Posted by
Chris Walker on Friday, November 21, 2008 3:54:06 PM
James Madison once said, “Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who wish to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.” Then again, what did he know? He was just a rich white guy who owned slaves.
But lets assume for a just a second that Madison possessed some degree of political knowledge and some simple wisdom, and that maybe, just maybe, he was onto something. He was, after all, “The Father of the Constitution”, though some have disputed this. (The results of paternity testing will be aired on an upcoming issue of the Maury Povich show.)
And Madison wasn’t alone in the “an educated citizenry might be a good idea” camp. A bunch of other rich white guys thought so too. Thomas Jefferson, author of several cookbooks among some other relatively unimportant writings, was a member. (Their battle cry was “AN EDUCATED CITIZENRY MIGHT BE A GOOD IDEA!”)
But what makes up and educated citizenry? Well, first one must be able to perform difficult mathematical proofs. One must also be able to describe, in detail, the mysterious inner workings of a dissected frog. And last, but certainly not least, one must be able to identify hidden symbolism in a poem that you have never read, nor heard of, nor will ever read again, by a poet that you never knew existed in the first place. We must never underestimate the importance of symbolism in poetry in the grand scheme of self-government, lest we are doomed to tyranny!
A really educated citizen would have been in a fraternity/sorority and have had a lot of extracurricular activities.
Am I the only one who feels like America is missing the point of public education? I thought – and I’m just a public school guy myself, so go easy on me – that education was necessary to a democracy because we are charged with electing our own governors. And, just maybe we should know a little something about the government we are entrusted with filling.
If anyone has seen the clips from John Ziegler’s film “Media Malpractice” I hope they are as confused as I am. What kind of education did these people get? I would venture to say that a lot of them had college level degrees, and yet I would feel safe in assuming that they could not pass a basic history/civics test, and they obviously had no idea about current events.
Here’s my problem. In the scheme of things, their vote basically canceled out my vote, and maybe yours too. That makes my a little uneasy, to say the least.
So why are more people not shouting out for a voting test? We have to take a test to do other really important things like waiting tables. Why not to vote?
I don’t care if a person has three PhD’s, if they don’t know how many houses are in congress, or they don’t know how long a term is for a supreme court justice, or who currently controls the majority in congress, I DON’T WANT THEM TO VOTE!
But, but, but that might disenfranchise some people right?
Who? Last time I checked, public education guaranteed at least a high school level education, and that should more than suffice. In fact, the beauty of a test is that, in theory, it would disenfranchise people of all different political affiliations equally. That's democratic right?
So for everyone arguing that the results of Ziegler’s interviews would have been the same if they polled McCain supporters – thanks for helping me make my point. If that is in fact true then a voting test would have weeded out stupid McCain voters and stupid Obama voters alike! It would have been good for everyone! At least in theory, again.
Americans have no excuse for the kind of abysmal ignorance of their country’s government and history that they continue to show, as evidenced by poll after poll on the subject, and clips like those from Ziegler’s film. We have betrayed the purpose of public education and the result is a people who would be better served by letting the presidential election be decided by the two candidates playing “paper, rock, scissors” on prime time. At least then we wouldn’t have to worry about recounts.
The truth is that the only people who would be disenfranchised would be those who had themselves refused to become educated, and that is their choice. Ignorance is a choice. If the consequence is disenfranchisement from the political system then I say let the disenfranchisement begin! And I think Madison and Jefferson would agree with me. But then again – they probably didn’t have a lot of extracurricular activities either.