A Problem With Western Education Of Children

There are petty objections to public schools that have nothing to with the philosophical fact that anything of core metaphysical and epistemological significance can be reasoned out by any willing, determined person regardless of age and without prompting from educators, as well as the fact that most of the less philosophically charged things taught in schools have no need to be taught because they are irrelevant to abstract and practical needs (like learning certain elaborate mathematical formulas with no context other than being taught them for the sake of being taught them).  Some people object to public schools, or at least to how they function today, for unrelated and asinine reasons.  The real issues are left completely unreleflected upon and verbally unaddressed in many cases by them.

Some Christians of the conservative evangelical variety pretend like they know that public schools are a spiritual battleground in the sense that demonic entities are literally influencing events.  The real knowable problems with the modern approach to public school are not connected to the idiotic assumption that there is some sort of Satanic conspiracy to use children in public schools as tools to "corrupt the West."  Not only does public education have nothing to do with demonic activity in and of itself no matter how ineffective or shallow it is, but there is also no evidence that this is the case even on a Christian worldview.  Hell, even people who have stupid philosophies or who practice unjust things are more than capable of doing such things on their own!

Having students get up as early as 4:00 or 5:00 AM to attend a series of classes every single day other than on weekends, during hazardous conditions, and on holidays is not necessarily directly helpful in a philosophical or job-oriented way, but it is likely to be detrimental.  There is simply no reason to tire out children on an almost daily basis for the sake of mandatory, artificially prolonged, unnecessary classes that are neither about anything of ultimate philosophical importance nor likely to be practically useful later on in the life of students.  This is the true set of problems with public education in its current form practiced in the United States.  It is overlong and does not focus on the things that, if anything at all matters, matter most--and if it was to focus on them, the problem would likely transform into the issue of most people relying on education instead of reason and introspection to spark most thoughts.

As is so often the case, the true problems with the Western-style education of children are not addressed as conservatives and liberals both erroneously tend to misdiagnose them.  The problems are irrelevant subjects or subcategories within subjects, emphasis on memorization and hearsay over truly intelligent reflection, an unnecessarily long daily or weekly structure that has some students doing almost nothing but attending school, completing assignments, participating in other school related activities, and sleeping.  Supposed conspiracies set in motion by Satan or liberals (according to some conservatives) or set in motion by a network of racists (according to some liberals) have no place in a rationalistic exploration of students' education in the public school system except to dismiss them as possible but utterly unprovable.