Today as I was strolling down the hall during my prep hour, I happened to walk by the classroom where business was being taught and overhear some of the lecture from our business teacher. Apparently the students had just finished watching the movie Corporate, which is about how businesses are sick and twisted and try to take advantage of average people by selling them harmful products and making lots of money on them out of pure greed. This passes for an educational film in public schools.
The film was useful in that it sparked some discussion with the students, and I eagerly listened to the discussion that the students and teacher engaged in. When I pose critical thinking questions to students, or ask them for their impressions of movies and videos that we have seen, I try to find out what the students thought, and like Plato, ask question after question of them to refine their ideas, get them to think deeper, and become more learned students. But I'm different than most public education teachers, especially the liberal ones- when they engage in discussion with students, it is a chance for them to bully students into adopting their worldview and positions on issues.
This discussion was like that. Many students felt that the film was too cynical and portrayed corporations in an unfair manner- many of these students worked for corporations or had parents who worked for corporations, and felt that the one-sided portrayal of a big corporation as sick wasn't right. But the business teacher disagreed.
The liberal business teacher in public education said that people in business, especially the successful ones, were sociopaths. Wikipedia defines a sociopath as someone who has antisocial personality disorder:
The essential feature for the diagnosis is a pervasive pattern of disregard for, and violation of, the rights of others that begins in childhood or early adolescence and continues into adulthood. Deceit and manipulation are considered essential features of the disorder.
According to our business teacher, every single person in business, especially the successful ones, have a pervasive disregard for the rights of others, and rely on deceit and manipulation of others to sell their products. These impressionable youths are sitting in this classroom listening to a person of authority tell them that without a doubt, every person in business, especially those who are good at getting a product to a consumer that they want at an efficient price, are bad people.
What will these students do someday when they vote? What will these students believe about the marketplace, about capitalism, about supply/demand, and about public policies that deal with these issues? What kind of a pervasive influence will this type of teaching have on the future of our nation?
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