Category Archives: Education

Monday’s Mtg: Can we revive rural and small-town America?

By DavidG on | Leave a comment

About one in five Americans (60 million people) live in rural areas, even though mostly-rural counties comprise 97% of the USA’s landmass.  Our urban areas, the other 3% of the land, contain the other 80% of the people.  (definitions here).  This ne-fifth of the country is both over-represented in our political system and a focus of many people’s cultural ideal of what it means to be an American (the “heartland”).  So, their fate matters as a practical matter, not just a patriotic and moral one. 

Everybody “knows” that rural America has been in economic and social decline for decades, and that it is probably a terminal disease.  Everybody also knows that a small number of our largest, mainly coastal cities have become the main engines of economic innovation, growth, and jobs.  The diverse, confident, media-centered big cities increasingly dominate U.S. culture, too, further leaving rural America in the dust.

But is all of this really true?  Specifically, is rural, small-town America doomed to keep on deindustrializing and shrinking in population?  If not, why do so many people think otherwise?  If so, what specifically needs to be done and who should do it?    

A LOT of thought and some effort has gone into trying to revive rural and small-town USA.  Some ideas center around fixing longstanding problems that have been allowed to fester.  These include crumbling infrastructure, lack of access to higher education and health care, and monopoly abuses by Big Agriculture.  (Just 4% of U.S. farms sell two-thirds of all output and small farms basically do what they’re told, at reduced profit.).  Other ideas emphasize bringing rural America into the modern, high-tech global economy.  Most involve ways to lure new manufacturing or well-paying service jobs to medium sized inland cities and university towns – and then hoping the benefits reach the truly rural areas. 

If there is one lesson to be learned about economic development both abroad and at home in the past 70 years, it is that no single, silver bullet solution.  Not improved education, or infrastructure, or government support for infant industries, or opioid treatment, or more civic pride.  There is no one size fits all solution.  Yet, some or all of these things can work together to give flailing rural/small city areas a chance to reinvent themselves.  Each town and rural area will need its own strategy created with local buy-in; resources (some external, especially financing); and the leadership to make it all work.  Many cities and towns are trying to do just that, albeit COVID-19 has proven to be yet another catastrophe to overcome. 

I think well-meaning city dwellers in groups like Civilized Conversation should become familiar with the debate over, let’s call it, “heartland” economic development.  (I normally hate the word heartland; it implies rural, mainly White America is the “real” America, and the rest of us – including poor urban and suburban residents – are something else.  But here it will do as a shorthand.)  Conservatives have demonized the very idea of “planning,” and many progressives are over-enamored with it, IMO.  But somebody’s got to do some of it, creatively and NOW.  The free market, laissez faire economy has at the least not solved this problem.  In many ways 21st century U.S. capitalism has flat out left large regions of the country behind.    

Monday will go like this:

  1. First: As discussed in the post above, the group that shows up will vote to stay inside or move to Panera’s outside seating, for COVID safety reasons.  Majority vote wins.  Dress for either.
  2. Second: I will introduce a few of the general principles and big ideas surrounding heartla – I just can’t – rural and small-town revitalization.
  3. Discussion.  If outside, we may have to break into two groups and I will float between them.  Traffic makes it very noisy outside Panera, so maybe two groups would be best after my intro.

OPTIONAL BACKGROUND READINGS –

  • Debunking some myths about rural America.  Examples – Only 6% work in agriculture. Largest employers are education and health care. One-fifth rural folks are non- White. Urban and suburban areas have many of the same problems.

Pessimistic –

Optimistic –

NEXT WEEK (8/16) – The problems associated with meat-eating.

Posted in: Economy/Economics, Education, Mtg Announcements, Social Policy/Social Science | Tagged: , , , ,

Monday’s Mtg (7/12/21): Do we have to face up to our past mistakes to make social progress?

By DavidG on | Leave a comment

Barbara’s topic idea is front and center of our political wars, but touches on many other issues, especially history and education.  Whether to even try to reckon with our nation’s historical injustices and their modern consequences will be a central political question for as long as the Republican Party stays in its current groove.

I’m sorry, but look around you.  Every prominent conservative issue these days is related to grievances over race: Cancel culture rhetoric, claiming the 2020 election was stolen (by whom, eh?), pushing state election laws that disenfranchise voters and take control of the vote counting process, the immigrant border crisis.    

To be fair, some of this is in reaction to what progressives have actually been doing. Trumpism, Black Lives Matter, Confederate monuments, and internal progressive politics have refocused liberals on exposing institutional racism and systemic injustices because they see doing so as right and just AND a prerequisite for attaining any more real social progress.  To liberals, this means teaching the kids and the general public the “hard history” of discrimination and expropriation that all nations have and prefer to keep hidden – even from themselves.    

Barbara suggests we discuss some of the major benefits and risks of historical reckoning. If I grasp her topic idea correctly, she wants to know:

  1. How much of a reckoning should happen?  How much of our dark side should be taught in the classroom and in popular culture? 
  2. Is such an honest reckoning necessary to achieve social progress?  Are today’s lived consequences of past injustices bad enough to justify public policies to level the playing field?  And, should we worry that over-emphasizing “national guilt” end up losing public (i.e., White public) support for more needed social reforms? 

Conservatives, going by what they say and write, seem to believe teaching America’s flaws amounts to an exotic “critical race theory,” allegedly motivated by White liberal guilt or anti-patriotism or a plan to inculcate anti-White racism in young people.  But, hysterical arguments like these should not lull us into dismissing all criticism that we are focusing too much, too fast on America’s flaws at a time of surging national disunity.    

Anyway, even without the partisan politics Barbara’s questions are very difficult to answer. How much historical reckoning is necessary, sufficient, and counterproductive?  Who decides?  Who teaches whom what and where?  Maybe these optional background readings will help shed some light. 

I will give my usual opening framing of the issue and then ask Barbara for her thoughts.  ** Gee, it’s good to be meeting in person again!

OPTIONAL BACKGROUND READINGS –

NEXT WEEK –July 19:  Could Atheists unite somehow to have a larger social/political impact?

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Posted in: Education, History, Mtg Announcements, Politics | Tagged: , , ,

Monday’s Mtg: Understanding Biden’s big infrastructure plans.

By DavidG on | Leave a comment

What all is actually in President Biden’s two huge infrastructure bills?  How would they change the lives of Americans if they passed and who would pay for them?  If all you want is horserace-style coverage of whether they will pass/fail, which party looks good doing it, and who’s on first, check your mainstream news media.  If you want to know what’s in the bills and what governing philosophy lies behind them – and the counterarguments – join Civilized Conversation next Monday, May 17th.

I will open our meeting with a brief description of that philosophy and then summarize the bills’ major provisions.  There are a lot of them, so I will focus on the biggest ticket items and the ones that probably would have the most transformational impact.  Philosophically, as described by the White House (none have been introduced yet as they are still negotiating) the bills will take a very broad view of infrastructure.  If everything that has been advertised as in them were to pass it would amount to about $4 trillion of new federal spending over the next 10 years, an increase of a bit less than 10% in the annual federal budget.  The spending could be placed into two buckets. 

  1. Traditional infrastructure plus.  The $1.7 trillion in spending reverses 30 years of neglected maintenance of traditional infrastructure and modernizes it for a new century; e.g., transportation, port facilities, water systems, the electricity grid, and broadband internet access.  The second bill seeks to
  2. Build a “21st century infrastructure” by spending close to $2 trillion over 10 years on public goods that Americans don’t have today but, in liberals’ opinion, are necessary to thrive in the modern world.  Housing support.  More access to higher education.  Childcare and eldercare subsidies. A higher minimum wage.  A sustainable energy-based economy.  All of this, it is said, will do what the New Deal did for the 20th century: Modernize our economy for a new era and restore its capacity for broad-based prosperity and global leadership.   
  3. Eldercare??  Biden infra = building out both physical and human infrastructure.

To conservatives, Biden’s supersized infrastructure plans look very different.  (I mean to elected GOP leaders and their news media.  Most of Biden’s proposals poll pretty well among Republican voters.)  To the GOP, Biden is building big govt social democracy masquerading as “infrastructure.”  And the spending, they say, is only partially paid for and only by soaking the rich and big corporations in ways that will slow growth.  YMMV. 

After describing the basics of the two proposed laws I will say a few words on the prospects for passage and the legislative pathway.  This will help you keep track of the coming debate, since it involves budget reconciliation and other weird procedural stuff.  Procedural limits also will be a major reason why some items will stay and others will get removed from any final laws that pass. The GOP plans to sink or shrink Biden’s plans are still opaque, but I think I get the basic strategy.

Oh – and we may be able to meet in person at Panera again very soon!  I will open with the latest on that. 

Here are a few readings if you want background on the infrastructure bills, the philosophy behind them, and conservative opposition. Lots of details, so optional or focus just on recommended ones.

OPTIONAL BACKGROUND READINGS –  

Already passed – COVID Relief

  • Under Biden:  $1.7 trillion COVID relief that helps – temporarily mostly – millions of desperate Americans. 
  • Under President Trump: Two other COVID stimulus bills ($2.2T + $900B) consisted mostly of checks in the mail but had some infrastructure spending.  (Almost every Democrat voted for both Trump’s bills; Biden’s got zero GOP votes.)   

Philosophy of Biden’s approach –

What the bills would do –

Conservative POVs and rebuttals

NEXT WEEK (5/24):  Cutting edge reproductive technologies – Will their impact be huge? 

Posted in: Economy/Economics, Education, Liberalism, Mtg Announcements, Politics, Presidency | Tagged: , , , , ,

Reading from Barb for tomorrow.

By DavidG on | Leave a comment

I know it’s last minute, but Barbara prepared a document for us full of interesting observations from her career as a professor. She will run the mtg tomorrow, mostly. It’s very interesting and she spent a of of time on it.

You can find it here:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1GwV0nYNbAvYImEuJtTY6OcGx1OMWQ9wuw9lAtBI2Tfg/edit?usp=sharing

Posted in: Administrative, Education | Tagged:

Monday’s Mtg: Has being considered weird lost its social stigma?

By DavidG on | Leave a comment

This idea is Barbara’s, and it’s based, she said, on her observations as a college professor. 

Barb has noticed that today’s students seem to wear non-conformity as a kind of badge of honor.  They often, Barb says, refer to themselves as “queer.”  Maybe this is mainly virtue signaling, trying to show solidarity with oppressed minorities or identify with the hyper-egalitarian ethos that seems to be so prevalent on campus these days.  Also, of course, slang terms change meaning all the time.  So “queer” or some other once-pejorative, self-identifier could just mean “I’m an independent thinker” or “I don’t let my identity be marketed to me via the mass media.”

Regardless, study after survey show that Millennials and Generation Z, which we have discussed before, are for the most part very comfortable with diversity of all kinds and very sensitive to discrimination – even via the use of language they deem demeaning.  This is the so-called political correctness and cancel culture conservatives are up in arms about and are about to make a central 2022 campaign issue. (not kidding). 

Barbara will introduce her subject more precisely on Monday to open the mtg and provide a few suggested readings later this weekend.  This one does not have to be at all political, really.  FWIW I would just like to talk about the younger generations, especially their social views and feelings about the direction the country is taking.  But I’m afraid their tolerance of what many conservatives consider to be deviance (or maybe their insistence that you can’t say you don’t agree out loud) is a major focus of anger and resentment by conservatives. Such “cancel culture” is a constant focus of conservative news media and as always follows, the entire Republican Party these days. So, who knows where we will end up?

I hope we can spend as much time as possible focusing on Barbara’s thesis: That many young people today seem to be proud to be non-conforming/weird or even queer or gender non-conforming.  I would also like to know if they are really all-in on the notion of hyper egalitarianism and social acceptance as universal social values.  Maybe we could ask questions like…

  • Do we really believe they are like this?  Is it just college students or some other minority of young people, and not most of them?  Is posing the same as actually believing?
  • Has pressure to conform really faded away, or just changed form?  Is claiming to be non-conforming the new conformity? 
  • Do the young still have limits re what is considered too weird or deviant to be accepted? 
  • To the extent weird/queer/con-conformity is cool now, why?  TV, movies, and social media?  Those damned liberal college professors and Boomer parents?  How about the fact that Gen Y and Z are the most diverse generation in our history and maybe their social tolerance comes from experience and comfort with differences, not indoctrination?
  • Is it just (a) young and (b) Americans?  Worldwide phenomenon? 

OPTIONAL BACKGROUND READINGS –  

NEXT WEEK (5/17):  Understanding President Biden’s infrastructure / economic modernization bills.

Posted in: Education, Mtg Announcements, Philosophy, Social Policy/Social Science | Tagged: , ,

Monday’s Mtg: Can empathy and compassion be taught?

By DavidG on | Leave a comment

This topic is Penny’s idea and is a kind of companion topic to our February 15 meeting on, “how much self-centeredness is too much?”  I guess our most obvious broad questions involve

  1. How do empathy and compassion differ? 
  2. How do they normally develop in life?
  3. Can they be taught or learned as adults?

We also could ask normative questions concerning the moral value of these two qualities.  Is there such a thing as too much empathy or compassion?  Which is “better,” for the individual and for society?  Is a lack of empathy or compassion for other people a root cause of our many (especially recent) social and political problems?

Searching on-line for information about any general education topic – especially one that touches on self-help, emotional growth themes – yields an avalanche of results.  I am not qualified to weed out the good from the silly.  But, below are a few general articles that address the three broad questions above, from sources that probably are not fringe or trying to sell you something (education is a huge biz these days). 

For our meeting, I will give a very brief introduction and then ask Penny for her thoughts.  Then we can discuss these or other questions.

OPTIONAL BACKGROUND READINGS –  

Are empathy and compassion good/bad or necessary/sufficient?

Can empathy and compassion be taught or learned?

FYI, Related CivCon mtgs:

  • Two weeks ago: How much self-centeredness is too much?
  • 2018: Does religion expand or limit empathy and compassion?
  • 2018: Is human nature best grasped by science, religion, or philosophy?

NEXT WEEK (3/8):  How central is personal honor in Western & non-Western cultures? 

Posted in: Education, Mtg Announcements, Philosophy, Religion, Science | Tagged: ,

Monday’s Mtg: Civics education – How good is it and how badly do Americans need it?

By DavidG on | Leave a comment

A good civics education is supposed to promote understanding of how a constitutional government operates and an appreciation of the rights and responsibilities of its citizens.  It also should encourage informed and responsible participation in civic life.  Civics involves knowing a bit about our country’s history but is distinct from history as a subject.  (h/t Penny for the definitions; this topic was her idea.)

Americans are notoriously ill-informed about how their representative democracy is supposed to function, and famously lazy about participating in it.  CivCon once discussed how big a problem ignorance about public affairs and civics actually poses to our democracy.  But that was in 2015, about 300 years ago in disastrous government decisions and loud-mouthed public civic idiocy time.

Penny asks: How good is American civics education and would more or better civics increase young peoples’ respect for our political system and better appreciate their stake in it?  Could an expanded and more “modern” form of civics instruction teach kids how to deal with the blizzard of propaganda and lies they will face about politics as adults – and to be good citizens anyway?

We have some information about these things.  Contrary to myth, almost all of America’s young people receive some civics education.  But there are some problems.  Only nine states + DC require a full year of govt/civics to graduate high school.  Critics (links below) find that civics courses tend to emphasize history over civics, focus on multiple choice tests about dry facts, and fail to build useful civic skills.  In grades 4, 8 and 12 all U.S. student are tested on civics knowledge, via the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) tests.  But only about 25% rate as proficient in civics.  They do poorly on the AP U.S. govt exam too, Penny found.

Raising the quality of civics education is a huge priority – for academics and education specialists begging we do so.  For cash-strapped state governments and local school districts that are already under fire for mediocrity in teaching reading, writing, and STEM preparation – not so much, say the studies.

Here is a short list of questions we could ask and discuss (plus Penny’s, above), and the usual suggested pre-mtg readings.  Like I said, evaluating what’s wrong with civics classes is a growth industry.  So, if you get time to do any of the readings I would focus on the recommended ones.

To facilitate our discussion I will open with a short intro on the basic components of civics as currently taught (hopefully I can find this out).  Then I will list a few of the main limitations of civics and criticism of the way it’s done.  In discussion, I hope we can revisit whether public ignorance about public affairs has left many Americans vulnerable to the demagoguery and lying we have endured so the last 3-30 years, depending on your POV of how long respect for and use of our democracy has been slowly crumbling.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS –

  1. Civic Ignorance: Is it a real problem? Evidence?  Which problems does it contribute the most to?
  2. Civics: Why is it taught in school – for what purposes?
  3. Content: What do they teach in k-12 civics classes?  How does it vary by state and from the way it used to be taught?
  4. College: Do states require any college civics, Govt 101 etc.?  How many, how good, etc.
  5. Effectiveness: How useful is civics education these days at achieving its objectives?  Are key content or concepts or history left out?
  6. Better civics: What are the best ways to make civics education better?  Examples –
    1. Require more courses, in H.S> or college?
    2. Help raise kids’ “media IQ” (distinguish reliable news sources from fake/biased/manipulative ones)?
    3. Encourage them get involved like vote or volunteer?
    4. Teach less history and more civics, or vice versa?
    5. Teach more (or less?) about the dry but crucial Constitution?
    6. Viewpoint: Out of fashion confident (or triumphal/exclusive) view of U.S. history versus a more balanced (or pessimistic/negative) view?

OPTIONAL BACKGROUND READINGS –  

Civic ignorance – does it matter?

Civics – what is it and how good is it?

Quizzes for you – 

  1. Constitution quiz: 29 Qs.
  2. Civics quiz:  7 Qs, from Pew.
  3. U.S. citizenship quiz.  (With answers)  They ask you 10 of the 100.

NEXT WEEK (August 17):  Self-driving cars: Fears and realities.

Posted in: Civics 101, Constitution/Legal, Education, Mtg Announcements, Politics, Social Policy/Social Science | Tagged: , ,

Monday’s Mtg: Common Core education standards – A big deal, but do they work?

By DavidG on | Leave a comment

At our last topic committee meeting, Nile’s teenage son, Konstantine, looked at the list and asked, “How are most of these relevant to young people?” A good point. We will do college loan forgiveness on January 13 and Generation Z (those born since 2000) on February 3. Monday, at Konstantine’s suggestion, we will look at the major changes in U.S. education brought on by the Common Core K-12 educational standards.

As you probably know, developing and getting the states to adopt Common Core was a major effort in the mid-2000s. Basically, it was an attempt to create de facto national standards in reading and math for American school children. After decades of concern over mediocre educational outcomes, the National Association of Governors, the association of state Superintendents of Education, experts in and out of govt and in non-profit groups developed the standards and urged states to adopt them. California uses them as do 41 other states.

Common Core took about seven years to develop and test, starting in 2007. So, large-scale implementation is only a few years old, even in California, which made the decision to adopt in 2010 but only fully phased them in in about 2015.

Common Core is the main nationwide effort to improve American education that is still standing after the ideological education wars of the last 15 years. President Bush’s controversial No Child Left Behind law from 2002 was unpopular and has been repealed, although its annual standardized tests for grades 3-8 remain. Obama added a couple of major grant programs. Trump made big promises favored by the Right but has not done big things (see link). Most of the action is where it always has been: The state and local levels.

We have discussed other education fixes and fads, like charter schools and vouchers. They are still going and conservatives have vowed to keep going. But, results of both on student performance have been mixed. Common Core is the big policy change of the last decade in U.S. education – and they effect almost every American K-12 student every day.

Common Core standards are:

  • Not a federal govt program or requirement, although conservatives hated them because they thought they were or a sinister prelude to a federal takeover of education. Wrong as usual. But, President Obama controversially did try to pressure states to adopt Common Core by conditioning some federal education grants on the adoption of state standards that mimicked common core.
  • Standards only; i.e., ends not means. Common Core states the goals for what children should know and know how to do in each grade. They do not mandate (or even officially approve or disapprove) any specific curricula, method of instruction, or textbook.
  • Voluntary: Initially, 46 states adopted common core (that is, they pledged to adapt their K-12 standards for math and reading to Common Core’s). . Four states refused (inc. TX and VA) and 4 more have pulled out since. So, we’re down to 42.
  • Alterable. A number of states have modified their K-12 standards to ty to fix some of what they don’t like about Common Core.
  • Controversial for reasons other than right-wing ideological objections. These include allegedly overly-complex math standards, too-high expectations for very young students, and the continued use of constant standardized testing. The articles below explain more.

Describing education policy, much less measuring outcomes, is very complicated. CA’s standards in math and reading comprise hundreds of pages, and every state is different. Here are a few articles on Common Core, objections to it, and a good summary of our state’s math and reading standards.

I will see if I can describe the standards to open our meeting, then moderate the discussion as usual.

BUT FIRST, I will have one important administrative matter to discuss.

OPTIONAL BACKGROUND READINGS –

NEXT WEEK, Dec. 23: What is the state of inter-faith religious relations in the United States today?

Posted in: Education, Mtg Announcements | Tagged: ,

Monday’s Mtg: Critical Thinking – How can it be taught and/or learned?

By DavidG on | 1 Comment

How can democracy function if the public lacks the ability to think critically about what it sees and hears and reads? This question, along with the fact that critical thinking skills are crucial to many of today’s well-paying jobs, has led to an explosion of interest in teaching critical thinking skills at all levels of education. Our current political crisis has led many to wonder if a lot of Americans are incapable of thinking critically and whether such abilities as they do have an be unlearned or turned against them with skilled propaganda.

Penny asks, is it realistic to believe that critical thinking is a stand-alone skill that can be taught to kids or even to adults? What about to those Americans that either grew up in environments that discouraged independent truth-seeking or as adults self-marinate in political or social propaganda that is untethered to objective truths?

American schools are all over this issue in recent years. They are said to spend a lot of time and resources emphasizing the teaching of basic critical thinking skills. (Of course, education content is highly decentralized in the USA, so generalizations are hard. On December 16th we will discuss the Common Core educational standards that were create as de facto national edu standards. They heavily emphasize teaching critical thinking and analytical skills.) How are they doing? Can successful techniques be used on adults? See the discussion questions, below, for more.

To make this meeting meaningful and relevant to our times, I believe we must be willing to discuss honestly one thing above all else: The effectiveness of the deliberate assault on citizens’ ability to judge facts and arguments of the last 20 years. Especially, of course, in the last three hundred years of the Trump presidency.

My short remarks to open our meeting will just ty to introduce and frame this vital issue. Then we can debate. As with any topic related to education, there is a TON of stuff on the internet about it and how to teach it. I link to a few, but it is hard for me to judge their quality.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS –

  1. What does “critical thinking” really mean? Are there different definitions? How do they define it for pedagogical (teaching) purposes?
  2. How does critical thinking ability relate to (1) intelligence, (2) psychological makeup, and (3) age and experience?
  3. Teaching it: How can critical thinking be taught to young people that lack the factual or experiential context to help them? How do they measure or observe progress in learning critical thinking?
  4. Bubble dwellers: Many of us live in “epistemological closure,” closed circles where questioning revealed truth is discouraged (some religious communities, Fox News junkies, bigoted families, etc.  Liberals are not immune.) As we discussed in our mtg on cognitive bias, others find learning contrarian or conflicting information uncomfortable.
    — How can their bubbles be penetrated?
    — What will make them listen or at least be open to new facts?
  5. Propaganda: How much damage has fake news and deliberately deceptive propaganda done to our:
    — Critical thinking skills.
    — Democracy? Does a functioning democracy require a consensus on a common set of facts and trust sources of information?

OPTIONAL BACKGROUND READINGS –

Related CivCon mtgs –

  • 2019: Fighting fake news.  2016: The “Fox News effect.”
  • 2019: The power of cognitive bias. Key concepts.
    2016: What should kids be taught about U.S. history?

Critical thinking and its teaching –

NEXT WEEK: Time travel: Where/when would you like to visit and why?

Posted in: Civics 101, Education, Mtg Announcements, Philosophy, Social Policy/Social Science | Tagged: , ,

Monday’s Mtg: How does modern porn affect sexual maturation and real-life intimacy?

By DavidG on | Leave a comment

We did a version of this topic in 2015.  We focused on what was then brand new: Universal, worldwide access to free explicit hardcore porn. In 2007 a company called PornHub was formed to mimic the way YouTube streams videos: Free to users, with helpful suggestions for watching other videos you might enjoy based on your viewing history, paid for by selling personalized ads. It was wildly successful and profitable. Now PornHub’s parent company has gobbled up almost every major porn site in the world . Hey, it wouldn’t be a modern industry if it weren’t a virtual monopoly!  Free universal-access porn is not news anymore.

Yet, its impact on society remains a gnawing concern.  Further, as Peter just pointed out on-line, general discussions don’t really get at the controversy here. It is hard to really grasp what today’s porn has morphed into without viewing some of it, or at least reading honest descriptions of how graphic and aggressive and violent it can be.

So, the first few links this week do just that. A few caveats:

  • Don’t click if you don’t want to.
  • Not ALL porn is the worst porn.
  • How harmful this all is seems intuitively obvious, but not every moral panic is appropriate. And, research into our new porn-for-all world’s effects is still in its infancy.

Many of the same questions we used to guide our discussion in 2015 still apply. So here they are, modified a bit. I will give a brief opening and then give the first opportunity to comment to Peter.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS –

  1. How much: How ubiquitous is porn today, really? Does “everyone” really use it? What about women? Teens? Other groups?
  2. How bad: Is porn “worse” than it used to be? Can anybody, even kids, really view the worst of it?
  3. How mainstream: Is porn widely accepted in our culture now?
    1. Are there any holdouts?
    2. Are porn themes/POV surfacing in other parts of popular culture? Is that bad?
  4. How studied: How do experts study pornography’s impact on people’s attitudes and behaviors? Is there any consensus on major findings yet?
  5. Impact on adults views of sexuality:
    1. Men’s view of women? Women’s views of men? Expectation in a relationship?
    2. What are normal sexual expectations/behavior and what is deviant?
    3. Do users suffer a downward spiral effect in their viewing habits?
  6. Children/teens: Same Qs, but also –
    1. Which other influences matter in developing sexual attitudes?
    2. How can parent combat porn’s influence?
  7. Violence: Does porn promote misogyny and sexual violence, reflect them, or both?

SUGGESTED BACKGROUND READING –  

What is modern porn like? (Warning: Graphic descriptions and images.)

  • Direct link to PORNHUB’s “Categories” page. Explicit sex warning. Notice grosser ones; Gangbangs, Rough Sex, Fetish, Baby Sitter, urination (sorry)…
  • What types of porn women watch might surprise you. (h/t Peter.)

Analyses –

Next Week:  What if the USA had 4-5 major political parties?  What would they stand for?

Posted in: Education, Mtg Announcements, Social Policy/Social Science | Tagged: , ,