Linda Goudsmit
It does not take a village - it takes an adult
By Linda Goudsmit
Mammals, including humans, have a cycle of life with a beginning, a middle, and an end. The survival of the species requires that adult members of the group help newborns survive and develop into reproducing adults who can then help their own newborns develop into reproducing adults and the cycle of life continues. The growth process from the smallest to the largest mammals demands food, water, shelter, and a transfer of information from the knowledgeable adult to the uninformed young. The adults in the community teach their young how to survive. What happens when the process is impeded?
The United States of America and its social order was founded upon the principles of adulthood. Powers entrusted to the adult members of the family were gradually transferred to the children as they became adults themselves and began having families of their own. Parents taught their children survival skills and imbued them with their personal, moral, and religious values. What happened?
There has been a gradual shift in the established social order of America. Institutional "experts" pressured society toward regression, dependence, and mediocrity rather than growth, independence, and individual achievement. This movement has eroded parental authority and tilted young people away from independence and adulthood toward collectivism and middling both personally and professionally. The social order of adulthood is under attack. This is how it works.
Let's begin at the beginning. Traditionally, when new babies are born young mothers turn toward their own mothers for guidance – grandmothers have standing in the transfer of knowledge about raising children. Grandma's successes as well as her mistakes are a rich source of information for new moms – not anymore.
Authors Ari Brown, MD, Denise Fields, and Michele Hakakha, MD, have written an overbearing and incredibly condescending book titled Baby 411: Clear Answers & Smart Advice for Your Baby's First Year. On the acknowledgements page of the 2014 edition they arrogantly state that, "It's sad but true: any parenting book written before 2013 is already outdated." REALLY?
In an equally pompous description of themselves they state, "We give you the 4-1-1. Ours is the ONLY parenting book series in the market that updates with new editions every two to three years, giving our readers the most current, scientific-evidence based advice." Ahhh – scientific advice!
21st century parents are persuaded by anything claiming to be scientific – it is the foundation of their world. They willingly surrender their common sense and critical thinking skills to the "experts" who gladly tell them how to do anything and everything scientifically. A generation of American parents have surrendered their adult authority and independence to the self-proclaimed experts who offer them self-assured advice and online communities for support.
No other mammal seems to have this problem – once the bears and the cows learn their survival lessons they are on their own and either survive or die in the environment.
People are more complicated, especially new parents, they ruminate and obsess over whether they are doing the right thing and whether they are being good parents. Most of all they worry if their children are happy. Rather than having confidence in their own parenting instincts and the generational advice of trusted family, they trust the often corrupt "scientific-evidence based" advice of designated experts. Bears and cows trust themselves.
What happens when their children go to school? 21st century parents willingly surrender their adult authority to the educational experts as well. Why is that a problem?
Most parents are completely unaware of the ideological agenda of the experts in charge of the Education Establishment in America. Their children are being indoctrinated away from independence and traditional Judeo-Christian values toward collectivism and global citizenship and the parents are oblivious. Out with the old – in with the new.
Parents today are extremely stressed – they lack confidence in their own competence and ability to problem solve and are constantly in search of experts who will soothe their fragile selves and absolve them of personal responsibility. It's easier to believe the experts than trust themselves. Why are these parents so fragile and uncertain?
Adulthood requires assuming personal responsibility for one's decisions and taking responsibility for the consequences of those decisions. Parents today are so other-directed that they have unwittingly denied themselves the self-confidence and self-esteem enjoyed by their parents and grandparents because they have never assumed the adult responsibilities that empowered their elders. When an individual surrenders his/her adult authority and independence that individual is resuming the position of childhood instead of assuming the position of adulthood. Why does this matter?
It matters because it does not take a village – it takes an adult to raise a child. It matters because Hillary Clinton's village is socialism. When she talked about an unaware and compliant public she described the situation of childhood. Socialism is a children's village where the state has assumed the responsibilities of adulthood and the public has resumed the powerlessness of childhood.
Still, Hillary's romanticized village requires leadership – Hillary conveniently leaves that part out of her description of the village. It is the elite in socialist societies who rule those societies and reap the benefits – not the citizens. The Cubans and the Venezuelans were promised social justice and income equality too. What the citizens of their once thriving nations now have under socialism is poverty, scarcity, and lawlessness. The leaders have all the wealth and power – of course they do – that was their plan all along.
Every incremental step that reduces individual personal adult authority awards the government more authority and control over the individual. To understand the devastation of Hillary's village it is necessary to examine education in the village.
Bruce Deitrick Price has written a stunning book titled Saving K-12 that explains in chilling detail the deliberate destruction of public education in America courtesy of the leftist Education Establishment. He writes:
"When most people say the word 'education' they mean something very specific, and almost everyone knows exactly what that is: reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, to be followed by history, science, literature, and the arts. . . Unfortunately, the people who control public education and shape the debate have another meaning in their minds, and they know exactly what that is: social engineering, indoctrination, political correctness, and left-wing politics."
Price explains in unique and meticulous detail how failed systems of Sight-Words and Reform Math are still being taught decades later to innocent students with the support of clueless parents, often with fancy new scientific names. Traditional learning modes that stress simplicity, facts, and practical application are out of fashion. The new methods focus on "scientific" abstract concepts instead of basic skills. Common sense dictates it is impossible to run before walking so it should surprise no one that American children in public schools are falling down.
Consider the method known as Constructivism, an experiential program where children are supposed to invent their own versions of knowledge and teachers stand back and act as their facilitators to encourage the process. WHAT?? The problem with Constructivism is the same problem with Sight-Words and Reform Math – running before walking. Basic skills are what give children the foundation to understand their experience – simple before complex – children must walk before they can run.
Constructivism is just another harmful example of adults (teachers) abandoning their authority because the experts told them to. The children end up anxious and without foundational knowledge. It is idiotic to expect children to "invent knowledge," and since they cannot read they cannot even acquire basic knowledge independently outside their toxic classrooms.
The left-wing experts have deliberately dumbed down, confused, and produced such nervousness in students that many are being misdiagnosed as having disruptive behavior disorders, learning disabilities, anxiety disorders, and/or attention deficit disorders. The children are then given drugs and other therapies to calm them down!!
In 1955 Rudolph Flesch published his blockbuster book Why Johnny Can't Read that sold 8 million copies and explained why America had an illiteracy problem (Sight-Words) and what to do about it (bring back phonics). Flesch explained that English is a phonetic language that must be taught phonetically. If you teach English as Sight-Words, you are turning English into Chinese. The "experts" have arrogantly ignored Flesch's wisdom for 60 years but Johnny still cannot read. Why not?
What is the motive for deliberately insisting upon systems that are known failures? Why is this happening?
The answer is extremely difficult to accept because the good citizens of America trust the Education Establishment to teach their children well. They have great difficulty embracing the notion that there is a purposeful educational dumbing down of their beloved sons and daughters. Parents remain perilously unaware of the despicable ideological campaign of the Education Establishment toward mediocrity and socialism. It is simply inconceivable to most parents that their children are being deliberately taught to fail.
The Education Establishment's collectivist goals are accomplished through the the twin strategies of eliminating as much of the traditional curriculum content as possible and then making the remainder so confusing that the children don't understand or remember what they are being taught. The outcome is a staggering ignorance of basic knowledge.
Bruce Dietrick Price explains in exquisite detail the traumatizing experience of the child being taught to sight-read in a system of WHOLE WORDS rather than learning the foundational basics of sounding out words using phonics:
"Just for a moment, consider the silly theory that our top educators put forward. There should be no sounding out of letters and syllables; instead, children should memorize words as graphic designs or diagrams. Put yourself in the head of a kid showing up for first grade. The teacher points to a design like 'xhylg' and instructs, 'This means house. When you see this, say house.' So, can you memorize 'xhyld'? Probably. But will you be able to pick it out from similar designs, of which there are dozens, such as: xhydd, xyhld, xhydl, xyyld, xhdyl, xyjkl, xkyht, xygld, etc. of course you will need to be ready for variations such as XHYDD, XYHLD, XHYDL, XYYLD, XHDYL, XYJKL, XKYHT, XYGLD. . . You can probably feel the dyslexia creeping into your brain."
Price's book is riveting and should be required reading of all parents with young children. Saving K-12 says the unsayable. The motive for insisting upon failed systems of Sight-Reading and Reform Math that produce illiteracy is social control through a dumbed-down population. It is the strategy necessary to create Hillary's village of compliant adults who function as compliant children. A functionally illiterate society is easy to control.
In an equally disturbing article appearing in Renew America titled, "Memo to K-12 students: Resist" Bruce Dietrick Price exposes the psychological warfare being waged against K-12 students to prepare them for global citizenship in a restructured globalist one world government.
"You are a participant in a vast psychological war. Believe it or not, you are the enemy in this war. You are the primary target. Yes, they want you, your unformed personality, your uninformed mind. They want to shape you and make you so that finally you're indistinguishable from other kids. You're not supposed to know much or think much. In Brave New World you would be a Gamma or maybe a Delta. According to Wikipedia,'these people are deliberately limited in their cognitive and physical abilities, as well as the scope of their ambitions and the complexity of their desires, thus rendering them easier to control.'"
Limited cognitive abilities has been the undisputed consequence of decades of debilitating educational systems that subvert learning the basic skills of reading, writing, and arithmetic. There are 50 million people in the United States who are functionally illiterate. Price argues very persuasively that READING is the basis of all learning so parents can at least inoculate their children against the education establishment by teaching the children phonics at home.
Price reiterates Flesch's central thesis that English is a phonetic language and must be taught phonetically. If you teach it as Sight-Words, you are turning English into Chinese. It is as simple as that. So, why does Common Core teach Sight-Words?
Under ex-president Obama the egregious Common Core State Standards were adopted by 42 of the 50 states – all incentivized by "stimulus money" – nothing scientific about bribery. Common Core is the educational standard of the United Nations Agenda 2030 marketed to "ensure inclusive and equitable quality education for all." WOW! Sounds great! The problem is that United Nations Agenda 2030 is a globalist campaign to indoctrinate our children into becoming global citizens in an internationalized world under one world government – administered by the UN of course!
Now you are beginning to understand the deceit because what the "experts" mean by inclusive and equitable is probably not what you understand those words to mean.
Ileana Johnson has written an important article titled, "The Link Between Declining National Education Quality and UN Agenda 2030" that appeared in The Epoch Times on 7/15/18. Johnson directs the reader to the Pearson curriculum and its Common Core textbooks that are methodically indoctrinating our children and grandchildren.
In a suspiciously unpublicized event Education Secretary Betsy DeVos signed on to the anti-American globalist United Nations Agenda 2030 initiative while attending the July, 2018 G20 Education Ministerial Meeting in Argentina. Any American Secretary of Education who signs on to the globalist United Nations education agenda, including Betsy DeVos, is not fit for office. What could DeVos be thinking?
Appointing Betsy DeVos to be Secretary of Education was a HUGE mistake. DeVos' job was to eliminate the destructive Common Core Standards and return educational authority to the states and to parents. The United Nations Agenda 2030 Sustainable Development Goals are diametrically opposed to American sovereignty, American independence, and the stated America-first goals of the Trump administration. President Trump has wisely taken us out of the Paris Accord, the Iran deal, and NAFTA – thanks to Betsy DeVos he will now have to take us out of any commitment whatsoever to this egregious agreement with the UN.
The United Nations and every one of its deceptive initiatives is designed to weaken America in preparation for one world government. The deal DeVos signed on to with the Education Working Group of the Group of 20 is arguably the worst and most sinister deal of all because it propagandizes American students against America! We need representatives of America who represent American interests like Nikki Haley – not incompetent fools or closet globalists like Betsy DeVos.
When curriculum content becomes a national security threat it is a federal matter and demands the attention of the President. President Trump must withdraw the United States from any involvement in UN Agenda 2030 and replace Betsy DeVos with an education secretary who is committed to American excellence through excellence in American public schools.
Making America great again requires making American public education great again. We must reclaim the power we were entrusted with and demand a total K-12 educational overhaul committed to reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, to be followed by history, science, literature, and the arts. We must insist upon restoring phonics and traditional math in the classroom. We must ensure our children acquire the skills they need to survive.
It does not take a village to raise a child – it takes an adult.
If Americans continue to trust the Education Establishment "experts" and allow the insidious dumbing down of America through Common Core and the UN Agenda 2030, America will not remain free. As Thomas Jefferson said, "You cannot be both ignorant and free."
© Linda Goudsmit
September 17, 2018
Mammals, including humans, have a cycle of life with a beginning, a middle, and an end. The survival of the species requires that adult members of the group help newborns survive and develop into reproducing adults who can then help their own newborns develop into reproducing adults and the cycle of life continues. The growth process from the smallest to the largest mammals demands food, water, shelter, and a transfer of information from the knowledgeable adult to the uninformed young. The adults in the community teach their young how to survive. What happens when the process is impeded?
The United States of America and its social order was founded upon the principles of adulthood. Powers entrusted to the adult members of the family were gradually transferred to the children as they became adults themselves and began having families of their own. Parents taught their children survival skills and imbued them with their personal, moral, and religious values. What happened?
There has been a gradual shift in the established social order of America. Institutional "experts" pressured society toward regression, dependence, and mediocrity rather than growth, independence, and individual achievement. This movement has eroded parental authority and tilted young people away from independence and adulthood toward collectivism and middling both personally and professionally. The social order of adulthood is under attack. This is how it works.
Let's begin at the beginning. Traditionally, when new babies are born young mothers turn toward their own mothers for guidance – grandmothers have standing in the transfer of knowledge about raising children. Grandma's successes as well as her mistakes are a rich source of information for new moms – not anymore.
Authors Ari Brown, MD, Denise Fields, and Michele Hakakha, MD, have written an overbearing and incredibly condescending book titled Baby 411: Clear Answers & Smart Advice for Your Baby's First Year. On the acknowledgements page of the 2014 edition they arrogantly state that, "It's sad but true: any parenting book written before 2013 is already outdated." REALLY?
In an equally pompous description of themselves they state, "We give you the 4-1-1. Ours is the ONLY parenting book series in the market that updates with new editions every two to three years, giving our readers the most current, scientific-evidence based advice." Ahhh – scientific advice!
21st century parents are persuaded by anything claiming to be scientific – it is the foundation of their world. They willingly surrender their common sense and critical thinking skills to the "experts" who gladly tell them how to do anything and everything scientifically. A generation of American parents have surrendered their adult authority and independence to the self-proclaimed experts who offer them self-assured advice and online communities for support.
No other mammal seems to have this problem – once the bears and the cows learn their survival lessons they are on their own and either survive or die in the environment.
People are more complicated, especially new parents, they ruminate and obsess over whether they are doing the right thing and whether they are being good parents. Most of all they worry if their children are happy. Rather than having confidence in their own parenting instincts and the generational advice of trusted family, they trust the often corrupt "scientific-evidence based" advice of designated experts. Bears and cows trust themselves.
What happens when their children go to school? 21st century parents willingly surrender their adult authority to the educational experts as well. Why is that a problem?
Most parents are completely unaware of the ideological agenda of the experts in charge of the Education Establishment in America. Their children are being indoctrinated away from independence and traditional Judeo-Christian values toward collectivism and global citizenship and the parents are oblivious. Out with the old – in with the new.
Parents today are extremely stressed – they lack confidence in their own competence and ability to problem solve and are constantly in search of experts who will soothe their fragile selves and absolve them of personal responsibility. It's easier to believe the experts than trust themselves. Why are these parents so fragile and uncertain?
Adulthood requires assuming personal responsibility for one's decisions and taking responsibility for the consequences of those decisions. Parents today are so other-directed that they have unwittingly denied themselves the self-confidence and self-esteem enjoyed by their parents and grandparents because they have never assumed the adult responsibilities that empowered their elders. When an individual surrenders his/her adult authority and independence that individual is resuming the position of childhood instead of assuming the position of adulthood. Why does this matter?
It matters because it does not take a village – it takes an adult to raise a child. It matters because Hillary Clinton's village is socialism. When she talked about an unaware and compliant public she described the situation of childhood. Socialism is a children's village where the state has assumed the responsibilities of adulthood and the public has resumed the powerlessness of childhood.
Still, Hillary's romanticized village requires leadership – Hillary conveniently leaves that part out of her description of the village. It is the elite in socialist societies who rule those societies and reap the benefits – not the citizens. The Cubans and the Venezuelans were promised social justice and income equality too. What the citizens of their once thriving nations now have under socialism is poverty, scarcity, and lawlessness. The leaders have all the wealth and power – of course they do – that was their plan all along.
Every incremental step that reduces individual personal adult authority awards the government more authority and control over the individual. To understand the devastation of Hillary's village it is necessary to examine education in the village.
Bruce Deitrick Price has written a stunning book titled Saving K-12 that explains in chilling detail the deliberate destruction of public education in America courtesy of the leftist Education Establishment. He writes:
"When most people say the word 'education' they mean something very specific, and almost everyone knows exactly what that is: reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, to be followed by history, science, literature, and the arts. . . Unfortunately, the people who control public education and shape the debate have another meaning in their minds, and they know exactly what that is: social engineering, indoctrination, political correctness, and left-wing politics."
Price explains in unique and meticulous detail how failed systems of Sight-Words and Reform Math are still being taught decades later to innocent students with the support of clueless parents, often with fancy new scientific names. Traditional learning modes that stress simplicity, facts, and practical application are out of fashion. The new methods focus on "scientific" abstract concepts instead of basic skills. Common sense dictates it is impossible to run before walking so it should surprise no one that American children in public schools are falling down.
Consider the method known as Constructivism, an experiential program where children are supposed to invent their own versions of knowledge and teachers stand back and act as their facilitators to encourage the process. WHAT?? The problem with Constructivism is the same problem with Sight-Words and Reform Math – running before walking. Basic skills are what give children the foundation to understand their experience – simple before complex – children must walk before they can run.
Constructivism is just another harmful example of adults (teachers) abandoning their authority because the experts told them to. The children end up anxious and without foundational knowledge. It is idiotic to expect children to "invent knowledge," and since they cannot read they cannot even acquire basic knowledge independently outside their toxic classrooms.
The left-wing experts have deliberately dumbed down, confused, and produced such nervousness in students that many are being misdiagnosed as having disruptive behavior disorders, learning disabilities, anxiety disorders, and/or attention deficit disorders. The children are then given drugs and other therapies to calm them down!!
In 1955 Rudolph Flesch published his blockbuster book Why Johnny Can't Read that sold 8 million copies and explained why America had an illiteracy problem (Sight-Words) and what to do about it (bring back phonics). Flesch explained that English is a phonetic language that must be taught phonetically. If you teach English as Sight-Words, you are turning English into Chinese. The "experts" have arrogantly ignored Flesch's wisdom for 60 years but Johnny still cannot read. Why not?
What is the motive for deliberately insisting upon systems that are known failures? Why is this happening?
The answer is extremely difficult to accept because the good citizens of America trust the Education Establishment to teach their children well. They have great difficulty embracing the notion that there is a purposeful educational dumbing down of their beloved sons and daughters. Parents remain perilously unaware of the despicable ideological campaign of the Education Establishment toward mediocrity and socialism. It is simply inconceivable to most parents that their children are being deliberately taught to fail.
The Education Establishment's collectivist goals are accomplished through the the twin strategies of eliminating as much of the traditional curriculum content as possible and then making the remainder so confusing that the children don't understand or remember what they are being taught. The outcome is a staggering ignorance of basic knowledge.
Bruce Dietrick Price explains in exquisite detail the traumatizing experience of the child being taught to sight-read in a system of WHOLE WORDS rather than learning the foundational basics of sounding out words using phonics:
"Just for a moment, consider the silly theory that our top educators put forward. There should be no sounding out of letters and syllables; instead, children should memorize words as graphic designs or diagrams. Put yourself in the head of a kid showing up for first grade. The teacher points to a design like 'xhylg' and instructs, 'This means house. When you see this, say house.' So, can you memorize 'xhyld'? Probably. But will you be able to pick it out from similar designs, of which there are dozens, such as: xhydd, xyhld, xhydl, xyyld, xhdyl, xyjkl, xkyht, xygld, etc. of course you will need to be ready for variations such as XHYDD, XYHLD, XHYDL, XYYLD, XHDYL, XYJKL, XKYHT, XYGLD. . . You can probably feel the dyslexia creeping into your brain."
Price's book is riveting and should be required reading of all parents with young children. Saving K-12 says the unsayable. The motive for insisting upon failed systems of Sight-Reading and Reform Math that produce illiteracy is social control through a dumbed-down population. It is the strategy necessary to create Hillary's village of compliant adults who function as compliant children. A functionally illiterate society is easy to control.
In an equally disturbing article appearing in Renew America titled, "Memo to K-12 students: Resist" Bruce Dietrick Price exposes the psychological warfare being waged against K-12 students to prepare them for global citizenship in a restructured globalist one world government.
"You are a participant in a vast psychological war. Believe it or not, you are the enemy in this war. You are the primary target. Yes, they want you, your unformed personality, your uninformed mind. They want to shape you and make you so that finally you're indistinguishable from other kids. You're not supposed to know much or think much. In Brave New World you would be a Gamma or maybe a Delta. According to Wikipedia,'these people are deliberately limited in their cognitive and physical abilities, as well as the scope of their ambitions and the complexity of their desires, thus rendering them easier to control.'"
Limited cognitive abilities has been the undisputed consequence of decades of debilitating educational systems that subvert learning the basic skills of reading, writing, and arithmetic. There are 50 million people in the United States who are functionally illiterate. Price argues very persuasively that READING is the basis of all learning so parents can at least inoculate their children against the education establishment by teaching the children phonics at home.
Price reiterates Flesch's central thesis that English is a phonetic language and must be taught phonetically. If you teach it as Sight-Words, you are turning English into Chinese. It is as simple as that. So, why does Common Core teach Sight-Words?
Under ex-president Obama the egregious Common Core State Standards were adopted by 42 of the 50 states – all incentivized by "stimulus money" – nothing scientific about bribery. Common Core is the educational standard of the United Nations Agenda 2030 marketed to "ensure inclusive and equitable quality education for all." WOW! Sounds great! The problem is that United Nations Agenda 2030 is a globalist campaign to indoctrinate our children into becoming global citizens in an internationalized world under one world government – administered by the UN of course!
Now you are beginning to understand the deceit because what the "experts" mean by inclusive and equitable is probably not what you understand those words to mean.
Ileana Johnson has written an important article titled, "The Link Between Declining National Education Quality and UN Agenda 2030" that appeared in The Epoch Times on 7/15/18. Johnson directs the reader to the Pearson curriculum and its Common Core textbooks that are methodically indoctrinating our children and grandchildren.
In a suspiciously unpublicized event Education Secretary Betsy DeVos signed on to the anti-American globalist United Nations Agenda 2030 initiative while attending the July, 2018 G20 Education Ministerial Meeting in Argentina. Any American Secretary of Education who signs on to the globalist United Nations education agenda, including Betsy DeVos, is not fit for office. What could DeVos be thinking?
Appointing Betsy DeVos to be Secretary of Education was a HUGE mistake. DeVos' job was to eliminate the destructive Common Core Standards and return educational authority to the states and to parents. The United Nations Agenda 2030 Sustainable Development Goals are diametrically opposed to American sovereignty, American independence, and the stated America-first goals of the Trump administration. President Trump has wisely taken us out of the Paris Accord, the Iran deal, and NAFTA – thanks to Betsy DeVos he will now have to take us out of any commitment whatsoever to this egregious agreement with the UN.
The United Nations and every one of its deceptive initiatives is designed to weaken America in preparation for one world government. The deal DeVos signed on to with the Education Working Group of the Group of 20 is arguably the worst and most sinister deal of all because it propagandizes American students against America! We need representatives of America who represent American interests like Nikki Haley – not incompetent fools or closet globalists like Betsy DeVos.
When curriculum content becomes a national security threat it is a federal matter and demands the attention of the President. President Trump must withdraw the United States from any involvement in UN Agenda 2030 and replace Betsy DeVos with an education secretary who is committed to American excellence through excellence in American public schools.
Making America great again requires making American public education great again. We must reclaim the power we were entrusted with and demand a total K-12 educational overhaul committed to reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, to be followed by history, science, literature, and the arts. We must insist upon restoring phonics and traditional math in the classroom. We must ensure our children acquire the skills they need to survive.
It does not take a village to raise a child – it takes an adult.
If Americans continue to trust the Education Establishment "experts" and allow the insidious dumbing down of America through Common Core and the UN Agenda 2030, America will not remain free. As Thomas Jefferson said, "You cannot be both ignorant and free."
© Linda Goudsmit
The views expressed by RenewAmerica columnists are their own and do not necessarily reflect the position of RenewAmerica or its affiliates.
(See RenewAmerica's publishing standards.)
