Our area is very conservative. For years the local college--in contrast to the general population--was essentially moderate-to-liberal, but of late--with the rise of students who are interested in Business, and the faculty we need to service them, no doubt--the balance is shifting in the direction of conservatism. So we, my wife and I, were pleasantly surprised to see a notice about a college panel discussion of 'What Is the New Deal?' We went, and were pleasantly even more surprised to see that the room began to fill up, and soon it was completely packed.
There was an excellent, and well-informed panel, consisting of three professors from colleges close by, and three students, one from each of those colleges. They took turns to give short presentations (only two of which were supported by slides!) and we were off to a healthy, moderate-paced discussion. (I will talk about the actual topic at the end, if I remember to.)
One thing that stood out, is that the speakers talked about Messaging. What is messaging? (I just Googled that, and man, did that hang my browser. Google wanted to know exactly who wanted to learn about this term, and to let some special clients know...) Most of the entries reported that the word meant essentially Text Messaging, using the various applications that support that, but one entry caught my eye, and following up, I arrived at a page that contained the following text excerpt. We can easily infer what that article considered to be messaging from the context:
Furthermore, in today's communication world, people are beginning to realize that their audience only listens to those who are saying what the listeners want to hear.
Okay, I have made some enormous conceptual leaps here; maybe when most people talk about Messaging, they mean just sending texts. Many others, though, mean that we have to be clear, and on the same page, when making important statements. A few, though, mean that we should not alienate our audience with statements that conflict with their belief systems.
Some of the discussion (about the Green New Deal, and) about talking one-on-one with friends and neighbors about most topics that extreme conservatives do not believe in, e.g. global warming, energy conservation, environmental pollution, income inequity, social justice, access to family planning, universal healthcare, good faith negotiation of international treaties, voter access, support of education, supervision of banking, etc, brought up the issue of disagreeing with them politely. This whole business of civil discourse is important, and I do not want to suggest that it does not make sense. But we must disagree without making it impossible to resume the conversation another time. (Of course, in many cases, the conservative side of the conversation just wants to say goodbye and head home, especially if most of their arguments consist of canned statements put together by their leaders who do not have much experience at rational argument, and do not have much of a scientific background. We must have a diplomatic way of disengaging if our conversational opponent is not prepared to argue; literally not well prepared, and continuing will only end up humiliating him or her.)
One major point, which was part of the messaging of those putting forward the Green New Deal, is that it merges together the two apparently different agendas that the Liberals had been concerned with: Environmental Conditions and Global Warming on the one hand, and Social Justice on the other hand. It isn't easy to see, but we are beginning to understand that these two concerns are two sides of the same problem. The Green New Deal, therefore, combines the issues of Warming, of a Minimum Wage, of Tax Reform, meaning that those who earn the most must pay their fair share. (Why? Because they use the resources of the nation proportional to their wealth. Work it out yourself.) And Medicare For All, which is clearly a social justice issue, as is Education For All, and Immigration Reform, and numerous other reforms that are needed, because they make worse the difference between the rich and the poor.
Religion
One of the strangest, and most amusing, phenomena of our times is how Fundamentalist Christians support our ultra-conservative administration so enthusiastically! As a former Christian who knew his New Testament a heckuva lot better than most modern Bible Thumpers, I just can't take these jokers seriously. If any of my readers happens to be a believing Christian, I do not meant to insult you, unless you agree with or support the current administration, and who considers our present Leader to be God's Gift to Believers. Trump is clearly an agnostic, if not an outright atheist, and certainly a cynic and a hypocrite, but having received the anointment of the Conservative Christian Leaders, the Followers bend their knee, however reluctantly, until such time as he might fall out of favor.
Now, thinking about engaging our friends and acquaintances one-on-one, it certainly seems to me that they're not going to give the time of day to a confessed atheist. The minute I reveal that I'm a born-again atheist, I may as well be talking to the trees. Most, if not all, Fundamentalist Christians have a very poor background in science, even if not all of them believe in a Flat Earth, and can't argue their way out of a scientific paper bag. But, to their great relief, they can cut down the number of those who would argue against their most fond 'scientific' beliefs, by first checking to see if the person concerned is an atheist, in which case, they can consider him or her to be sent by the devil.
I do not like to argue with Fundamentalist Christians, because they do not use logic the same way I do. I only have experiences with Fundamentalists on Facebook, which is so often a hotbed of illogic. The fallacies these people dream up are pathetic and laughable. One thing of which I live in fear is that the legal profession will be taken over by Fundamental Christians, and then we may as well shoot ourselves. (I hope none of them are reading this, or that's what they will certainly do; and we can say goodbye to the courts.)
So, dear friends, someone has to talk nicely to these Christian types, but it won't be me.
Education
The problem of messaging has, in a way, raised its ugly head in Education.
Just as most people are unwilling to listen to anything except what they want to hear, something similar has happened in education. Students are unwilling to listen to any lesson except about something they know already. Of course, there is a general principle in education: From the known, to the unknown. This is good advice to anybody who wants to explain something to someone. Unfortunately, today's youth want you to STOP the second you depart from the realm of the familiar.
It was terrible in mathematics. I begin teaching something, starting from the familiar. Soon--too soon--I go into a topic that is unfamiliar. There's a good reason it is unfamiliar even if it is firmly within the high-school curriculum, or even the Middle School curriculum: it is probably a topic of which the school teachers are scared of, or uncertain about. "That isn't even math!" my students exclaim indignantly. "You're trying to teach us something from, like, PhD level, or something!"
There's no point telling them that it is Trigonometry, which is used to calculate the circumference of a circle, and so on. If they haven't seen it already, then they do not want to see it. So they want to take a vote whether or not this topic should be discarded!
Things did not become that hilariously extreme routinely. But there is absolutely no doubt that unfamiliar material is considered inessential. This is why we cannot have students establishing the curriculum; at least not typical students.
Wishing you a happy end of the week,
Arch
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