and has different aptitudes. I have a science and math aptitude, but had to develop it completely on my own as an adult. I could have used more focus on math instead of learning how to play the bells in the magnet school bell choir.

ETA: I guess the way to look at it is: do you feel the educational system in the US is more or less effective than in the past?

a reply to: interupt42

Exactly and when that virtual barbwire goes up and the virtual freeways are tolled (trolled for money) at every turn we will all be herded to our free speech virtual sheeple pens when all is said and done.

Unless we vote for Trump.

a reply to: stabstab

Unless we vote for Trump

I don't know about that, He has talked of censoring the internet before.

money.cnn.com...

"We're losing a lot of people because of the Internet," Trump said. "We have to go see Bill Gates and a lot of different people that really understand what's happening. We have to talk to them about, maybe in certain areas, closing that Internet up in some way. Somebody will say, 'Oh freedom of speech, freedom of speech.' These are foolish people. We have a lot of foolish people."

a reply to: bigfatfurrytexan

Well, I can't comment on grade school, I don't have any kids in it and I'm too far removed from those years. From what I've read of Common Core I think that it's on the right track. If PISA tests are anything to go by we're not doing too bad there either, but we won't really have a complete picture on that front until December of this year. Once the new PISA scoring comes out, there's going to be a lot of datapoints to compare what is and isn't working.

I can agree however that we definitely aren't funding education properly. There's no reason Illinois and Kansas should be unable to keep their schools open for the entire school year, that indicates there's some deep problems in the management.