On Behalf of Real Books

On Behalf of Real Books

by Michael Peroutka

The contents of a recent article by Tom DeWeese of The American Policy Center deserves our attention.

It’s about book burning – not in the 1930’s, not in Nazi Germany, but in the present day, in America, by school administrators who believe that books are antiquated and – (pardon the intentional pun) books are so “old school”.

The future of learning, they argue, is achieved by opening up the internet superhighway in the classrooms so that every child has access.  

Headmaster James Tracy of Cushing Academy, a private prep school in Massachusetts that just trashed 20,000 books and revamped its library into a pseudo internet café, explains that they are exchanging real books for a database of millions of digital books.  And all this is, of course, available on the laptops that are provided to all students.

The Headmaster went on to say that it doesn’t matter if a student is reading Chaucer by way of a Kindle or by way of a paperback.

Actually, I’m not so sure.

First, traditional libraries were always ordered to be quiet areas because students were researching or writing papers. The atmosphere now tends to be loud and boisterous.

Second, printed books cannot be changed. The content in iPads can be changed by outside forces and one can’t trust the content to be accurate. Third, those same outside forces can actually control what information is available. They can control knowledge.

And haven’t we already seen an assault on attitudes, values and beliefs that has largely replaced academics?

Free enterprise is racist and evil. Private property ownership is a social injustice. Individual thought is dangerous. Free speech is a threat.

Coincidence? Or the result of an orchestrated plan to create a new kind of citizen for the future? One that doesn’t challenge official dictates?

How do you create such a citizen? Keep them ignorant of history, philosophy and contrary ideas. If they don’t know there is a question they will never ask it.

In any event, as a Councilman, I will work to ensure that our county stays real and keeps real books.

This is MIchael A Peroutka for Your County Matters. (July, 2017)