X-Message-Number: 15418 From: Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 10:52:20 EST Subject: Re: Literacy is Unnatural In a message dated 1/22/01 4:05:33 AM Central Standard Time, writes: << All too much attention has been given the last few thousand years to "literacy", with all of its obvious defects. Basically, it's just another one of those linear, outmoded, left-brained vestiges of traditional hierarchical oppressive Western civilization which we must discard. Besides, learning to read is artificial and UNNATURAL. Moreover, it requires a lot of unpleasant effort. Forcing children to learn to read needs to be unmasked as the child abuse that it is, >> Absolutely right, Lee. You'll be happy to know that the public school system is way ahead of you here; I just finished a stint of pretending to teach 9th grade science, and out of 125 students, only 5 were contaminated with traditional literacy. Math abilities are not natural, either, of course, and most of the students cannot multiply two-digit numbers or fractions. Unfortunately the majority of the students can add and subtract, but they never know whether their answers are the right order of magnitude, so this ability has no practical effect on them. So we can rest assured that the students' brains are in a completely natural state, filled exclusively with memes from TV ads, just like their neolithic ancestors. Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=15418