It's Saturday morning, and my 20-month old Sofia, and I are watching/reading what we like.
I think constantly about the people who run this country: their moral and ethical standards, their crimes small and massive. I can't help thinking that where my daughter is concerned, I've got to take full responsibility for making sure she doesn't grow up believing, most critcally, that truth is tied to egocentricity and power, i.e. that the truth is whatever she thinks it to be, enforced by immovable ignorance and bogus "proof."
This era of Bush's Iraq War has me finding so little difference between what we'd consider history and propaganda. What characterizes me as a liberal, primarily, is that I don't believe a damned thing I hear anymore, from any major television news outlet or newspaper. I give equal believabilty to both the editorial and the front pages.
Since I've had a child, though, my time of inaction has ended. I simply can't just hide from major news in the angry (and warm) bosom of the left wing blogosphere. I've got to...do something for my daughter, because she, a little part of me, is going to be taught that mainstream news is as trustworthy as an entry in Merriam-Webster.
At the same time, I can't envision a way in which a kind of deconstructive reading could be taught to a grade schooler. I'm afraid that teaching the elusivity of meaning in language and "truth" and symbol would lead to a kind of dangerous nihilism. As elusive as I think most things are, I've got my anchors-- primarily, a love for my daughter.
My biggest problem with the current ruling regime is its elementary school history book mentality about truth and news reporting-- namely that both ought to be sterilized and romanticized and fed to what the government thinks are the seven-year old minds of its masses-- like the story of the first Thanksgiving. How can this be happening? We all ask. How can adults be so obtuse?
The truest thing I ever heard about George W. was from Jon Stewart: "It's not that he's stupid, it's that he talks to everyone like they're stupid." When I hear W.'s defiant rhetoric about the status quo in Iraq, it's doubly stupifying: I feel like I'm being manipulated and by someone who thinks I'm an idiot. If we dare try to tell our teacher or any of his cronies they're wrong, we get the equivalent of a duncecap.
The question is, What can I do to make sure my daughter doesn't grow up egocentric, and without respect for truth, justice and, er, the...American Way (whatever that will be)?
- Keep her away from any glorified "-centrisms." Let her be proud of her country for its contributions to humanity, not because it's "the greatest nation in the world" and that's all anyone needs to know.
- Stress to her that wars are horrible, scary, most times unnecessary fights between people who cannot get along, or give up trying.
- Teach her that everything living deserves equal respect, understanding, and care.
- Make her understand that there are two sides to every story, causes for effects, and that everything seemingly evil ought to be studied.
- That telling the truth is very simple in a world where it is what's most important.
- That she should never support anything, especially the killing of civilians in war, which she wouldn't go and do herself.
- That she should never own any possession she couldn't give away in a hot minute.
- That capitalism isn't just for the betterment of the individual, but for the collective-- that every working human being is an idividual anyway, and ought to be treated by the government in duty to keep them alive, fed, and healthy to a more than liveable standard.
- That nobody who can help it deserves to be poor, hungry, or sick.
- That each individual soldier's life is as important as that of his commander-in-chief, the President of the United States.
Can anyone think of more?