Maggie's Farm

The article by the conservative businesswoman about being the only conservative at a recent dinner party struck a nerve with me. One tries to keep one's head in a situation like that but it's difficult. When I was young, my Dad used to organize our dinner table conversation on confrontational discussions to help us learn to handle this sort of thing. His first discussion point was that you [or me as the case may be] can always stop the bullying in its tracks by asking that the attacker define his terms. Many times this will back the bully off the subject entirely, but this, after all, is what debating teams do regularly. when they encounter another team -- how they start the debate by laying the ground rules. And it's a great way to clear the decks for something worthwhile to occur.

There is a blog online called Betsy's Page. Betsy is a charter school Civics teacher, who trains her students to debate, and gives up her own time on weekends to go with them to debate similar groups from other schools. I think she is doing an excellent job of training her young students to be successful business people with successful lives, and I am convinced that few if any conventional secondary school teachers would bother to do this. Because it is work.

Of course, it results in a valuable skillset for the students who participate. And it gives them worthwhile skills for the great game of life. But many of today's teachers wouldn't want to do this because it cuts into their off-time.

But I say ... yay Betsy. There should be more like you.

Marianne