tzor wrote:Woodruff wrote:If you agree that it is "the norm today" for schools to teach and train students to have anti-American values, then you are quite simply ignorant. There is no other way to put it, frankly. I am stunned to even see these sorts of statements typed out they're so far from reality.
But I am curious...exactly which anti-American values are you referring to, that are being taught so plainly in our high schools? Let's get into some specifics.
I do want to point out that "anti" means displaying opposite characteristics. It doesn't imply that "anti-American" values "hate" America or take American values in to the back room and mugs them.
That's not how I believe the term was being used, and I don't believe you think that either, but ok...we'll roll with that.
tzor wrote:American values are (or should be) derived from the adoption of the values of the Age of Enlightenment in the late 18th century. It is based on inalienable rights and the limited role of government to assure these rights to all (the fact that this in theory never happened in practice is besides the point; nothing in theory happens in practice and any system that thinks otherwise is doomed to failure).
American values are whatever values Americans in general believe they should be. HOPEFULLY, American values are malleable over time as we educate ourselves on how to treat others, else we would be valuing slavery, inequality and the irradication of Indians.
tzor wrote:The modern value system that is taught in the schools these days derives from the progressive era that really started in the late 19th century. It is derived from an European mindset that government should provide the means to "free" us from our problems.
American high schools really don't teach students that the government is there to free them from their problems. In fact, I find such an idea laughable.
tzor wrote:In short, our original values depended on equality of opportunity
Equality of opportunity? The hell it does. "Our original values" depended on the equality of opportunity among white males.
tzor wrote:while the modern progressive system depends on equality of results. "Everyone gets a trophy."
I haven't seen ANYTHING in high schools that runs to "equality of results" other than "No Child Left Behind" (which, you may recall, I am firmly against). High schools do not play the "everyone gets a trophy" game, nor do universities.
Woodruff wrote:I would suggest that how he was treated had more to do with "Vietnam vet" than his having been in the military or his being a "gun nut" or anything else, given the high incidence of PTSD and how poorly it was treated for so long that came from that era. That plus general misunderstanding and ignorance of PTSD.
To put this in a different context, are you suggesting that we had no gay people in this country until they came out of the closet?[/quote]
Huh? I have no idea at all what you're trying to get at here.
tzor wrote:The fact is that PTSD is not really "new." We just now see it for what it is.
I am well aware of that. It seems odd to me that you would think I don't, given my background.
tzor wrote:But it was the fact that he was familiar with guns because he was a vet that scared them, not because he was a gun not (he wasn't really a gun nut).
You read the guy's mind, then, and determined why the vet scared him? Or is this just the impression that the Vietnam vet gained, and how he passed it on to you. I find it very unlikely that another adult would be that scared of someone just because they know how to handle a weapon. I don't know ANY adults, teacher or not, who would have such a view of things.
tzor wrote:Vietnam is an interesting example. Few people who opposed fighting wars hated the people who fought them; merely the people who ordered them. The anger towards the Vietnam War was directed to the soldier; they hated him more than they hated the war. Never before had a nation so vilified the people who were drafted by the government to mess up their lives against their will.
I agree. That's why my contention is that perhaps it was the appellation of "Vietnam vet" (and the resultant fear of "they're gonna lose it", as irrational as that is) that so bothered the other individual, rather than the fact they were good at handling weapons.
tzor wrote:But the "Hippy" era took over the campuses after the war and such values have flooded the modern education system we have in public schools today.
So now we're teaching students to villify the military? Any idea how popular Junior ROTC is in the high schools? Principals and school boards LOVE Junior ROTC, because it provides things for their students that many times they don't get elsewhere.
tzor wrote:I have a feeling that had he been a First Gulf War veteran the same thing would have applied. It's assumed that they don't let "those people" teach their children. So veterans have to "hide in the closet" to get teaching positions.
This is truly not even remotely the case. In fact, I have to go back to my statement regarding ignorance.
...I prefer a man who will burn the flag and then wrap himself in the Constitution to a man who will burn the Constitution and then wrap himself in the flag.