Sometimes Education is Not The Answer
After each new national tragedy at the hands of people who are intent on acts of widespread devastating violence, the media and talking heads start producing the same idiotic rhetoric that “education is the answer” to preventing a repeat offender. If more people have a higher level of intelligence, bad things like Columbine and September 11th wouldn’t have happened.
I say, wrong.
Education is not the answer for peace. Education is not the answer to the war on terror or the answer to stop obnoxious teenagers who feel somehow brazenly entitled to go into a movie theater and kill and wound and terrorize complete strangers, nor is it the answer to prevent a little punk in middle school from harassing another student. A “higher education” did not stop two ungrateful young males from worshipping a religion that tells them by murdering Americans they will live life as a martyr and enjoy endless sexual bliss with virgins. They may have been “educated” but it certainly didn’t prevent them from committing an act of jihad on American citizens.
Education is just simply not the answer–common sense and self-responsibility are the answers with a healthy dose of humanity.
Look at Osama Bin Laden, for example. He studied economics at the elite Al-Thager Model School then went on to King Abdulaziz University and studied business administration. There are reports of him going on to earn a civil engineering degree in 1979 and a degree in public administration in 1981. So was he uneducated or not a nice guy?
This past April 15th a homegrown terrorist cell consisting of two brothers Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev bombed the Boston Marathon. Their destruction of life at such a historical and jubilant event reignited the chant on talk shows across this country about how education prevents violence.
Oh really? The Tsarnaev brothers were far from uneducated or stupid. Unfortunately for us quite the opposite is true, with plenty of help from the United States, providing this education. The older brother was furious because the United States would not grant him citizenship over a violent record and both of them were delving heavily into radicalism and Islamic religious culture and anti-American brainwashing of sorts.
When Mohammad Atta and his 18 fellow hijackers changed our landscape forever on 9/11/01 by using commercial planes filled with innocent souls to kill as many innocent people as possible, they were completely unknown to America. They did not live here and share relations to view us as human beings instead of the target of their political and religious hatred.
But as these Tsarnaev brothers, brainstormed, plotted, and implemented their infamous and torturous Boston Marathon day bombing, they knew us intimately because they grew up on the streets of Main Street USA. They had friends and family in America. They ate our food, wore our clothes, absorbed our education system and befriended some of those who are now grieving by their actions.
When the younger brother Tamerlan was finally captured he was wounded but alive and made sure to leave a message for the world to know, written in the blood from his selfish soul. Their death plot to kill as many Americans as possible was out of ideology and a pathetically undeserved feeling of self-righteousness. They schemed and took their horrific action not from a lack of knowledge but instead from a heart full of hate that was determined to blame and revenge innocent Americans by causing them to suffer and die.
In the message, Tsarnaev takes responsibility for the attacks and says they were motivated by U.S. military action in places like Iraq and Afghanistan.
“When you attack one Muslim, you attack all Muslims” he reportedly wrote, referring to the victims of the Marathon bombings as ‘collateral damage.’ Three people were killed and more than 250 injured in the attacks.”
So the Tsarnaev brothers were disciplined, educated and smart, but they got the short stick on common sense, which is too bad for them (and lucky for us) that they did not have a better escape route. They apparently thought they were so smart they had pulled it off, but with just a little more common sense—and less “education”–they would have maybe noticed all the public video cameras.
“Education” didn’t help the bright, young but socially awkward and deeply troubled 20-year-old Adam Lanza either. After first killing his mother, he drove to Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut and methodically massacred twenty children and six teachers. He then cowardly pulled the trigger on himself, as the authorities were closing in. This unconscionable behavior brought out the political talking heads and their insistent need for more education and stricter gun laws.
My personal opinion is that perhaps if Adam’s parents had stayed married instead of his mother having to work, as a family they might have noticed some of the signs of bullying and abuse Adam was experiencing at school. Maybe none of us would even know the name “Sandy Hook” today.
Seung-Hei-Cho took the Virginia Tech campus by a storm of rage on April 16, 2007. He was a student there when he killed 26 people and injured 17 others. He was a very bright young man who started school with excellence and finished a three-year elementary program in half of the time it normally took. Through his developing years, grades and learning were not the issue–but his social development definitely was. “More education” would not have prevented the death and destruction Mr. Cho caused that demonic spring morning.
The list of “smart enough people” doing unforgiveable things with unconscionable results goes back as far as you can research. From massive death like the Colorado Columbine massacre, to the anti-Semitism of Adolph Hitler, to Saddam Hussein, and Fidel Castro, and individual criminals like serial Ted Bundy–all of the aforementioned were extremely bright, well read and educated.
So where is the logic, any rationale that education produces civility and kindness in the human spirit? Certainly not from history.
Civility comes from the family, the home, and the citizens within.
What is wrong with our youth and the violence amongst us is painfully obvious. Our societal structure has morphed to such that we are producing enraged, fuming and hell-bent individuals that live in all our neighborhoods. Couple this with the likes of jihad and religious zealots that wish us harm and it is no wonder we are in trouble. Power joined with a hateful spirit is a very dangerous combination.
With all due respect to the noble profession of teachers in our society, the basics for life skills begin at home. It does not take a teacher to teach a child to read, or a village to raise a child, or a daycare worker to change a newborn baby’s diaper.
Before Feminism took hold and started lying to women about how they could “have it all”, American children lived in homes, rather than simply in a house. It is impossible to do it all and have it all; something has to give and unfortunately the weakest link is the children. As Rush Limbaugh correctly states, parental lack of responsibility and accountability results our kids having “heads full of mush.” So it is our privilege and responsibility to teach our children how to behave, and the best way to do that is the desired atmosphere of an intact and healthy home and family structure.
When mothers started working we moved from a typical family life of “Leave It To Beaver” to latchkey kids, frozen meals, fast food, teenage pregnancy, abortion, STD’s, debt, resentment, divorce and a completely sad and misfortunate breakdown of the family. This is not a glamorous comparison, but it is true. I personally experienced how my parents did it the right way and stayed married while raising a responsible family. But my aunts and uncles did not fare as well, falling into the downward spiral of divorce. And true to form, as adults from divorced parents, my cousins all have issues and drama and are passing it to the next generation. They are not uneducated but are rather repeating what they learned at home.
Social studies continually show that one of the consistent threads of successful, happy, and productive citizens is that as youngsters growing up, they broke bread together as a family on a regular basis.
How can any of these positive, loving and life affirming situations take place when the family is broken? Bottom line, they can’t and often the residual effects are devastating and life altering.
There is no “pretty side” of divorce when children are involved. The adults move on and adjust to the circumstances that they made for themselves, as the innocent children are mere casualties, forced to accept that their parents do not love one another. I think these dynamics are creating some mad and really mean people and no, mere education is not the answer.
