I’ve been holding off on this for a little — didn’t want to snark John before there was real reason to believe he might think life worth living again. Now, with Not-Mongo in the fold, I have hope for our fearless leader.
So, let’s talk.
John may have his own catalog of things he got wrong, very wrong, catastrophically wrong, this-ship-is-unsinkable wrong, but for my money, the leader of Balloon Juice truly hit the acme of wrongness when he declared the Wingularity Peak Wingnut (per Bumper @1)
That announcement came before John recklessly handed the keys to the blog to yours truly, so I’m not sure of the date, but I was talking to Tim F. (last night, as it happened) and he recalled that it was just after Obama won in 2008. The reasoning, I guess, is that after all the crap dumped during the campaign there was nowhere crazier to go.
Well, we all know how that turned out, which is the Wingularity is an ironic category here.
But every now and then you get a glimpse into the soul of the feral crazy so pure, that satori strikes. It’s like the moment Cantor grasped there are infinities beyond infinities. It’s could drive the sane mad, or at least to the liquor cabinet, there to wonder whether mixing bourbon, peppermint schnapps and doloroso sherry is as bad an idea as it sounds.
Thus it was today when I learned…
…oh hell. Read it and weep (via TPM):
Compulsory education laws have resulted in parents disengaging themselves from the responsibility to oversee the education of their children and have caused schools to falter under the burden of being all things to all people.
Those points are among the arguments made by Sen. Aaron Osmond, R-South Jordan, in an article posted Friday on the blog of the Utah State Senate, in which Osmond called for the end of compulsory education in the state.
…
“Osmond told the Deseret News that there is a need to shift the public mindset to viewing learning as an opportunity as opposed to an obligation, while also reinforcing the idea of liberty and choice.
“Let’s let them choose it, let’s not force them to do it,” he said. “I think that’s when you start seeing the shift.”
Buried in the Deseret News story linked above is the tell. A brief disapproving mention of school based sexytime education, which suggests that Senator Osmond wants parents to be unfettered by the state as they teach their precious ones about aspirin between the knees and all that.
But Osmond’s crazy runs deeper than just the usual obsession with the moist bits.
I love — and I mean that — the utter clarity that comes whenever someone from the Wingnut side lets the mask slip just a bit too far.. The problem with education isn’t that we’ve under resourced our schools, or that we ask them to do to much. It’s that too many people are being forced, Forced I Tell You, to get down with that book-learning stuff.
In other words, your modern Republican party: Life — and the simulacrum of democracy — would be so much easier if more voters were more ignorant. Fastest way to get there? Less schoolin’
There is no wingularity. There cannot be. No Schwarzschild radius of stupid/vapid/batshit crazy exists. It’s turtles all the way down.
May the Flying Spagetti Monster Bless These United States.
Image: Theodor Bernard de Heuvel, The Classroom, 1872.
Bumper
Actually, John’s theory was Peak Wingnut, not the Wingularity. Or are those really the same thing?
Villago Delenda Est
Actually educating the masses was a mistake. High literacy rates lead to open rebellion against traditional values.
We need to turn 90% of the populace into Orwell’s proles.
Redshirt
Well, let us consider the opposite of the Wingularity – when a White Hole is created and a whole ‘nother Universe is born.
Somewhere, in some distant alternate reality, infrastructure is being built up, logic is progressing, compassion ever more present, taxes are raised wisely on those who can most afford it, and their political discourse is unfailingly polite and constructive.
Let’s move there.
themann1086
I like Wingnut Event Horizon. You can get closer and closer, but you can never truly reach it!
Or escape it…
karen
Paraphrasing “A Handmaid’s Tale, only they were talking about women
“The biggest mistake we made was teaching them how to read.”
Baud
I only skimmed the post. He’s talking about abortion rights, correct?
Davis X. Machina
This’ll meet the deschooling/unschooling movement coming around the other side.
lamh36
But wait, have you seen this story? Apparently Tucker Carlson high school douchebags at the Caller sent some 16 year old intern to the WHPC to ask a question the Jay Carney. I guess Turker and the douches thought they were gonna troll the press secretary, but Jay Carney very calmly was having none of that!
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/07/17/daily-caller-sends-16-year-old-to-question-the-white-house/
AliceBlue
I read this in the a.m. Christ. No wonder The Onion closed up shop.
Xecky Gilchrist
I live in Salt Lake City. Contempt for education like this is nothing new here from the lege. Happily, vouchers got beaten 2-1 last time they came up for a vote. Utah’s legislators are tons more wingnutty even than their constituents, especially on the sex ed issue.
Baud
@lamh36:
A more diplomatic response than I would have given.
Redshirt
@themann1086: Yes, but the Wingularity presupposes that you’ve passed the Wingnut Event Horizon – that would be Peak Wingnut. Once past it, a whole new realm of reality opens up, and what was destroyed is born again, fresh and Cantor free. Though with some trace energy of Orange Boner’s tears.
GxB
@themann1086: Bonus: We can use the term asymptote and laugh at all the dumbassses who insist we are swearing or “just making words up.”
Roxy
Sweet Joseph, can we get any crazier,
Here’s some more info and his connection with Bill Gates, oh yeah got my degree and education so screw all of you. Also yes he is connected with the Osmond family
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaron_Osmond
Redshirt
Don’t need to know how to read to work at Mickey D’s – they’ve got picture buttons!
And an uneducated serf is a more trustworthy serf.
The Dangerman
I wonder if they’ve gamed this out; sure, lots more stupid voters, but since they can’t read and/or won’t have jobs, thus no cars, voting could be a challenge.
burnspbesq
The Wingularity is a myth. There will always be someone willing to go there, wherever “there” is.
The trick is to make them politically irrelevant.
We have work to do. Let’s get busy.
Violet
Posted this story earlier today. Just cannot believe these people.
cob
Yessiree – turtles all the way down — to infinity and below.
geg6
Is this stupid motherfucker one of those Osmonds? A more vapid and uninspiring bunch I simply cannot imagine. And he’s obviously a Mormon, a sect that even more than evangelicals, requires one to be as stupid and uninformed as possible or the entire cult would die out due to lack of any marginally intelligent woman who would run as far and fast as she could to get away from the inbred freaks.
Gin & Tonic
I wish to publicly thank Cole for building a place where someone like Tom can write a post about politics which mentions the Schwarzschild radius, and casually assumes that the readers will get it, or mentions Cantor without having to explain that Georg is meant, and not Eric. Bravo!
RSR
I saw that report earlier today, and I’m completely unsurprised. Here in the Philadelphia area, public schools are broke, school buildings are being shuttered (and likely to be sold off to charters), and thousands have lost jobs, but we’ve got upwards of half-a-billion dollars for a new prison facility.
Might as well just get rid of the whole education component for *those people* and just get more prisons ready.
Redshirt
@Gin & Tonic: There’s too many PhD’s here. Once the Wingnut Revolution starts, well, we’re all on The List.
Villago Delenda Est
@burnspbesq:
It’s like Rule 34.
Mr Stagger Lee
It is a tragedy that a beautiful place like Utah is spoiled by such wackiness. Are you sure the LDS there is not inbreeding? Maybe the Osmonds are.
maya
Reminds me of this gem. Don’t forget the role guns played in this. Who knew Irving Berlin could be so prescient?
Narcissus
How ‘ya gonna keep ’em
down on the farm15 year old sisterwives, after they’veseen Pareetaken biology?scav
@Mr Stagger Lee: Never did trust all those teeth and they did seem preternaturally vacuous.
JCT
Race to the bottom, bitchez!
Hill Dweller
The Twitter machine is telling me Hagel has ordered a 20% cut in top Pentagon positions and civilian posts(3,000 to 5,000 jobs).
Frankensteinbeck
This is not new. The right wing fringe hates public education and always has. It exposes their children to the outside world, and shockingly their children have decided they like the outside world in greater and greater numbers for two generations now. Now that the right fringe controls the mainstream GOP, of course you’re hearing about it.
The right fringe controlling the mainstream GOP is certainly not new. The desire to destroy public education is not new. This is not an observed increase in Wingnut. Personally, I think they’ve plateaued, but I no longer know what it will take for levels to drop again.
Gin & Tonic
@efgoldman: Touché
SiubhanDuinne
@lamh36:
So The Daily Caller, once again, Gabe the Finger to Obama?
Gin & Tonic
@efgoldman: And I guess you made it back from Waltham safely?
? Martin
Forget it Jake, it’s Utah.
Redshirt
At some point, this insanity has to hurt them – as long as there’s an escape. Meaning, Utah might go down the Wingnut Hole, but if you care, you could move to California.
Thus depriving Utah of bodies and minds, and over time, that has to take a hit
Consider the new generation of home schooled wingnuts who shall soon be coming of age under the Obama Nation. What prospects for college do they have, save Wingnut Colleges? What kinds of jobs will they be able to get? What happens when they all fail and kids from CA, MA, and all the other sane states succeed?
Surely, at some point, that will have an impact. Maybe? Hopefully?
Redshirt
@efgoldman: Dish! Or wait for the inevitable thread.
Did Special Timmeh show up? I would guess not.
catclub
@efgoldman: You mean the Cantor Set is not like the Thomson Twins?
Gin & Tonic
@Redshirt: If the goldmans were home by 9:45, that wasn’t a very long-lasting meetup.
Roger Moore
@lamh36:
And I thought Conservatives hated contraceptives.
Redshirt
Gabe Finger sounds like a Jewish porn actor.
kuvasz
educated slaves revolt
Mike in NC
Republicans have been trying to destroy public schools ever since they were told they couldn’t push the Holy Trinity of Jesus, Joe McCarthy, and Ronald Reagan.
Randy P
@Gin & Tonic: I’m very familiar with Georg Cantor’s famous proofs, and yet somehow I still read that line as talking about Eric. I thought “what, did Eric Cantor have some rant on the House floor when somebody tried to explain uncountable infinities to him?”
I blame it on being up since 4:30.
ETA: Is there enough of a quorum in the Philly area for a BJ gathering?
Matt McIrvin
Cabinet-level positions in the next Republican administration?
Roger Moore
@Mike in NC:
FTFY.
Brother Shotgun of Sweet Reason
This was just great:
So many obscure references in one funny line! I love this blog.
Redshirt
@Matt McIrvin: Not so many, nor even counting all the “Think Tanks”.
They’re building their own lower class of the future – but perhaps that’s for the best, so the sense of victimhood can live on.
Avery Greynold
In Utah, when they screened the movie Nell, it was released under the title A beautiful Mind.
Roger Moore
@Matt McIrvin:
Sorry, those positions are reserved for nepotistas.
Redshirt
@Roger Moore: Or important “volunteers”.
The more I read, the more I hear, the more I see, the more I become a single issue voter: Stop the Republican Party in all its forms.
The prophet Nostradumbass
Private Eye magazine has a category for such stories: “Educhasun Newz”.
mai naem
I’m actually surprised. I know the whackjob mormons in Colorado City(the Warren Jeffs people) made money off the school system because they were getting tons of fed money from the gazillions of breeders and Jeffs and his buds were getting the money in contracts and such from the school district.
Chris
@Redshirt:
Yep. Me too. Everything that’s wrong with America now, trying to bring back everything that was ever wrong with America? Yeah, I’m voting against.
RaflW
@Tom
The Republican political class will not be satisfied until there are actual serfs serving in regal fiefdoms. They are bitter that they missed out on that power.
I just hope they don’t mind the dysentery and cholera that goes with it.
FlyingToaster
Jeebus, the eebil stench smells all the way from Utah to Massachusetts.
I assume this nephew of Donny (who is still the perfect Joseph from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, seen him live) is all “I got mine, sucks to be you”.
I’m beginning to think the solution to this mess is to start up a fund for bus tickets, first months rent and jobs in civilization to let everyone escape from these assholes.
BTW, perhaps Mr. Osmond is unaware that Americans have the freedom to send their children to private or religious schools, or home-school them. Please inform him so that he quits wasting the Utahn legislature’s time.
Petorado
Osmond uses a pretty typical attack line of the conservatives: that there was an idyllic past that was interrupted by change (with the agent of change always being “government”) that disrupts the natural flows of the world’s order. Progress (and necessarily progressivism) is bad, because it upsets the idyllic past, therefore any change must be feared. Great mindset for keeping those on top in the top spot, and for keeping anyone hoping to better their lives from doing so.
Redshirt
@Petorado:
Word yup, mang. There’s so many words that need capturin’.
R. Porrofatto
Well heck. It’s not like the Dark Ages were all that dark. Let’s give ’em a try!
JGabriel
@burnspbesq:
Peak Wingnut is a myth because it presupposes a limit.
The Wingularity, however, is a point of collapse due to density, f(wingnut) = infinity, where wingnut is a measure of right-wing crazy, defined as delusion * the cube of stupidity: Wn=DS^3. Once delusion and stupid are dense enough, Wingnut collapses into a Wingularity, at which point it can no longer communicate with the rest of the universe — because it is separated from the basic laws of physics and reality, and any communication coming from within the Wingularity turns in on itself, effectively rendering it into gibberish to any outside observer.
In contrast to quantum mechanics, the observer of a Wingularity can no longer influence the observed Wingularity at all.
All of which is to say, that while Peak Wingnut is a myth, the Wingularity is not.
In short, you are mythtaken.
.
JGabriel
@burnspbesq:
Peak Wingnut is a myth because it presupposes a limit.
Wingularity, however, is a point of collapse due to density, when f(wingnut) = infinity, where wingnut is a measure of right-wing crazy, defined as delusion * the cube of stupidity divided by sense: Wn=DSt^3/Se. Once sense equals zero, Wingnut collapses into a Wingularity, at which point it can no longer communicate with the rest of the universe — because it is separated from the basic laws of physics and reality, and any communication coming from within the Wingularity turns in on itself, effectively rendering it gibberish to any outside observer.
In contrast to quantum mechanics, the observer of a Wingularity can no longer influence the observed Wingularity at all.
All of which is to say, that while Peak Wingnut is a myth, the Wingularity is not.
In short, you are mythtaken.
.
Flatlander
@Davis X. Machina: Yes, yes it will. Secular homeschoolers will agree with Osmond that the public education system has moved far, far beyond its original brief in this country and is failing to be all things to all people. It is simultaneously failing the kids who come to school unprepared for learning and unable to focus as well as those kids whose (parents’) ambitions to college begin in preschool. We are also similarly aware that the history of compulsory education in America is not all kind and gentle, and its origins in forced assimilation and indoctrination continue to inform its current practice.
We will certainly agree that public schooling should be an opportunity rather than an obligation. Many non-wingnut people think that the mass free babysitting of public school is a bad environment and use of time for our children, who would be better off learning and developing their skills with their families, friends, and neighbors. We have this in common with right-wing religious homeschoolers, and their rights are our rights, so we stand together with them. We are pleased to have worked together to make homeschooling legal in all fifty states.
Where secular homeschoolers will likely disagree with Osmond is in the analysis of policy repercussions. Those who are currently failed to the greatest degree by our public schooling system would likely be failed even more by a reduction in its scope. Even if we do not need and do not use our local public schools, we liberals would like to see them meet the needs of those whose lives may be improved by them.
The article in question, however, only makes four very sensible suggestions (you can find them where it says First, Second, Third, and Finally). I don’t see much discussion here of whether these four suggestions are reasonable. Does anybody here find any of them unreasonable? One couldn’t know from the comments here. I see instead a kind of pearl-clutching freakout at the very idea that there could be people who don’t like public education as it is, with the same kind of vague ‘you know what I mean’ insinuations everybody’s least favorite uncle uses when talking about Obama.
A more reasonable response to Osmond’s suggestion about reviewing compulsory education would be to ask for more concrete policy suggestions, or to point out that in fact children are not in fact compelled to attend school in Utah, per state law:
I think that of the major distinctions in latter years between the right and left wings of American politics (in an age where our supposedly socialist Democratic president is far to the right of most previous Republican presidents) is that the left wing believes that policy can be improved, for better effect and less onerous miscarriage, whereas the right wing believes that government is inherently evil, and policy is only good to the extent you can make a buck off it.
Could not socially-minded liberals improve policy regarding our public education system in such a way that it would benefit both those who send their children to school and those who don’t? Or is such a thing beyond our abilities?
lou
First, apparently Republicans, who worship the free market, haven’t read Adam Smith, who advocated for compulsory education. He warned capitalism couldn’t work without an educated populace.
Second, Flatlander, I have no objection to people homeschooling if they want. But I do think there should be checks on it, to make sure kids are getting educated. And that’s it’s not a smoke screen for abuse. There have been at least two cases in the last couple of years in our area of children who ended up dead after their “parents” withdrew them from school to “home school.” And conservatives are never going to let those checks happen. Also, this. http://www.salon.com/2013/07/09/i_was_a_home_school_freak/
Omnes Omnibus
@Flatlander:
Let’s start with the first point Osmond mentions in his little editorial. Of course parents are primarily responsible for the education of their children – just like they are primarily responsible for feeding, clothing, and sheltering them. But let’s be realistic, many parents’ lives are consumed with the feeding, clothing, and sheltering part. Hungry kids don’t learn well; it is known. Schools in well-off districts seem to do just fine, it’s the poor ones that have troubles. So, let’s fix poverty.
Also, reading to kids and taking an interest in homework is one thing, but are the majority of parents actually prepared to provide a good education for their kids on their own? I tend to doubt it. Not everyone is suited to being a teacher. Some lack substantive knowledge, some lack the knack of communicating that knowledge at a rate and level of complexity that can be understood by kids.
This opportunity v. obligation talk smacks of privilege v. right. Education should be a right, the state should be obligated to provide it, and people should be obligated to participate in it.
schrodinger's cat
Wingularity is like Absolute Zero, you can never really reach it, only approach it. I don’t think we have reached maximum
entropycrazy yet.schrodinger's cat
@karen: The most traditional of India’s Brahmins kept their women illiterate and bare foot, literally.
mclaren
After that big buildup, I was expecting something impressive. “Senator introduces bill to repeal tides.” Or maybe “New House legislation bans menstruation.” Something amazing.
Instead, all we get is this piddling little bullshit story about yet another wacko who wants to privatize K-12 education.
Seriously, what’s wrong with the Teahdists? Go for the gusto. Come out for privatizing the U.S. army! That would be truly Touching the Void of craziness.
But this?
This?
Pfft. Nothingburger.
Roy G.
The wingularity will never happen, because science never happens if you don’t believe in it. Faith based logic, QED.
moofalumbo
oops, “more”
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JCR
@Flatlander: One could also argue that we have a civic duty to participate in public education. Not only because our grand experiment in self-governance depends on an educated and well-informed citizenry, but also because, now more than ever, we need to pull together nationally and globally to deal with global problems without destroying ourselves. Public education, for all its flaws, does more than impart information; it also helps break down tribal boundaries and exposes young minds to different world views. And since the content of the courses and the licensing of teachers is shaped by the democratic process, this does help create a common foundation of understanding that allows us to work together. Certainly there are big improvements to be made, but one constructive thing liberals can do is to get onto school boards and get involved in local governing. This is how the conservatives built up their power over time, and it’s time to take some of that power back.
Deb T
Didn’t have time to read through all the comments so forgive me if I’m restating what someone else has written. I see a dark scenario behind ‘make education a privilege and not a right’. Great way to disenfranchise even more of the electorate. And if it’s not supported by the government, that means it won’t be free and only folks with money will be able to afford schooling. It’s just another way to separate classes.
Flatlander
@lou: I don’t know if I’d be too sure that compulsory public education has brought us, or will bring us, an educated populace. I understand that the literacy rate in America is lower now than it was two centuries ago, before it was initiated.
As far as children who ended up dead because they homeschooled, you’ve opened an ugly can of worms there. It’s a certainty there are far more abusive parents who send their kids to school than who homeschool; if you don’t love your kids, why would you want to be around them all day? School is not exactly a safe place for children, either. Besides the massacres, there’s bullying, the school-to-jail pipeline, pervy teachers, and death by physical restraint.
I agree (although other homeschoolers don’t) that checks on homeschooled kids are reasonable. It wouldn’t take much for kids who homeschool to match the averages for their grades in tests of actual subjects like reading, writing, and arithmetic. They’d probably screw up the averages in their districts.
I think most conservative homeschoolers, along with liberal homeschoolers, would be okay with checks as long as they’re not a stalking-horse for indoctrination. What’s tested in the schools is too wishy-washy and politicized to fit the bill. Too many would be reading from a different book of myths to pick the correct answers for what passes for history in in our schools. A) The Pilgrims survived because Squanto was happy to share a meal with the them at the first Thanksgiving. B) The Pilgrims survived by robbing graves in a plague-ravaged continent.
Flatlander
@Omnes Omnibus: Omnes, I agree with you that the majority of people will never be suited to, nor will want to, provide their children’s education themselves. I haven’t heard many people argue seriously that should be the predominant system. As you say, not everyone is suited to be a teacher (including many people employed as such). It’s rather a question of minority rights, including the rights of children to choose who their teacher should be in consultation with their families rather than having a teacher assigned to them by the state.
When you say that “Education should be a right, the state should be obligated to provide it, and people should be obligated to participate in it,” that sounds rather threatening to people who want to retain the right to choose their own teachers and own paths in education. Compulsory education was instituted in this country by force; children were taken away from their families and sometimes their cultures because they were “obligated to participate in it.” Those dark times are gone now, and I for one hope they do not return.
If one suggest, as you seem to, that homeschooling should be outlawed, then all private schools should be closed as well. Otherwise you are advocating a class-based system whereby only those wealthy enough to afford private school can leave public school. I know many people homeschooling successfully on minimal or fixed income. Are you really proposing this society move further towards a class-based educational system?
J R in WV
@Flatlander:
Maybe the longest troll ever?
I read those 4 recommendations. The first sentence of each one makes some sense. But then he takes off and makes the most twisted and non-logical conclusions anyone could from the not-totally-crazed beginnings.
Flatlander
@JCR: When Andover, Exeter, Sidwell Friends, Trinity, Horace Mann, Chicago Lab, etc. have all been closed, along with all the parochial schools, and that whole 10% of schoolchildren sent back to their local public schools, then would be a better time to talk about participation in these great democratic institutions of the 2% who homeschool.
In my city, we don’t even have local public schools. It’s all lotteries and charters and buses back and forth.
low-tech cyclist
@Gin & Tonic:
I second this.
As for Eric Cantor, the closest he comes to having any relation to Georg is that he manages to cram an uncountable quantity of stupidity into a brain of measure zero.
Tom sez:
Then fuck this shit, I’m moving to Discworld, where one turtle suffices!