There
is a common narrative that tells us the better educated one is, the better
decisions one will make in life. I think there was a time that was more
true than not, but it is looking like that simply isn't the case anymore.
One thing education cannot do is provide morality unless morality
is part of the education curriculum and the atmosphere of the educational
system. These days, it isn't true.
We could make an argument that our educational systems are
providing a type of morality, which is, by historical standards, rather ‘immoral.’ College is now more about sex and
intoxication as important cultural experiences rather than critical thinking
and learning the aspects of good character.
Here’s
an example of what college students are really thinking about:
Yes,
folks, an ‘alcohol enema.’ What does
this tell us?
Well,
not much on its own. But, when held up
with the other many examples we have from colleges, we are seeing young people
who have be purposefully subverted from entering adulthood by being kept as ‘teenagers’
mangle themselves with horrid experiments in immorality.
They
are not being prepared for adulthood, but rather for excess. By introducing debauchery and putting off the
growing specter of adulthood, maturity becomes harder and harder for young
adults. Like Adam and Eve in they are
being given the choice to indulge and avoid maturity or take on the hard
lessons of life, with all the encouragement going to the former.
Colleges
are laying the foundations for a whole generation that will struggle with
addiction because they are teaching that adulthood and responsibility are to be
avoided (except when it suits administrators) and that morality is an ‘inconvenient
truth.’ Students are not being taught
critical thinking but rather to repeat the ‘critical thoughts’ of their
professors. On their own, they make
horrible decisions, like alcohol enemas.
Adulthood
requires the ability to think critically and understand morality, but since we
now depend on ‘the system’ to provide these, and they are not, college students
are thrust into the world with a number of rude awakenings:
1) the
world expects them to be responsible, even though they have been taught not to
be responsible.
2) the
world expects them to be honest and upright, even though they have been taught
that needy people can’t be expected to do those things, and who is needier than
a college grad with no life experience?
3) the
world expects them to earn a living and pay taxes by working hard and showing
up on time, when their experience of work before graduation has been partying
punctuated by a few classes.
Tossing
the coddled into the cold water of reality makes adulthood all the more
painful. Where do we turn when we are in
pain?
We see
it already: alcohol, drugs (legal and illegal), food, porn, sex, gambling… is
their really any difference between the addictions of the ‘underclasses’ and
those of the ‘college grads?’ I would say
very little. Addiction is addiction.
I think
our educational systems are part of the larger social problem of
addiction. Things need to change.
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