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June's avatar

So very true. Having been raised in authoritarianism in the home and the church, now I know why evangelical Christians are so focused on obedience: so everyone will fall in line and vote the way they want them to, not protest when there is injustice. If the leaders are doing it, it must be right…right? That is how I thought for so long, and any time I questioned things, it fell on deaf ears. “This is the decision. Deal with it.”

It’s amazing how focused they were on getting to this moment in history. To give them credit, they think very long term and are willing to sacrifice and bide their time. Now if only the left - or somebody? - would adopt the same long term thinking. And make schools democratic institutions while they’re at it.

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Sara Sadek's avatar

Fran I resonate with so much of this. I believe in public school, but not in authoritarian public school. I believe in disrupting hierarchies between adults and children, and don't know how one can disrupt them effectively in a system build on oppressive white supremacist hierarchy (and patriarchy and ableism and and and)

I honestly don't know if our public institutions built on industrialized models of education will ever actually be able to give our kids the *embodied experience* of having their dignity and autonomy and respect cared for and protected because they are inherently built to serve the current system. And what our kids internalize within those oppressive systems becomes their primary lens on how they walk through the world, which is so not okay and totally tracks with our current political climate.

At the same time, it is incredibly hard for most working class folks who demand two earning incomes to find alternatives to what's offered in public school. Who gets to be free? Which kids get to have a liberation-based childhood? And how do we make the alternatives that you and I live and breathe with our kids accessible to everyone? Do we build parallel free schooling models aligned with our values? What would that take?

So glad to be in this conversation together. Thanks for your words!

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