Is Education Even a Good Idea?

There is more than one side in the ongoing debate about education in today. School vouchers, private schools, charter schools, No Child Left Behind, even private school access to government grants for safe playgrounds have aroused the defiance of secular groups. Yet these subjects are not always easily divisible into for/against arguments. The knights ask, very seriously, is education even a good idea?

This may sound like a shocking question. Pop culture has so permeated and saturated the present political and cultural landscape that most people simply consider education one of Plato's Goods which are good to possess for their own sake.

But is that really the case?

Disclaimer

The title of this article is meant to provoke rather than entertain a negative answer. We do not mean to suggest that it might be a god idea to forswear education and raise a generation of unlettered fools. There are already third-world countries doing this and the results speak for themselves.

Obviously, it is good for children to learn how to read and write and apply mathematical knowledge to

real-life problems. The question is whether the modern education establishment is even useful for anything.

This article is particularly aimed at men who are just coming of age and at those who are now well into their manhood and considering spending time and money on education.

If you want to become a highly-skilled professional whose work will have visible and lasting effects on the real world, then the answer is most-likely affirmative. Future engineers, doctors, computer programmers and others need access to great minds and the certification apparatus which universities and associated organizations can provide.

The problem with taking that route is that you will inevitably expose yourself to an Orwellian culture managed by thought police. As long as you are choosing to study some sort of applied science, your exposure may be limited since the type of person sustaining PC culture is generally unfit to handle the intellectual requirements of these fields.

That is why you absolutely msut avoid a university if you have a desire to "study" English, history, philosophy, etc. Humanities-based fields have been compromised by PC culture. In such environments, you always find yourself "learning" things which are completely incongruent with reality and common sense.

What Is Even Being Accomplished in College?

In the interest of full disclosure, I had a classic, All-American college experience and enjoyed it immensely. I graduated from the University of Arizona in 1995.

I always expected to have to join the army to get my education but I was blessed with scholarship offers after scoring particularly well on the SAT. I got to to a four-year state college with help from parents for rent but my tuition and books were paid for. I stayed in a dorm my first year, lived with buddies in crappy apartments for the next three and graduated with a fairly useless degree in the Humanities but which I definitely did not regret earning.

But I have to wonder if it might not have been better for me to learn something useful. I enjoyed writing and had taken a lot of writing courses. This led to me ending up as a semi-miserable teach for more than a decade.

When I finally left teaching, I did so after googling how to make a living on the Internet. I became a content writer. I worked for pennies at first but eventually earned the equivalent of my teacher pay after a couple years. Not only that, I actually learned how to write clearly and concisely.

The experience left me wondering: what was the purpose of my college education? I had learned much more in just a few months of writing for a living than I had as a student.

Now, I certainly understand that I learned much more in college. I took a wide variety of classes in pursuing my liberal arts degree and I really enjoyed most of them. But the content of a lot of these classes was actually available to me in the real world. For example, my humanities classes showed me a lot of art which I could see in museums and learn about by reading encyclopedias. Had it really been necessary to take out four years of my life to "learn" in a college classroom?

Today, with the Internet available to everyone, this question is even more pertinent. While I am willing to debate the necessity or value of my college experience in the 90s, I cannot imagine an argument which would convince me that taking four years out of your life to learn about art and literature makes sense when you could just do it in your free time while you plied a trade.

So, I have to wonder what kids in college today are doing if they are not studying the hard sciences. Philosophy can be learned and discussed on the Internet (though one wonders if that is actually happening anywhere). The same goes for Art, English and many other fields of study.

Take foreign languages for an example. I learned Spanish in middle school, high school and for two years in college. I still couldn't speak it. I ended up in Juarez, Mexico after college and was speaking fluently within a matter of weeks.

Sure, my college learning did provide some foundation for my fluency. It was clear to me, though, that some things in life are best learned by simply doing them rather than "studying" them,

What Should a Man Do? 

Whatever your station in life, you should carefully consider your next step if you are contemplating higher education.

• If you are going to work in medicine, science, nursing or some technological field, you need to go to school. 
• If you are planning on studying the liberal arts, you would be ultimately happier if you learned a trade and studied these things on the side. By the time your peers are graduating with their worthless philosophy or communication degrees, you will be earning plenty of money and able to set aside plenty of time for reading and trips to the museum. And you will not be less educated than a bunch of overgrown kids who have spent four years sitting in classrooms and taking multiple choice tests.
• If you want to become a lawyer, psychologist, teacher or work in a related field, you might complain that you need the seal of approval that a college gives. I would simply counsel you to not pursue these dreams. Lawyers are scum and psychology is bullshit. As for teaching, it is not a profession that a man should expect to provide him a living nor is it respectable.

It is long past time for educators and learners to embrace technology. Most of what we need to learn, after a modicum of early instruction in reading, writing and arithmetic, is available for free on the Internet. If you have a hankering to learn more about the Renaissance, Google it. Don't waste your life and resources on attending a course taught by someone who has a piece of paper declaring his worthiness to "reveal" information that is easily discovered otherwise.

The First Steps in Preparedness

Now that you have decided to become more prepared, you need to make the first steps in the transition from the way you are now to the way you want to be. The gulf between these two things often intimidates people into doing nothing. Don't let that happen.

Take some baby steps and be satisfied with them. Understand that you will never be truly prepared for anything in life, only more prepared than you were before.

There are three key areas in which you should begin to advance in this endeavor.

• Developing a Physical Skill
• Learning a Mental Skill
• Becoming Physically Fit
• Saving Money

Developing a Physical Skill

Many men today, those that are actually working at all, find themselves sitting behind keyboards or cash registers all day. These jobs are not similar in any way to the trades in which many of our recent ancestors worked. 

There is some good to this. You would probably not trade your office gig for a short-lived and miserable stint in a coal mine before you died of black lung.

However, we have definitely lost something in this transition to a safer and more sedentary lifestyle. We have lost the muscular challenge to our bodies. Consequently, our bodies are no longer prepared for anything but riding in buses and cars and having robots do most of our heavy lifting. 

Furthermore, many of us realize that we do not know how to do anything besides punch keys on a keyboard. This can be a depressing and debilitating realization when you have already reached the age of full manhood. 

This is why prepping goals are valuable outside of any concern about doomsday. Achieving a lot of prepping goals is simply good for rounding out your character and your skill set. 

If you are presently in a job that requires a serious physical commitment (landscaping, construction, carpentry, etc), then this area of preparedness is of less concern for you. Understand also that this is not simply about physical strength but about knowing how to do something with your hands or something that has a real physical impact. 

An engineer or a medical doctor is already a master in this area because his actions and recommendations have a real impact, even in a world deprived of technology. A lawyer cannot say the same. Hopefully, you get the idea.

If you think that you have not acquired any such physical skills, find a way to learn and incorporate them into your life. Robert left the teaching field and became an ER nurse. I am learning how to handle and maintain weapons. You could learn to hunt, study car repair or go to HVAC school. Any such move in life will not only "prepare" you but will also be a big boost to self-esteem.

Learning a Mental Skill

If you are already learned in some crucial physical skill, then you may want to cross train yourself in something more cerebral. It depends on what your other skill set is. 

If you are truly prepping for TEOTWAWKI, then you should know that it is not enough to be a tough guy with a gun. You would need to be able to think clearly and analytically. You would also need some valuable knowledge beyond the details involved in camping and shooting guns.

Branching out into a different field is valuable as well to those who simply want to become better men. 

Either way, if you are already competent in some physical skill outlined above, you should try to acquire some skill in a more cerebral area. This could be as simple as learning how to play chess well. Or you might study calculus. 

Perhaps the best route to take with this endeavor is to learn code. Too many people on this side of the culture war are ignorant about the basic processes involved in using computers.You can do this for free online with your spare time. Try the Code Academy or some other resource on the Internet.

Becoming Physically Fit

Physical fitness is a crucial part of overall health. Not only do you become physically stronger, you increase your lifespan and reduce your recovery time from illness. You can find out more about becoming physically fit at our Preparing the Body page.

Saving Money

It is unmanly to be financially unstable. Robert and I can say that because we have both been financially insolvent and suffered the indignities of debt slavery. Poverty is not shameful but a man does not live beyond his means. 

You can learn more about money saving at our Financing a Christian Life page.

Acquiring new skills and strengthening your own independence are the proper foundations of true preparedness. These things have priority over buying a year's worth of peanut butter or amassing a small mountain of ammunition.

What Is Investment?

There is an old saying. It goes something like, "Don't work for your money. Put your money to work for you."

Of course, I know that you have to work for your money. If you were independently wealthy, I highly doubt that you would have reason to read these words on this blog. But the idea is still something which you can put to use.

Away with Stereotypes!

You may be under the impression that investment is something that sharp guys in sharp suits manage in air-conditioned offices. Maybe you are invested through your retirement program at work but you have no idea how it works or even how much you have. It's just something those financial guys on the other end of the telephone are handling for you, right?

So Can I Invest My Own Money?

Investment is just a form of saving. In fact, when you put money in a savings account, you are investing. You are sticking your money in a bank and letting them use your money in return for a meager interest rate.

Not everyone is aware that banks are using their savings account money but they certainly are. They make loans with the money that you provide and earn much more than they pay back to you.

There are more productive ways to invest your money, though having a savings account is a good idea. You can invest your money in stocks, bonds, land, precious metals and a variety of other possibilities. Most importantly, you can generally make more from these investments than you can with a savings account.

How Much Does This Cost?

Not long ago, investment was expensive. You had to pay a broker to purchase stocks for you. Before the Internet, we lived in the great age of the middlemen. These people made money providing access to things like education, the stock market, real estate and so on. Increasingly, as automation advances, we live without expensive middlemen.

This revolution began with stock investment several years ago when agencies like ScottTrade or ETrade began offering clients the opportunity to make stock purchases and trades for small fees. This situation improved considerably just a few years ago when RobinHood began offering completely free trades on the stock market.

So the answer is that investment is free. Totally and completely free. The other day I bought a couple shares in a small company, They each cost 50 cents and that is all I paid for them. There were no fees or taxes. I just paid a dollar with a few taps of my phone and became owner of two shares. If I want, I can also turn around and sell them at no cost, instantly.

A lot of people are so used to the old way of doing things that they cannot believe this is true. They think that I am leaving something out or forgetting some small fee but the revolution has happened. This service is completely free. Its tie to take advantage of these advances and start making some money

What Should I Invest In?

We will go into this in more depth in a further set of articles. In the meantime, know that you have a wide variety of investment options. They include stocks, bonds, ETFs, mutual funds, real estate, precious metals and other alternative investments.

Why Should I Do This?

Because you should be financially free. Whether you are single, still married or one of the many divorced men who have been financially raped in court, a knight should be economically stable. You do not need ot be rich but you should be knowledgeable about money and capable of managing your own finances.

Also, we live in a time when we can no longer count on family to take care of us when things go bad. Those of you who have strong families (like Robert), God bless you. But those of you who find yourself afloat in a  sea of semi-strangers (like Joab), need to have more than your paycheck to protect yourself. Investing can give you protection and freedom.

That security can help you become a better knight of the Resurrection.We are not locked up in monasteries praying for a better world. We will have to forge it with our own hands.