For Tea Baggers, the Future Looks Dumb
One thing tea baggers object to is “government schools,” or as normal people call them, public schools. You see, at the government schools, kids are forced to learn science, to associate with others not exactly like them, and every now and then, be subjected to an address from their president asking them to do their homework and become successful. And you know where all this leads. That’s right, buddy, the big “S.” Socialism with a capital…Well anyway. So following Trish’s Law of Coincidences, which states that there are no coincidences, a recent increase in home schooling must be correlated to rising numbers of tea baggers. In fact, one unscientific (how fitting!) online poll shows just that.
The people at the whyhomeschool blog came up with a poll that asks first if you support the Tea Party movement. Of the 99 people who responded in the affirmative, 88 percent selected this answer: “Yes, and I currently homeschool, have homeschooled in the past, or plan to homeschool my child(ren).” Slightly more than 5 percent (five votes) went with, “Yes, and I send, have sent, and plan to send my child(ren) exclusively to public school.” Another 4 percent checked, “Yes, and I send, have sent, or plan to send my child(ren) to private school.” And finally, 3 percent said that although they support tea bagging, they have no children.
On the other hand, only 36 readers said they do not support the Tea Party movement, but most of them also home school, and what with this being a blog for home schoolers, that’s not a huge surprise. Of those who felt negatively toward tea bagging, 89 percent still home school, and 3 percent each use private and public schools. A final 6 percent (two people) who don’t have kids also don’t like tea parties.
The Orlando Sentinel recently published a story about the new-found popularity of home schooling, and linked it to the rock star popularity of home schooling’s most famous alumnus, University of Florida football quarterback Tim Tebow. Tebow, who sports a New Testament bible verse citation in his eye-black, was home schooled by his missionary parents until he showed promise in football. At that point, they enrolled him in a public high school, followed by a big fat football scholarship and four years at a public university.
This kind of self-reliance (yes, I’m being facetious) inspires both religious zealots and tea baggers alike, according to another poll published with the story. It asked, “If you home-school your children (or plan to), what is the primary reason you chose to do so?” While 18 percent answered that they would never consider such an option, the numbers were almost equal (16 percent each) for these three responses: “I want my child to receive an education that addresses spiritual issues that are important to my family,” “Traditional schools stifle creativity and frown upon nonconformists,” and most worrisome, “I don’t want the government involved in my child’s education.”
Anyone who has seen the movie Idiocracy knows where this is going. Over time, with even less exposure to challenging ideas, tea baggers will become stupider and stupider, until finally they will drown in a sea of dumb. The question is whether we will all get pulled under with them.