Opinion: Education must be separate from state

I am a fan of education. If there were such a thing as public education, I’d be a supporter. Unfortunately, what exists instead is “public schooling.".

By “public,” they mean government controlled, and by “schooling” they mean indoctrination. Schooling is not the same as education, but its opposite.

I oppose socialist, tax-funded government indoctrination and the compulsory day-prisons for children where it occurs. It’s no wonder socialist and Marxist ideas sneak in to the curriculum.

I understand some parents need daycare for their kids, but that’s a separate issue. Or should be. It also shouldn’t be compulsory or tax funded.

Any education that occurs in these institutions is accidental. Kids are learning machines and it’s nearly impossible to keep them from learning. After a century and a half, though, government schools are getting dangerously close to eradicating the childhood hunger to learn.

It’s not most teachers’ fault. My family is full of current and former schoolteachers, and one former principal. They are crippled by a system that shouldn’t exist.

Another problem arises when government decides what it will indoctrinate the kids to believe this year, which may change again next year. Government usually sets itself up as the hero of the story — if not the hero of the past, then of the present by acknowledging the wrongs its predecessors committed, while pretending it isn’t even worse today.

The issue raised its head recently when residents of Portales became aware of the New Mexico Public Education Department’s newly proposed social studies standards.

The mask slipped, but the ugliness has always been there. Social studies is always the worst offender.

The current issue concerns the Marxist conspiracy theory called “Critical Race Theory,” and its twin lies of “identity” and “equity.” It’s the latest example of the toxic indoctrination government schools have always spoon-fed their inmates. I understand some may think these concepts will make the world nicer, but one look at actual history and you’ll know it doesn’t work that way.

Government always hides and changes the history presented in schools to suit its interests and to sell a particular version of the present. Critical Race Theory is simply the latest lie used to give government illegitimate power over your life.

Education needs to be freed from government control — federal, state, and local — forever. The solution has always been a complete separation of education and state. Education is much too important to let government handle.

Farwell’s Kent McManigal champions liberty. Contact him at:

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