Dumbing Us Down

Brick factories only make bricks, and are for the sole use of the brick-makers. Gatto’s thesis is that compulsory education teaches no one anything of value except for fitting in as a brick in a static social pyramid.

Asserting that reading and basic math skills can be taught in just 100 hours, he believes that the real lessons taught by the school system are implicit lessons, like living in a confined space within time periods regimented by bells. He asserts that these implicit social lessons were explicitly designed, to keep minorities and the lower classes in their place. Now the system is out of control, and combined with television and a culture that values speeches over the written word, has started to consume the middle and upper classes as well.

Gatto believes that “Networks" look like “communities," but are not the same. "Networks" are constructed to mirror natural human communities, but are made to be dehumanizing. They require individuals to suppress all behaviors except the ones beneficial for the network. I think any social construct or organization could be depicted like this, so it appears to be a distinction without a difference, and certainly not precise enough to be useful.

I don’t disagree with his main point. My parents chose to homeschool my sisters and me, and we’ve each grown into unique people who are successful in our own ways. Societies sometimes puts too much blind faith in the opinion of experts, forgetting that nature is constant change and growth in ways no one can predict. Gatto sounds paranoid to me: he ascribes the creation of this rigid social structure of “school" as intentional and inimical. To me, recognizing the outline of the invisible chains Gatto has revealed is enough for each person to make their own choices about their children’s education, and remembering that expert opinion is only a starting point for each person’s own process.