Category: Andrew Fiala Blog

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The anti-woke education wars are a symptom of a broken community. We don’t agree about schools because we don’t agree about the value of education or about what it means to be American. This is a fraught time to be a teacher, as polarization and distrust reach into school board meetings, libraries, and classrooms. It’s also a difficult time to be a parent and a student, in a world where schools are a focal point of political divisiveness.

The anti-woke school movement

The Trump era was a time of polarization, and Donald Trump’s divisive message has not abated. The former President recently warned that American schools have been “taken over by radical Left maniacs.” He announced that if he were re-elected, he would ban federal funding for any “school or program pushing critical race theory, gender ideology, or other inappropriate racial, sexual or political content onto our children.” Trump’s anti-woke alarmism seems to echo and amplify what we are hearing from Florida, where Governor Ron DeSantis, has been waging a war against woke.

Trump took this to another level, however, when he suggested in his recent speech that what was being taught in the schools was antithetical to “Judeo-Christian values.” He said that woke ideology resembled, “an established new religion.” Trump concluded, “If we have pink-haired communists teaching our kids we have a major problem.”

I doubt that many pink-haired maniac teachers are trying to establish a new religion, or subvert Judeo-Christian values. The teachers I know, and have worked with, are acutely aware that we live in a diverse world. They often avoid discussing race, religion, and gender because they know that these things are divisive in a world that is increasingly polarized.

The shifting First Amendment

Most teachers are aware that the First Amendment to the US Constitution prohibits them from imposing a religion at school. The Establishment Clause of that amendment means that Judeo-Christian values cannot be pushed in schools. Nor can any other religious ideology.

Yet recent Supreme Court rulings make it easier for educators to bring religion into school. A recent case (Kennedy v. Bremerton) involving a Christian coach leading a prayer at a football game was decided in favor of the coach, who claimed that the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause gave him the right to pray with students. In an essay about this for OnlySky, I suggested that this opens the door to a contest of religious views in the schools.

That’s not an optimal outcome. It would be better if the Establishment Clause were interpreted more firmly to keep religion out of schools. But in the present legal environment, the result appears to be that conflicts of religion will creep into the educational space.

Are Trump’s warnings about “woke-ism” as a religion a case of the chickens coming home to roost? Hardly. I doubt many teachers are actively pushing any religion, woke or un-woke. But our legal system is shifting and the world is becoming more polarized, making conflict more likely.

What are schools for in a democracy?

None of this will be resolved easily or soon. The Court has shifted its understanding of the First Amendment, and polarization makes it harder to find common ground. This is especially true with regard to questions about the purpose of education in a democracy.

This politicized debate includes the fundamental question of whether schools exist to teach what parents want them to teach or serve some other social purpose. A school board member in Iowa got lots of pushback when they said, “The purpose of a public ed is to not teach kids what the parents want. It is to teach them what society needs them to know. The client is not the parent, but the community.”

Despite the pushback, this idea is not absurd. It can be traced back to Plato, who thought that education was about the well-being of the whole community. Plato went so far as to suggest taking kids away from their parents in order to give them a proper education. This proposal should be read in light of the fact that Plato’s ideal republic is more dictatorship than democracy.

But defenders of democratic education have made a similar point. John Dewey, America’s most important philosopher of democracy, put it this way:

Democracy has to be born anew every generation, and education is its midwife. Moreover, it is only education which can guarantee widespread community of interest and aim. In a complex society, ability to understand and sympathize with the operations and lot of others is a condition of common purpose which only education can procure.

John Dewey, “The Need of an Industrial Education in an Industrial Democracy”

Dewey’s point is that in modern democracies, education brings diverse people together, helps them to understand each other, and encourages them to discover a sense of common purpose and identity. Parents may want their children to be protected from this. But it is good for society for kids to become citizens of a broader community made up of diverse others.

Our broken community

Of course, the problem is that the American community has been corroded by polarization, identity politics, disinformation, and distrust. What after all, is the American community? We don’t seem to know anymore. And if we don’t know what the community is and what it stands for, then we will not be able to agree about the value of education.

There is a paradox lurking here. The solution to our broken community is an education that can help us understand our shared values. But that solution will only work if there are shared values to be understood. And it is becoming apparent that we don’t agree: about who we are, what we value, and what we want our kids to learn. The next generation will pay the price of more polarization and fragmentation unless the adults can agree about what it means to be an American, and why American schools exist.

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A recent controversy over Islamic art raises the question of how we ought to deal with art and images in a world of deep diversity. At Hamline University in Minnesota, Erika López Prater lost her job teaching art history because she showed students artistic representations of the Muslim Prophet Mohammed. A Muslim student took offense. The University’s Dean of Students accused the instructor of Islamophobia. And she was not rehired. How should we deal with controversies involving art, including Islamic art, and other controversial symbols?

Academic freedom and the study of religion

This case has prompted critical commentary, including on OnlySky by Hemant Mehta and Barry Purcell. In my contribution to this discussion here, I suggest that we need to think more carefully about the spiritual power of art and images. The secular principle of freedom of expression allows us to disagree about symbols and their spiritual power. But the symbolic realm is a place of controversy because art and religion are ways that we imagine who and what we are. Controversial symbols require us to respond with compassion, as we work out what it means to be human.

Academic freedom is central to this. So we should applaud those who responded to the Hamline case by calling for greater respect for academic freedom. Indeed, academic freedom is good for the study of Islam and other traditions. Without that kind of freedom, we would not be able to learn that there is diversity within Islam and that not every Muslim was offended by the Hamline case. Recent commentary also teaches us that despite a common canard about Islam, it has not always been considered blasphemous to represent the Prophet. 

One expert in Islamic art, Christiane Gruber, analyzed the artwork in question, explaining that the image was created by medieval Muslim artists as part of a Muslim art movement in which it was not uncommon to portray Mohammed. Professor Gruber concluded that these artworks are not Islamophobic but are in fact “Islamophilic.” She points out that these Islamic artworks are not equivalent to anti-Muslim cartoons that have been condemned as Islamophobic.

It is fascinating to learn more about diversity within the Muslim world. It is academic freedom and freedom of expression that allows this lesson to be learned.

The magic of words and images

Behind this lesson is a deep question about the power of symbols and how we ought to manage that power. Are some words and images so important or powerful that they should not be uttered or seen? And how should we handle controversial symbols in a world in which people disagree about their meaning and power?

There is no doubt that words and images are powerful. Poetry, music, and art transform the world and move our hearts and minds. The Greeks thought that art and poetry were divine gifts, associated with the Muses. Many people still believe that sounds and objects possess magical power. Prayer and worship can be understood on a continuum with spells and incantations. Some people hold on to good luck charms. And political life is pervaded by flags, pledges, and anthems, which unite and inspire.

Social life rests upon a kind of symbolic magic. Consider the power of a wedding ring to define a whole web of relationships. Some words (“the n-word”) are so offensive that they should not be spoken. Political imagery can provoke emotions and empower violence and hate (for example, the swastika). And religious imagery can give meaning and purpose to life.

Religious belief tends to trace the power of words and images to some divine source. Religious texts are often supposed to be gifts of God. And religious words and images are thought to possess spiritual power. Some think it is blasphemous to spell out the name of “G-d” or to “take the Lord’s name in vain.” People venerate icons and holy books. And religious violence is linked to the desecration of those symbols.

A respectful humanistic explanation of symbolic magic

Atheists often roll their eyes and scoff at all of this. Humanists tend to think that there is no such thing as magic. Words are simply sounds. Art is form and color. And prayers and pledges are merely hot air infused with wishful thinking. From this perspective, the magic of words and images is entirely human. It resides in our brains and in the way that symbols work in human cognition and social life.

But humanism cannot deny the powerful emotional, social, and cognitive force of the symbolic realm. Poems, books, and songs move people and unite them in social groups. So do representational artworks, monuments, and film. There is indeed “magic” here: the magic of thought and imagination.

This can be explained in terms of cognitive processes, the evolution of which is connected to our existence as social beings. Cooperative social animals like ourselves communicate across distances. A raised eyebrow has meaning, as does a raised fist, or a sob, or a shout. Human beings have supplemented visceral, vocal, and immediate communication with technologies such as art, writing, and electronic media.

This humanistic explanation does not appeal to divine powers. But it reminds us of the need to respect the cognitive and social processes that inspire art, religion, and other works of the human imagination. Even if words and images are entirely human, they are nonetheless of fundamental import. Symbols matter. They give shape to social life and are deeply embedded in human psychology. That’s why we should do our best to understand and respect the values that different people place in words and images.

A compassionate secular response

So, what about the case of Islamic art with which we began? Well, we’ve seen why academic freedom is important. Compassion and understanding develop when we are able to explore the symbols of the world.

Furthermore, it is disrespectful simply to ignore the claims of those who are offended by certain uses of images or words. The mystical tendency to venerate symbols is a natural and near-universal occurrence in human thought and culture. Words and images move us. We ought to take that fact seriously. 

And if some people are offended by certain symbols, let’s try to figure out why by inquiring more deeply. This does not mean that those who are offended get the last word on the matter. Freedom of expression is a basic value in a world in which people who inhabit different symbolic orders must live together. But the project of secular living-together works better when we are generally more attentive to the power of words and images.

It is always a good idea to be careful in what we say and considerate of the responses of others. Freedom of expression needs to be supplemented by principles of civility and compassion. Disagreement is inevitable. The power of symbols to inspire and unite is linked to the way that symbols also divide. And if someone is offended, let’s listen to them and try to understand why.

Human beings will never agree about the significance of our symbols. That’s why we need secular principles of freedom of thought, expression, and religion. Those freedoms allow us to coexist in a world in which the mysterious power of the human imagination is always busy making meaning. And compassion helps us build bridges of understanding among the diversity of symbols that structure the human world.

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I understand the inclusive spirit of saying “Happy Holidays.” But holidays are still “holy days,” which leaves out the non-religious. At any rate, what we need most in the dark of winter is mirth and merriment. The cheerful exuberance of making merry is not the sedate joy of Christian salvation. Rather, it’s the laughter of children looking for Christmas loot. It’s the exuberance of skiing down a slope. It’s the pleasure of giving gifts to those you love. I have no problem with Christians keeping Christ in Christmas, if they don’t force the idea on others. But humanism teaches us best how to make merry at Christmas time.  

Christian joy and sorrow

Donald Trump often suggested that to win the “war on Christmas” people need to say “Merry Christmas” again. This is nonsense. No one stopped saying “Merry Christmas.” And why should we? Christmas means all kinds of things, including cookies, Santa Claus, and Christmas trees. For most Americans, “Merry Christmas” means “Have some fun this winter.”

The culture warriors forget that Christmas is not in the Bible and that the nativity story is contested by Bible scholars. Christmas is a human creation that combines myth, pop culture, and family traditions. Only the stiffest Christian thinks it only means “a messiah is born to save you from Hell.”

That bit about Hell may sound extreme. But Christian salvation is a response to sin. Christmas carols make this theology clear. “Silent Night” says “Christ the savior is born.” “Joy to the World,” tells us that “the savior reigns.”

With all of the good news about salvation, Christians often insist that Christianity is not the morbid religion that Nietzsche suggested it was. But Christian joy is not merry. C.S. Lewis said Christian joy is more than pleasure. It comes from a metaphysical desire that is unsatisfied with ordinary merriment. Pope Francis explained the “joy of the gospel” as salvation from sin. Francis said, “The joy of the gospel fills the hearts and lives of all who encounter Jesus. Those who accept his offer of salvation are set free from sin, sorrow, inner emptiness and loneliness.”

Francis and Lewis are focused on the joy. But the back story is gloomy. Joy to the world means that you are saved. But to be saved, you first had to be lost.

Humanist merry making

Humanists think otherwise. Some melancholy humanists may maintain that life is unsatisfactory. But a merry humanist would say that life is pretty good. Sure, there is death and grief and loneliness. But there is also friendship and books, electricity and modern medicine. Human life is better today and more enjoyable thanks to human ingenuity and inventiveness.

Christmas is one of those human inventions. We decorate our homes with electric lights. We eat fruitcake and drink mulled wine. We go sledding or watch old movies. The point is to fill the winter with fun. Sin and salvation are far from people’s minds when they drink eggnog or build a snowman.

Life is not perfect or permanent. An asteroid could wipe us all out. And death comes for each of us, as surely as every snowman melts. But here we are, playing on a watery planet swinging around a minor star. As the solstice nights grow cold and the waters turn to ice, we turn up the heat and party. It’s a tribute to the human spirit that we can feel jolly even in the bleakness of winter. This is not eternal salvation. Loneliness and sorrow are never completely defeated. But we can make merry. And for humanists, that’s enough to get us through the winter.

Merry humanism in the ancient world

Such a merry humanism, has roots in ancient Epicurean philosophy. Epicurus explained that pleasure is easy to find and that evil can be endured. He suggested that the gods are indifferent to us and that death is like a dreamless sleep. He encouraged us to stop worrying and start living.

And the ancients liked to party. The Romans warmed the winter with their wine-soaked Saturnalia. Of course, excessive carousing can cause a hang-over. So, we need wisdom in making merry. The Epicureans suggested simple pleasures and moderation.

One inspiring source is the Roman poet, Horace. In one lovely poem, Horace sits beside a fireplace in winter, observing a snow-covered peak. He is an older man, with snow white hair. He tells his young servant, whom he calls “Master of Revels” (“Thaliarchus”), to stoke the fire and tap a keg of wine.

Dissolve the cold.
Throw another log on the fire
And be generous with the old vintage,
My good Thaliarchus, you Master of Revels,
The gods will take care of the wind, the snow, and everything else.

Horace, Ode 1.9 (my translation)

Horace goes on to encourage his young servant not to fret about tomorrow. Winter does not last forever. Nor does life. But none of that is in our control. The gods take care of the seasons. Our role is to tend our hearths and make this life worth living.

Don’t worry about the future, seize the day

Merry humanism embraces the fragility of the present. As the poem continues, Horace advises, “Don’t worry about the future.” He encourages his young servant to enjoy what fortune brings.  Make love before the green sprouts of youth are covered in snow. And in old age, you can find solace, sipping wine by the fire and sifting through your the memories of spring.

Horace is also famous for coining the phrase carpe diem. In the poem (Ode 1.11) where he suggests that we should “seize the day,” the poet reminds us that this winter may be our last. We never know when the end may come. So be wise, he suggests. Drink some wine and live in the moment. We are here, now, on a rock in the vastness of space. We don’t know what tomorrow may bring. But rather than fearing the cold, we can light a fire and make merry in the darkness.

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Civility may seem like a quaint throwback in our current political era. But it is an essential value for those who esteem rationality and nonviolence. Incivility lies on a violent continuum that includes bullying, harassment, and the heckler’s veto. Civility is one of the peaceful virtues, connected with hospitality, generosity, and a spirit of open inquiry.

Disruptive boors make life miserable. This includes activists who exercise the heckler’s veto and undermine public events. In responding to challenges of civility and the heckler’s veto, universities, such as the UC Hastings Law School, are changing their policies to prevent hecklers from silencing speakers. Nadine Strossen, an ACLU attorney, has argued that there is no right to heckle, since it violates the rights of the speaker and the audience. And some commentary is questioning the very notion of free speech. Free speech is a wonderful thing. But it ought to be guided by the virtue of civility.

The pyrrhic victory of the heckler’s veto

A heckler’s veto occurs when a heckler prevents a speaker from making their point. This has become a recurrent problem on college campuses. I witnessed it recently, at an event I helped organize.

As our invited speaker gave her lecture, a heckler shouted and made her way to the front of the room. The speaker tried to be polite and responsive. She even invited the heckler onto the stage. The heckler continued to yell from the stage, preventing the speaker from being heard. The audience turned against the heckler, booing and jeering. And the event was ruined.

In one sense, the heckler won. The speaker was not able to make her point. We might even think that hecklers have a kind of courage. Heckling may be inspired by a vision of civil disobedience or an anarchist ideal of direct action.

But in another sense, the heckler lost. The crowd turned against the heckler. And the audience became even more supportive of the silenced speaker. After the event, most people praised the speaker for her civility and patience. No one praised the heckler. The heckler’s veto results in a pyrrhic victory similar to the Streisand effect. Heckling tends to direct sympathetic attention to the speaker who has been vetoed.

Politics, power, and persuasion

Protesters have employed the heckler’s veto from both the left and the right. Activists on each side feel that they are justified in disrupting speakers they disagree with. But each side ought to consider what things would look like if the shoe were on the other foot.

In the background is a waste of time and energy—of event organizers and audience members hoping to learn something. The audience might even have learned that they disagree with the speaker. But heckling prevents that from happening. And shouting does nothing to change people’s minds. When a speaker is prevented from speaking, the underlying arguments remain unaddressed.

Heckling does violence to the marketplace of ideas. The remedy for speech with which you disagree is better speech. If someone makes a bad argument, respond with a good one. If someone states a falsehood, correct it. Heckling does not show what is wrong with a speaker’s argument; nor does it offer counter-evidence or present truths that could expose a lie.

Heckling—like harassment, bullying, and more overt forms of violence—can serve a political purpose, if we understand politics as the mere assertion of power. The heckler wins in a short-term struggle for power by silencing speech. Terrorism and other forms of violence do the same thing. But in the long run, politics is not only about power. It is also about justification and rational persuasion. Democratic deliberation aims to build consensus through dialogue and critical discussion. For this to work, we need to hear bad arguments as well as good ones.

The nonviolence of civility

In his Autobiography, Gandhi explained, “Experience has taught me that civility is the most difficult part of satyagraha. Civility does not here mean the mere outward gentleness of speech, cultivated for the occasion, but an inborn gentleness and desire to do the opponent good.” The term that Gandhi uses here, satyagraha is the heart of his nonviolent activism. The term can be translated as “truth force.”

With this in mind, we can understand Gandhi’s point about civility. In the long run, the truth is the most powerful political weapon. And it is good for everyone. When bad ideas and lies are exposed, people change their minds. In order to expose fallacious arguments those arguments need to be heard—and responded to civilly, rationally, and nonviolently.

Gandhi’s nonviolent strategy is not focused on quick victories in the short term. Rather, it is aimed at a long run transformation of ideas and institutions. Civility is essential for this process because it is a pre-condition for critical thinking.

The heckler’s zealotry and patient secular hope

Gandhi’s theory is guided by religious faith. Can we adapt this idea for a secular world?

Secular systems are intimately connected to the ideal of democratic deliberation and the value of tolerance. Tolerant principles of freedom of speech allow dumb ideas to be expressed. Such principles may seem to permit heckling. But heckling is not wise. And it is rude to speakers and audience members.

The secular hope is that good arguments will triumph over fallacious ones. But this is a slow process that relies upon the hard work of human reason. Arguments and persuasion take time to develop. And sometimes bad actors and ignorant folks say stupid things. It may take a long time to disabuse people of dumb ideas. And some people may never be persuaded.

Hecklers and other activists are impatient. The heckler’s zealotry is understandable. They want change to happen quickly. And they do not want to hear from those they disagree with. In exercising a heckler’s veto, zealous activists may succeed in effecting a quick change. But this does nothing to advance the long-term effort at persuasion. The art of persuasion is patient, farsighted, and nonviolent. Heckling, bullying, and harassment can have an effect on bodies, events, and institutions. But they have little effect on hearts and minds.

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Fifty-four years ago, in 1968, American biologist Paul Ehrlich warned that a human “population bomb” threatened global catastrophe. The world’s population at the time was 3.54 billion.

On November 15, 2022, the UN estimate of Earth’s human population flew past eight billion.

This “population bomb” is only partly to blame for climate change and other unfolding catastrophes. We might be able to sustain a population of eight billion if each of us consumed and polluted less, especially the affluent hyper-consumers of the developed world. But it would also help if there were fewer of us consuming and polluting.

But where did all of these people come from—and how might we slow that growth?

There is a strong argument to be made that religious belief and practice are a major part of the problem, and that increasing secularism could be part of the solution.

When pro-natal ideology meets modern technology

There is a variety of contributing causes to the explosion of human population during the past few centuries, the most obvious being the Industrial Revolution, the Green Revolution in agriculture, and related revolutions in medicine and healthcare. These innovations have made it possible to produce more children who survive long enough to produce more children of their own.

But reproduction is not merely a biological fact. It is also influenced by cultural, social, and psychological factors. The problem is that the new technologies of modernity arrived in a world that is structured by pre-modern worldviews that are pro-natal. Pro-natal ideologies worked well enough in previous millennia when child mortality and death were more common. But as we’ve developed better medicine and agriculture, pro-natal ideas no longer make sense.

On average, religious people have more children

The most obvious sources of pro-natal ideology are religious. Let’s put this bluntly: Religious people have more babies. This is especially true for orthodox or fundamentalist versions of religion, which tend to have a pro-natal ideology.

This point was made over 10 years ago by UK professor Eric Kaufmann in the book Shall the Religious Inherit the Earth? I discussed it in my own work a couple of years after that.

While the religiously unaffiliated worldwide have an average of 1.6 children per woman, Christians average 2.6 children and Muslims 2.9 children worldwide. Some smaller religious groups outstrip even these, such as US Mormons at 3.4 children per woman.

The basic pro-natal idea in the Abrahamic faiths can be traced to God’s command to Noah after the flood: “be fruitful and multiply.”

The pro-natal orientation of religion was confirmed by a recent report by Lyman Stone in Christianity Today that indicates fertility rates are higher among those who regularly attend religious services. Stone published a related report for the conservative Institute for Family Studies where he argues that even though religious women have more children, the rapid growth of secularism in the United States means that the US population will decline.

Stone notes correctly that nonreligious women have fewer children and that conservative religious women tend to have more children than women who are members of more liberal faiths.

Stone seems to want the general population to continue to grow, but his apparent central purpose is to sound the alarm of religious decline. One solution, he concludes, is for religious congregations to encourage women to have more children.

External messaging of this kind can actually have a noticeable effect: Research at Cornell University in 2021 found that even living in a secular country reduces the birth rate and family size of religious believers in that country.

Liberal religion and non-religion may slow reproduction

The empowerment of women is key to addressing the ecological crisis and the population boom. Women with education, contraception, and meaningful careers tend to have fewer children. Traditional patriarchal religious beliefs tend to keep women subordinated and confined to domestic life. That’s why liberating religion from patriarchy may be one way to slow population growth.

Among the most important factors here is the liberation of sexuality from reproduction. The human sex drive is powerful. But religions that are opposed to contraception actively refuse to restrain reproduction in other ways as well.

Furthermore, as secularism grows, it is worth reconsidering more broadly the pro-natal worldview. In a world of eight billion people (and counting), it is simply reckless to listen to the command to go forth and multiply. The Biblical basis for this idea ought to be critiqued. There was no flood, and humanity did not develop from Noah’s seed. Rather, we evolved as one species among many. Our big brains and upright posture allowed us to develop technologies, social systems, and ideologies that led us to conquer the earth.

The time has come to apply new technologies, social systems, and ideologies to help us avoid ecological collapse.

We already have the main technological tool we need: contraception. Now it’s time for social systems and ideologies to catch up, and for human beings to choose to have fewer children.

Population decrease is not misanthropic

The goal should not be active depopulation. Some radical ecological theories see human population as a plague or cancer. Such a misanthropic approach may lead to so-called eco-fascism, a movement that can also be connected to white supremacy. Racist misanthropes encourage the elimination of undesirable others.

We already have the main technological tool we need: contraception. Now it’s time for social systems and ideologies to catch up, and for human beings to choose to have fewer children.

But we can reduce human population without being inhumane or by eliminating actual humans. Rather, we can slow population growth by encouraging responsible reproduction.

Critics of such a policy might call it “anti-natal” and try to link it to some radical authoritarian program such as China’s former “one child” policy. But it would be wrong to force people to stop having children, nor should we be opposed to children and birth. Children are wonderful, and birthing is a mysterious joy. We need new generations to provide new ideas, productivity, and social support.

Life beyond reproduction

But there is more to life than having children. Robust forms of feminism and humanism remind us of this. Women should be free to become artists and scientists, teachers and lawyers—or to have children if they want to. But women’s opportunities are constrained by pro-natal, patriarchal ideologies. And traditional religion often forecloses other non-family-oriented opportunities to find meaning and purpose.

RELATED: You don’t have to ‘be fruitful and multiply’: More Americans having just one child

Humanists need to continue to critique pro-natal and patriarchal forms of religion while reminding people that there is life beyond reproduction. But this critique should not focus on blame and guilt. A grumpy ecologist may wag their finger and say that it is irresponsible to have more than two children per couple. But scolding and blaming are not as useful as focusing on the positives of reduced fertility.

Children are great, but so too is life in a family with fewer kids or none. And in the long run, fewer children means a better life for each of them.