That doesn't match reality. Do you have kids in public school? Of course they judge actions—especially those that harm others. Sometimes that's called social-emotional learning, one of the things that Florida politicians have tried to make a boogeyman. We're certainly willing to punish kids based on their actions.
Whereas even in "my time" these values would have resonated with the tone in a public school, I am pretty sure that's not going to be the case today. But these values remain for me very central, and I would sacrifice a lot to ensure my kids are educated in an environment that supports them. A religious school that frames these values along the lines of "what G-d expects of me" would totally work for me separate from whether I literally believed in the religion. "Anything goes" by contrast to this is the vibe that it's fine to not do any of these things.
It's funny/sad to see eg on HN folks saying "oh, I don't see why it's important to have children, or to have my work matter." Right, but the fact that you "don't see it" is sad to me (you do you but I don't have to think it's great) and I don't want my kids to "not see it"
I'm not aware of that class in the curriculum. Is it supposed to be taught during math, history, geology or sports?
These topics come up at the very least in: literature, history, social studies, sex ed, etc...
In terms of the values you cited, such as raising the next generation and contributing to society, these are extremely common values found in a wide spectrum of society and indeed, are heavily emphasized in virtually any education system you care to examine!
One of the primary benefits (and drawbacks) of religion is that it provides a set of packaged values that are straightforward and generally work pretty well for a lot of people. Thousands of years of refinement went into the development of those packages.
They're mostly effective and convenient for a lot of people.
Determining values from first principles is hard, and there are a lot of easy mistakes along the way. You can easily find yourself trapped in nihilism or moral relativity or one of the other common philosophy potholes.
It's kind of like a happy meal vs cooking from scratch. We all know cooking is healthier and cheaper, but sometimes we just don't have time, and there's no guarantee on how it will turn out.
It's a shame they decided to put a bunch of weird stuff in Happy Meals because I think you're right about this.
Not providing guidance to children is at least as bad as providing overly dogmatic guidance.
As a gay man who grew up religious (in public schools), “what god expects of me” was not only oppressing but also the source of a lot of self-doubt, self-hate, depression, and anxiety. (Thankfully I quickly ditched the religion and paved my own path - very content with life now!)
> I don't want my kids to "not see it"
I get where you’re coming from. But also, you can’t force kids to see things a certain way. There’s no amount of schooling or indoctrination that can force them to adopt the outcome you’re expecting of them.
Setting a good example yourself by how and with whom you parent is probably 10x more impactful than the school you sent them to.
Okay, for you, but what about the 90% of the population that shouldn’t forge their own path? Society actually needs them to do what’s expected of them.
Who decides who these 90% are?
>Society actually needs them to do what’s expected of them.
You would be surprised how many people do what society needs without forcing them.
Elders.
> You would be surprised how many people do what society needs without forcing them.
It’s surprising how many don’t. TFR for white people in LA (to use an example of a place where social norms have been upended quite thoroughly) is just over 1, and more than half the adults are unmarried. Without immigration from more religious and rigid Latin American countries, LA would be shrinking in half each generation.
i'm sure that religion is the only reason why immigrants into the United States would want to have kids.
/s There's definitely no US-centric financial/legal/immigration-related reasons, right? /s
This is a phenomenon across the developed world. Permissive western societies are outsourcing the job of perpetuating the population to Catholics and Muslims, just like they outsource industrial production to China. Permissive societies don’t appear to be sustainable without that arbitrage.
Why does the job of perpetuating the population need to be done at all? At what levels? Why those levels? Does it matter where that population lives or their quality of life? Why or why not?
If you're fine with your people's history just disappearing from the world, feel free to never reproduce.
Why is maintaining the human population at or above present levels something that so obviously needs to be done?
I’m only here with my three kids because the British colonized the country I’m from. The Latinos in LA—who are doing the grunt work of society as well the work of raising the next generation, while white people have dogs instead of kids—are only there because the Spanish were worse colonizers than the British. Secular white people tell me how wonderful their permissive, individualistic values are. But it’s like saying how great a job a government is doing when they’re running massive, unsustainable budget deficits. A value system can’t be “good,” in my view, if it can only exist because of an immigrant servant class.
Are those Muslims from the same countries/cultures as the East Asians or is religiosity only one of a host of differences between the cohorts?
"Do no harm" is a terrible metric to use for guiding one's actions. Libertarianism (which is the source of the "no harm" principle) is completely oblivious to the notion that humans are complex, interdependent, and not purely self-determined.