I am a business owner in Riverside, CA with my girlfriend and two other roommates/employees (one of them is Xomniverse on these forums and on Youtube, and my girlfriend is Rose0883 on Youtube). I also blog for The School Sucks Project, which is a pretty cool site. I have been strongly influenced by Ayn Rand, John Holt, Alfie Kohn, Harry Browne, Aristotle, and Stefan Molyneux although I tend to strongly stray from all of them in different parts of their philosophies. While I am well versed in economics and politics, I tend to be more interested in the psychological and epistemological realms of philosophy. I have also taught voice, piano, and theater fairly extensively. First as an occasional teacher in the public system, and later as a teacher in voluntary private institutions. Within 5-10 years my girlfriend and I have intentions of starting a free school and performing arts studio. I most commonly express my ideas on Youtube with the screen name Aaron0883
Posted on 2010 Jun 06 by Aaron
I would like to thank Brett for the opportunity to write a blog for the School Sucks Project. I take his invitation to do this work as a high compliment since I have such profound respect for the podcasts he has made and the goals he is working towards.
About two years ago I made a video talking about how Unschooling and education has no prominent philosophical voice since the death of John Holt, but rather the dominant Unschooling crowd has consisted of well-intentioned, and friendly leftist who held more of a mystical and/or emotional appeal for educational reevaluation. When Brett first announced his intentions for the School Sucks Podcast on the Complete Liberty Podcast I was reservedly excited. Once I started listening I thought he offered educational insight and leadership that didn’t exist in the movement.
I hope my insight and words can contribute in any way possible. If you have any criticisms or comments, feel free to leave them in the comment section or to send me a personal message here, or on my Youtube channel (my SN is Aaron0883).
The Evolutionary Child
Imagine being an evolutionary biologist and reading about this fictitious animal.
“The Kindermouse tends to hate foraging and other work unlike most mouse species. It’s curiosity is limited to the interest it has in exploring the mouths of Hawks. Though it’s survival depends on the cooperation of other mice, it tends to be an anti-social animal. It has the natural inclination of hanging on top of psychoactive toads to get into a mind altering state and then spend hours and sometimes days just directing different frogs through heavy traffic.”
I think if a person who knows the smallest bit about biology read about this mouse he would believe it is impossible for a mouse like that to exist because the mouse would not be able to survive (let alone reproduce). However, the same person could read a statement like this and find no problem with it.
“Children don’t want to work, they just want to do mind numbing activities like playing video games. If parents aren’t there to tell them what to do than they will never learn how to read or any other meaningful educational experience. When parents aren’t around to give a child good values they will often end up doing drugs, become self-destructive and mooch off of society.”
This is really the same statement about two different species, and somehow this eludes people.
Children are a finely tuned result of millions of years of evolution. Their desires are made to guide them into the most advantageous position to make them happy and successful. In fact, happiness itself is an evolutionary tool used to inspire people into productive situations in order to replicate it’s genes.
When we find people who are self-destructive it is very rare that it is a product of their nature (with an exception being a genetic mutation, or another physiological malfunction of the organism). Self-destructiveness is most often a result of the result of an undermining of their natural desire. Which means … when you treat a child like dysfunctional human, they will often live up to your treatment.
Unfortunately many people tend to see the health in a child as a symptom of a dysfunction. Here is a good example.
-While at the top of a parking structure a child sees the opportunity to explore physics and his power to influence the world. He spits off of the top. As it floats down he watches it zig zag for a while, and then split a couple of seconds before it lands. He now has integrated a slightly better understanding of gravity, acceleration, velocity, force, wind, liquid, and many other educational topics. Unfortunately, all the parent saw was their child being destructive and inconsiderate of the remote possibility of another person or thing at the receiving end or, god forbid, someone saw that it was their child.
When you start viewing a child as a finely tuned biological organism you can start understanding their actions in a much more empathetic and reasonable way. If they do something that is unproductive for their lives it is generally because they lack information, and this is the place for a parent to step in and offer help in a friendly and respectful way. The concept of punishing a child for doing something that is against his self-interest would be like assaulting the Cookie Monster for looking in the wrong place for a cookie.
Man (including children), like all evolutionary animals, have a natural propensity to improve their situation in life in order to spread their genes. Children are not born with original sin, or as a dysfunctional human. Rather they are born in a early stage with early natural desires to explore, learn, and grow. While this exploration can often lead them into sensitive situations that might seem dangerous, like touching a stove, evolution has chosen for this to be a worthwhile risk to gain a rich understanding of the world around the child. The place for a parent is not to stifle, or even direct their natural and beneficial curiosity … but rather to offer greater insight when it is needed or asked for.
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