While reading the article I found it to have the following positive aspects; it exhibited good spelling, punctuation, grammar and was a carefully thought out piece of writing from a personal viewpoint. There- did my bit as a literary critic or maybe I should have been an English teacher observation.
My thoughts as to whether I agree or not with the above mentioned article is not the subject of this post but rather, my assessment of the current state of education in this country based on careful reading of the comments to the above article which numbered over 700 in response, both for and against. The author of the aforementioned blog was writing from a decidedly non-liberal political viewpoint. So now in an effort to avoid howls of protest etc. from those who may stumble across this blog of mine, I shall define liberal for the purposes of this post.
–adjective
1.
or reform, as in political or religious affairs.
or reform, as in political or religious affairs.
2.
( often initial capital letter 
) noting or pertaining to a political party advocating measures of progressive political reform.
) noting or pertaining to a political party advocating measures of progressive political reform. 3.
of, pertaining to, based on, or advocating liberalism.
4.
favorable to or in accord with concepts of maximum freedom possible, esp. as guaranteed by law and secured governmental protection of civil liberties.
5.
favoring or permitting freedom of action, esp. with respect to matters of personal belief or expression: a liberal policy toward dissident artists and writers.
6.
of or pertaining to representational forms of government rather than aristocracies and monarchies.
7.
free from prejudice or bigotry; tolerant: a liberal attitude toward foreigners.
8.
open-minded or tolerant, esp. free of or not bound by traditional or conventional ideas, values, etc.
9.
characterized by generosity and willingness to give in large amounts: a liberal donor.
10.
given freely or abundantly; generous: a liberal donation.
11.
not strict or rigorous; free; a liberal interpretation of a rule.
13.
of, pertaining to, or befitting a freeman.
–noun
14.
a person of liberal principles or views, esp. in, or religion.
15.
( often initial capital letter ) a member of a liberal party in politics, esp. of the Liberal party in Great Britain.
I now define conservative for purposes of this post.
) a member of a liberal party in politics, esp. of the Liberal party in Great Britain.I now define conservative for purposes of this post.
–adjective
1.
disposed to existing conditions, etc., or to restore traditional values and to limit change.
2.
cautiously moderate or a conservative estimate.
3.
traditional in style or manner; avoiding showiness: conservative suit.
4.
( often initial capital letter ) of or pertaining to Conservative party.
) of or pertaining to Conservative party. 5.
( initial capital letter ) of, pertaining to, or of Conservative Jews or Conservative Judaism.
) of, pertaining to, or of Conservative Jews or Conservative Judaism. 6.
having the power or tendency to conserve; preservative.
7.
Mathematics . (of a function) having curl equal to zero; irrotational;llar.
–noun
8.
a person who is conservative in principles, actions, habits, etc.
9.
a supporter of conservative political party policies.
10.
( initial capital letter ) a member of a conservative political party, esp. the Conservative party in Great Britain Great Britain.
) a member of a conservative political party, esp. the Conservative party in Great Britain Great Britain. 11.
a preservative.
I restrict my intended meaning of the words liberal and conservative in this post to the definitions that relate themselves to the political usage and not the mathematical or preservative- as well as reserving the right to reference other entries should the occasion present itself. (Hope you Lawyers out there find this to be acceptable.)
I restrict my intended meaning of the words liberal and conservative in this post to the definitions that relate themselves to the political usage and not the mathematical or preservative- as well as reserving the right to reference other entries should the occasion present itself. (Hope you Lawyers out there find this to be acceptable.)
I found that the comments were generally supportive of the writer's viewpoint, while there were a significant number of comments that weren't. Ok- kudos to the author for posting comments that were in opposition to his view-with the exception of posting those that were perhaps too vulgar to warrant publication. I have no way of knowing what standard of vulgarity he uses to determine the publishing or not of a particular comment. I'm cool with not posting blatantly vulgar comments as there is enough profanity (and yes I realize that I'm guilty of it as well on this blog- I'm working on that- but I am who I am) out there and in most cases there are better ways to express yourself without resorting to that level (again...I know...so sue me for hypocrisy).
What was fascinating to me as I read the comments, were from readers who disagreed vehemently with the author. My reading of comments that were in disagreement, for the most part, and there were a paltry few exceptions, exhibited the following basic format. 1) A personalized attack- (commonly known as flaming for those internet savvy readers out there) which usually take the form of 'name calling'-ie- moron, idiot, a*** hole, and the like followed by an admonition to the author to obtain some form of psychiatric counseling and then lastly a closing salutation that professes love and tolerance on the part of the writer of the comment for the author of the offending post. 2) A lack of ability on the part of some commentators to use a spell check tool (read dictionary, either an actual bound book remember those? or the electronic version that seems to be incorporated into just about any word processing platform). 3) An outright ignorance of -and/or inability to form- a complete sentence. And no- I don't believe that spell check or grammar check tools that are provided with most word processing programs are infallible. I am aware that many times comment blocks on blogs are devoid of even a spell checker, depending on the set-up of the page, which leads us back to that thing called a book. And finally, 4) Many of the writers in opposition to the author exhibited - shall we say, as kindly as possible, if not politically correct- an obvious deficit of skill regarding reading comprehension.
Now I bet you think that I'm going to make the postulation that this occurs only when liberals respond to conservative comments. No. I find, from a strictly anecdotal viewpoint,the same type of response leveled in reverse.
On both sides of the Liberal/Conservative divide there seems to be an abundance of opinion out there on the Web (which is my primary focus for this rant-as newspapers, magazines, and broadcast television operate under more stringent rules, regulations etc. that the web generally doesn't have to contend with- prime example being this very blog) which ranges anywhere from thoughtful, concise, carefully researched and referenced posts to validate or dispute a view to outright trash that is the antithesis of the aforementioned attempts at due diligence and erudite examinations of any particular issue.
Which leads me to the following postulation known officially as - MJBlues American Education Needs Remediation theory. The welfare state as we know it has produced a country with a significant number of marginally literate and over-educated individuals who have not learned the basic rules of civilized behavior. To wit: if you can't say something nice- don't say anything at all. I'm not slamming legal or illegal immigrants! Please calm down and keep going if you find your blood boiling at this point in my diatribe.
And since every theory needs a corollary, I give you- MJBlues corollary to American Education Needs Remediation To wit: Who Needs to pay attention in English Class- isn't that what spell checker is for?- and what's civilized behavior?
In conclusion, I offer the following thought. If you really must tell some one to F**** Off and go to H-E- Double Hockey Sticks- in response to a blog post or email or even a letter to the editor of your local print publication- try please to do it in a way that has them looking forward to the experience and the trip! It makes for much more enjoyable reading for me. So, if you disagree, (disagreement after all, got this country started, and nowhere in the Declaration of Independence do I see the words- Hey Georgie-you fat lazy entitled jerk! You are a blithering homophobic, right-wing zealot who needs a trip to a psych ward because of your intolerance to us poor over taxed colonists, you Hater! I could go on but I won't) please, also try at least, to lend some evidence and fact to support your position (proper grammar, including decent punctuation etc. goes a long way as well) and show the world that you aren't a victim of our rapidly declining educational system.
With that said- feel free to use the red pencil and point out my errors regarding style, punctuation, run-on sentences, capitalization, paragraph structure etc! Bon appetite!
