Irony

I read it from my cell phone.... while watching TV.

Ok, I read the whole thing. I feel like I was just Rickrolled. You know- this sort of Chicken Little hand wringing has gone on over every major and minor cultural shift in history. The ancient Greeks worried that writing things down would ruin peoples ability to think for themselves. Look at the war between the printing press vs illuminated manuscripts. Theater vs. television. Oldies vs. Rock and Roll. Analog vs. digital. Culture is not and never has been static and there is always blowback against change. Especially by those with the most to lose from it. If you're a Religion focused homeshool teacher, of course you're going to bemoan the demise of the old white male dominated classics. Of course you're going to blame change and progress as 'ruining culture'. "New" and "different" is almost always attacked as being bad by the dominant paradigm. Sure people spend too much time on the internet. And yes, lolcats and text messaging is changing our lexicon. But look at things like (well run) online forums. Look at Make Magazine, Etsy, and other hacker/maker sites. The return of the DIY ethic, and the accessibility that modern technology gives it could potentially be the savior for our economy, our society and even our planet. The idea that not all students learn the same way, and perhaps shouldn't be taught the same way is relatively recent. Do you shut down Montessori and charter schools because they don't all teach F. Scott Fitzgerald? Come on. Next you'll be telling me that the 'MLA Handbook rules of blogging' say I can't reply in my own comments section. Every society that has existed has felt like they were the "last great ones". Hell, I fly the "old school" flag higher than almost anyone I know. But the world keeps on turning anyway, no matter how much I protest. Most of the time it's for the better. Now if you'll excuse me I have to go play World of Warcraft for the rest of the day. K, Thx, Bye

I thought the article was pretty interesting, thanks for the link... I agree that the article carries that theme of things (in this case, education) being better "back in the day"... My gut reaction was an adversarial one: "who's to say this is wrong?" Pretty predictable, although I'm moving through the generational machine so I'm not really on the receiving end of the criticism, I'm always for sticking that monkey wrench where it does not belong... The other part of the instinctual "push" is that the underlying (if unspoken?) message of the article seems to be one reinforcing the "dominant" paradigm: about halfway through, I found myself thinking about the book [u]"What if Freud were Phyllis?"[/u] (on a tangential note, THAT should be some required reading, motherf&^$%#s!) That is, the evidence really points to the fact that kids aren't familiar with much "high culture" (I think that is directly taken from the article), which is a pretty subjective judgment. Therein lies a piece of the problem: who decides what is or isn't "high culture"? Currently (although there's been progress!) that is pretty much still White Males of Privilege. Great, considering that's a pretty small portion of the global population, eh? On another side note, not to favor one side of the paradigm or another, but I wouldn't say it's at all a bad thing that Burt's kids know about MLK or Harriet T, although it might be better if they also knew about the DoI and Bunker Hill as well. Hopefully they get some useful education about gender inequality as well... But then, I always get tripped by the other end of the metaphorical seesaw... For example, Picasso didn't just pull the Cubist movement out of certain bodily orifices on a whim, nor did Zora Neale Hurston just pick up a pen and decide to write... The thing is [b]you have to know the rules to be able to break them![/b] Dismantling the machine from within, ah so sweet... Of course it's also monstrously ironic that this piece is being spread via the very medium it criticizes... Or even that it was published online at all?