Shut Up and Pay

by Lee Duigon

Once upon a time—in the real world—if you bought something, if you paid for it… you owned it.

The public pays for what people who don’t know any better call “public education.” But the public doesn’t own it. In that very real sense, “public education” isn’t public. Every moment of instruction, every textbook, school building, teacher pension, administrator’s gorgeous salary, every visual aid, locker, sports equipment—every cent of it, the public pays for.

And has no say in what that money buys.

Which brings us to former Clinton bagman and former governor Terry McAuliffe, now seeking another stint as governor of Virginia (replacing the abortion guy, whatever his name was), who recently had this to say about Virginia’s public schools:

“I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they ought to teach”.

Shut up and pay.

There’s been a great deal of vehement controversy in Virginia lately over what is being taught in public schools. It’s due to the COVID panic: when they closed the schools and required students to try to learn via “remote learning” at home, tens of thousands of parents, for the very first time, saw and heard what their kids were being taught. And they don’t like it. They have descended on their local school board meetings to tell the educators they don’t like it.

Which the Bagman doesn’t think they should do. Just shut up and pay.

What don’t they like?

Well, the biggest fly in the salad is “critical race theory,” which, er, “teaches” kids that white people are born racists, inherently evil, always looking to oppress the other races, and America’s a dirty racist country that has to be radically changed. Children are taught to hate themselves, hate other kids, hate their country, and hate their no-good racist families.

To add insult to injury, school boards usually deny they’re doing this—even as the teachers’ unions double down on it: “We’ll show you, you racists! You aren’t going to stop us from pumping this poison into children’s minds!”

They also “teach” that the whole reason the United States of America was established was to promote and protect slavery.

And when they’re not busy with that, they’re “teaching” the doctrine of Transgender. Trans this, trans that, you can be a boy one day and a girl the next, depending on how you feel. It’s a wonderful thing, you really ought to try it! Why else do you think we spend the public’s money on “comprehensive sex education?” It’s so tremendously liberating! Cast off the shackles of binary gender! And so on and so forth.

The parents don’t like that, either.

But they shouldn’t say so, should they? I mean, what business is it of theirs, what their kids are taught? Boy howdy, don’t they trust the teachers’ unions?

If you pay for it but don’t own it, what does that make you? Does the English language even have a word for that? Maybe “sucker” comes close.

For years and years, the American people have entrusted public schools with their children. They went about their business and left the schooling up to the professionals. But somewhere along the way, “education” turned into political and cultural indoctrination and not that many people noticed—although some did, and shouted warnings from the housetops.

Too many didn’t listen. “Oh, not in our schools!” Uh-huh. They didn’t want to rock the boat. Didn’t want to get involved.

Well, now they have to get involved.

Governor-wannabe Terry McAuliffe thinks they shouldn’t. He thinks you should just shut up and pay.

But if you do shut up and close your eyes and ears, that’s how you wind up paying for Critical Race Theory in your child’s classroom.

I have discussed these and other topics throughout the week in my blog, http://www.leeduigon.com/ . My articles can also be found at www.chalcedon.edu/ .

E-Mail Lee Duigon: leeduigon@verizon.net