Analyzing my nostalgia

We've been getting old TV shows on Netflix. We've been streaming some and ordering the DVD's for others not available. Specifically we've been watching old cartoons that I grew up on: G.I. Joe and Voltron. A few weeks ago while watching G.I. Joe, I got into a discussion with my oldest boys about how these cartoon were different from the one's that they and their friends watched now. We contrasted G.I. Joe with Star Wars: The Clone Wars. We noted that no one ever died in G.I. Joe, while characters often died in Star Wars: The Clone Wars. We also noted that the lines between good and evil were drawn a lot more carefully in older cartoon than they were today.

However, recently, my wife and I were talking and she pointed out something else. She pointed out that the objective of the older cartoons was problematic, in that they often held as the goal the teenage years, versus the adult years. We began thinking this through and noted a lot of the old stories on video that did this. If not the teenage years, certainly the early adult lifestyle.

It made me remember how subtle these things are. Of course, this can happen in books as well, but in books you spend so much more time with the narrative, that you can catch on more easily and defend yourself. Film often doesn't give you the time to reflect on the issues enough to make the distinctions.

Crisis of the Republic

Earlier this week I was able to go to one of the sessions of the Classical Conversations Parent Practicum. The speaker, David Lahones, introduced me to some new thoughts and helped crystallize some things I'd been trying to say for years but never been able to put into words as effectively as he did. One idea he mentioned was that of inoculation. We introduce our children to the ideas in great books to help inoculate them against the reality in life. I'll be further examining this for a while.

He also introduced me to a series of essays former presidential candidate Alan Keyes wrote during the 2008 campaign. He read from one of them to help illustrate a point about freedom and education. He said the essays were very difficult to obtain now but had a copy of them in PDF format. He posted them on his own blog, here. I downloaded the file and may, as I read them, post them or excerpts from them to this blog.

Waiting

I'm patiently waiting until my life calms down somewhat to where I think I can adequately reflect on the things that have taken place this past year. I am no longer a full-time teacher, in the traditional sense of the word. I now work a second shift job that has played havoc with my family life and we still haven't adjusted to that completely. This job presents me with excellent material for contemplation of the human condition, the importance of worldviews, and the task of education, but precious little time to reflect of it and blog about it. Nevertheless, I will eventually get around to doing this. Sometime...

A Risky Video

I was skeptical about this one at first, but I ended up laughing a lot. Enjoy.

Ask Doug

Canon Wired has a video with Roy Atwood, president of New Saint Andrews College in Moscow, ID. Check it out.

http://www.canonwired.com/ask-doug/k-12-classical/