Early morning on easter of this year my grandmother passed away. She was the greatest woman I have ever met; she gave up everything to help my father raise my brother and I. I always considered her more like a mother to me than anything else. I guess you could say she considered my brother and I like children because she kept everything we ever did.
Today was a very interesting day; today was the day we had to go through everything in her house. My living room is currently filled with boxes of random memories. Everything from my birth bracelet and balloons, to every assignment I ever did in school. While I was rummaging through I found a history test I completed in 6th grade. It caught my eye because I got all 50 questions correct...
Then I got to the 'short answer' question. The answer is shocking. Beware... I am not making this up.
The question was as follows.
"E. DISCUSS: Explain the positions of political liberals and political conservatives in modern America."
This question seems kind of deep for an eleven year old... but I wont go there. My answer was completely ridiculous... and yet I got it 'right'
My Answer (word for word and uncorrected)
"Librals want the goverment to controlle every thing and not have biblical standerds. Conservatives want to be free and the goverment only controlle fighting. And have biblical standerds."
I got that question right. What the hell. Now you are reading this wondering how the hell I got that right and you probably have already figured it out. I went to a small christian school in a very republican very conservative state. I was indoctrinated. I was lied to. This was wrong. Why would you tell an eleven year old that? That is so unbelievably biased; it makes my head hurt. This should seriously be illegal.
I never realized how bad it really was. Once I got out of it and got new friends I realized I was living in a bubble, but what about the people who live in that bubble there entire lives. They become the John McCains and Sarah Palins... They truly believe a pile of dung because they were raised to. They never doubted and only learned reasons why they were right instead of possible reasons why the could be wrong.
Talking to a conservative, as I have realized, is like talking to a rock. They aren't listening and they aren't going to budge. Years and years of layers of lies and indoctrination have destroyed these peoples heads. That is why the republican party is falling apart. America is getting smart. We are learning things and the people that want to stay in the past can stay there... we are moving forward. They are clinging to Reagan. When are these people going to realize that the big bad communism didn't swallow America whole... and neither will the big bad socialism. Seems like we always have to have something to be afraid of. Well... I am afraid of ignorance and I will fight to make sure no one else is ignorant.