Freedom of Speech? The First What?

[kerrygoddess]

What is up with this? Kids don't know about the First Amendment. Hell, I asked mine tonight and she didn't know all that much...Beware of Margaret Spellings she's out to take more Freedom of Speech away!

“First Amendment No Big Deal, Students Say.”

AP News has an enlightening article today on a new study commissioned by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. The study conducted by researchers at UConn says, “America's high schools are leaving the First Amendment behind.”

The way many high school students see it, government censorship of newspapers may not be a bad thing, and flag burning is hardly protected free speech.

I read the article not once, not twice but three times grappling with the implications of this. Here we are in the midst of a fight to protect our rights that the Bush administration seems hell bent on taking away and high school students do not even fully understand what their rights are. There is something very, very wrong with this picture.

More - http://www.lightupthedarkness.org/blog/default.asp?view=plink&id=305

[nadinbrzezinski]

1. Easier to take away rights faster when people do

not know them... yes that is the cynic in me... but our kdis no longer read the Constitution or the Bill of Rights in school

[kerrygoddess]

2. I agree

This is so not a good sign. Most high schools have a cut a year of history out of their requirements. If you don't keep on top of your kids they aren't learning anything.

[jdots]

3. they may never miss something they had.

The bill of rights has been pre-empted by entertainment along with education and seperation of church and state.

[Guaranteed]

4. This is a product of not being taught history correctly.

If they don't have an appreciation for our rights, they don't understand the things that governments have done in the past.

[kerrygoddess]

5. They are not learning this in school

And the budget cuts don't help. The article said that there is no money for school newspapers and that's a primary source for kids to understand the application of their own freedom of speech.

My teen is already supplementing her high school education at community college because they don;t offer enough in the public schools in L.A.

[Red State Blues]

6. I wonder

how recent this really is. I know that I've been amazed by conversations on these topics for years; perhaps South Carolina is just on stupidity's leading edge?

This is scary though. I think I read Chomsky saying (might have been Zinn) that essentially it didn't matter what the laws were, that if people believed they had the right of free speech, they had it, and if they didn't believe ....

[kerrygoddess]

9. Just released ...

Very recent... part of this is about lack of funds to teach this in schools.

[Red State Blues]

12. Yes,

I realize that it is a new study. I also realize that we don't have earlier data to compare it with and while I would agree that schools having less money having something to do with it is a good hypothesis it still is not conclusive proof. Also, they compared the children to their "elders", which in this case was their teachers and principals, a selective sample that tells us more about teachers and principals than it does about anything else.

[happyslug]

7. Nothing new here

If you talk to kids under 12 (as opposed to talk to them) you will find they are the most conservative people out there. "That is the way it has always been and that is the way it is" Sums up the attitude of kids below age 12. I remember one time my younger sister was doing einee minee miniee moe catch the ...... The next word she used was Lion instead of the traditional word (Which I will not repeat here). Did we kids KNOW what the traditional word meant? No more than eniee, minee or moe. On the other hand what she was saying was WRONG, for it was not the TRADITIONAL way to say eninee minee minee moe.

My point here is kids under age 12 are very conservative, when such kids turn into Teenagers they become more liberal PROVIDED THEIR HOUSE IS INTACT. Teenagers wants to "rebel" against their parents, but only if the structure of the family is still intact. If that structure does not exist or is in tatters you have a mis-functioning home environment that forces the Children to stay conservative (Let the family disintegrate more) yet be "themselves" by being radical. The problem with being "Radical" is that it destroy whatever structure their have left, thus most of the Radicalism of such teenagers tend to be for radical re-construction i.e. Nazism etc. They want STRUCTURE for they have none in their life.

Thus why Teenagers from mis functioning homes tend to two appear to be two extremes, radical left or radical right and often at the same time. A kid could be Acing one class and failing another. A Teen may be "rebelling" wearing the most outlandish clothing yet join a Neo-Nazi group. The balance that the average teen is absent in this group, it it radicalization of traditional norms. The reason for the Radicalization is that such children from non-functioning home can NOT rebel against the structure of their parents, for no structure exists so they look for structure. Thus such teens tend to be Radical Right.

Some people will say this is tied in with the divorce rate, but the divorce rate stabilized around 1970 and has been fairly stable since that date and thus NOT the reason for the lack of structure in homes. The better explanation is the general decline of the economy and the clear decline in income in families earning less than Median Income (About $40,000 a year). This decline in Income has forced such families to borrow more, use more credit cards, and work more than previously. They are only maintaining their standard of living on Credit and as such the Credit has to be paid back. This is causing strain within the families and you are seeing more and more teenagers seeing their family structure come under attack. This forces such families to become more more dysfunctional and you have a tendency to more and more fascists and Nazi tendencies among teens i.e. a DEMAND for more structure so that they have something to rebel against.

Teens from healthy families "rebel" against the parents and the restrictions their parents impose on them. Such kids want Freedom of Speech, Assembly and religion. On the other hand where the parents can NOT impose such structure the Teen must do it themselves which lead to how do you rebel against yourself? Thus Teens in dysfunctional homes tend to DEMAND structure and thus the Bill of Rights goes to far.

My reason for writing this is to show that these teens observation that the Bill of Rights have gone to far may be the result of their economic background more than any feeling that the Bill of Rights has gone to far. Economics have trump most other considerations throughout history and why should today's teens be different.

[kerrygoddess]

8. We're not talking 12 year olds in this study

Did you read this?

[happyslug]

10. Did you read my Thread

I mention 12 year old as the Most Conservative to distinguish them from teenagers (12-18 year olds) which is the group I was writing about. 12-18 year olds (i.e. "Teenagers") in "normal" families tend to be much more liberal then their younger siblings (and much more liberal than they were when they were pre-teens). My point was the economic problems of todays low income families are forcing their teenagers to be more conservative than there should be. Thus I was NOT talking of 12 year olds but teens in general i.e. HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS etc.

[kerrygoddess]

11. Yes I did

I appreciate your observation, this article is about the fact that students are not learning about the First Amendment in High Schools and the same emphasis on teaching it and fostering it is not being made, as it used to be.

"Educators are not giving high school students an appreciation of free speech and free press, according to the study researchers, who questioned more than 100,000 high school students, nearly 8,000 teachers, and more than 500 principals and administrators" - http://www.firstamendmentfuture.org/main.html