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Comment by Joan Denoo on October 6, 2012 at 1:53am

The Fate of Humanity Is at Stake -- Why Are Romney and Obama Too Co...

Education intended to teach children to obey, to follow directions, to give the "right answer", to yield to authority, to look outside oneself for the correct response, to seek from others the meaning of events results in an adult trained to be an obedient laborer, to not cause trouble, to follow the rules, to give up critical thinking and to be a good worker for someone else's enterprise. 

Chomsky said, "The Enlightenment ideal of education was captured in the image of education as laying down a string that students follow in their own ways, developing their creativity and independence of mind.

"The alternative, to be rejected, is the image of pouring water into a vessel – and a very leaky one, as all of us know from experience. The latter approach includes teaching to test and other mechanisms that destroy students' interest and seek to fit them into a mold, easily controlled. All too familiar today."

In subjects of natural laws, a student needs to learn the principles of physics and mathematics, and evolution and these are topics one learns, not through obedience, but through inquiry, through reasoning, through experimentation, through living in the question. 

In matters of beliefs, a student needs to be able to differentiate the difference between attitudes, beliefs, customs, traditions and values that come to us through some external "giver of knowledge". If a belief is invalid, the value is invalid. An educated person can test, question, doubt. That distinction between laws of nature and laws of humans is part of being educated.

Comment by Joan Denoo on October 5, 2012 at 11:32pm

“There was one field in which man was unsurpassed; he showed unlimited ingenuity in devising bigger and more efficient ways to kill off, enslave, harass, and in all ways make an unbearable nuisance of himself to himself. Man was his own grimmest joke on himself.”
~ Robert A. Heinlein, Stranger in a Strange Land

Comment by Joan Denoo on October 5, 2012 at 8:55pm

A cello performance with a very good impersonation of visceral experiences of today's politics, economy and religion, all seeming to be reaching a frenetic crescendo of chaos at the same time in history, with a fear that it will all melt down to nothing, even as we hold a faint hope that order, good sense and compassion emerges.
Ruth, I like you contribution on these issues. 

Comment by Ruth Anthony-Gardner on October 5, 2012 at 3:17pm

While a cello performance seems irrelevant to Politics, Economics & Religion, this piece by Smells Like Teen Spirit captures the feel of that nexus today, with its heavy balance of frenetic/distorted/intense to serene/calm/sane. This is my nervous system submerged in the swirling current of economics/politics/religion/now.

Comment by Ruth Anthony-Gardner on October 4, 2012 at 4:05pm

Why That Crappy Presidential Debate Won't Change Anyone's Mind

Sorry, I forgot to include my source.

Comment by Ruth Anthony-Gardner on October 4, 2012 at 4:04pm

That snap poll that said 67% thought Romney won the presidential debate had me worried. But the uncommitted voters in the audience turned out to be "nearly all white, Southern and over 50." Not representative at all of US citizenry. It sounds like the Republicans managed to hoodwink us again, stuffing the peanut gallery, to give the impression their guy would win and discourage Dems.

Comment by Greg LeGore on October 4, 2012 at 9:57am

One of the more awful rulings to emerge from any court - they should be ashamed and of course recalled.

Comment by Chris Breman on October 4, 2012 at 2:21am

This is really disgusting - if the justice system won't protect the weak there's nothing left. You might as well overturn your Supreme Court.

Comment by Tony Carroll on October 3, 2012 at 8:17pm

Joan you're right. This isn't a right/left issue. This is a fairness issue. Small excert from the article;

In a 4-3 ruling Tuesday afternoon, the Connecticut State Supreme Court overturned the sexual assault conviction of a man who had sex with a woman who “has severe cerebral palsy, has the intellectual functional equivalent of a 3-year-old and cannot verbally communicate.” The Court held that, because Connecticut statutes define physical incapacity for the purpose of sexual assault as “unconscious or for any other reason. . . physically unable to communicate unwillingness to an act,” the defendant could not be convicted if there was any chance that the victim could have communicated her lack of consent. Since the victim in this case was capable of “biting, kicking, scratching, screeching, groaning or gesturing,” the Court ruled that that victim could have communicated lack of consent despite her serious mental deficiencies:

WTF!! Pardon me, but mental capacity of a 3 y.o. with CP, and further in the article, find out she is confined to a wheelchair! Gimme an effing break.

Comment by Joan Denoo on October 3, 2012 at 8:07pm

Furthermore, This is so terribly outrageously ignorant of not one, but four judges who overturned the conviction of a rapist! Absurd! I wonder, if any one of those judges had a daughter with cerebral palsy and mental capacity of three years, would their sense of justice have been different? 
I don't think this is a right or left issue! Justice, fairness, accountability weigh heavy on the minds and hearts of the liberals I know. So, we don't think the state should put citizens to death, we do think the state should hold people accountable and responsible for harming others and indeed, the state should provide protections for those who are unable to protect themselves.

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