Common Core Controversy

I usually have an introduction on my pages giving basic outline of sociology which is similar to Power Threat Meaning Framework (hopefully at least, since that's what I was going for and PTMF was put together by psychologists) and that might cause somebody to want to ask me "well, what's the point of yours then?". To that I'd have to reply that mine originated from the starting point of the concept of "break down & build up" idea that's congruent to military training, which shouldn't be startling in itself since there have been (maybe still are) other programs modeled from the system, i.e., civilian correctional diversion rehabilitation programs. The point being to the way I express the concept is to show that the same type of system is inherently part of human nature, but misused as a means to control or debase someone, and it's not always a conscious act.

I mention in my standard introduction that my perspective can be tested against what the reader considers reasonable. I mainly try to clarify some misconceptions. Often people will argue over some topic when there is something that they're not taking into consideration. Many people had a problem with the student loan forgiveness programs but were not taking into account that there was a predatory practice used by the corporations involved with higher education courses that were focused on specific careers, i.e., technical, medical, etc. The businesses were engaging in deceptive business practices and taking advantage of minorities. One corporation, CollegeAmerica, was sued by both U.S. and state gov't. My point is that an educational business that implies that everyone completing their course will have equal opportunity in the field is being deceptive. If the majority of opponents to the forgiveness programs are white, middle class people then that is actually part of the problem since they're merely defending wealthy shareholders that invest in the corporations.

One of the issues that I had immense difficulty with in social media debates is the controversy over the Common Core education program. I knew that there was a lot of time and effort put into developing the updated program and one of the main concerns that it meant to address was the fact that lower income students will transfer schools more often on average than more affluent students, so the program was intended to provide familiar consistancy. There was also controversy about the amount of testing but overall it seemed that there could be changes made to the program without it being attacked and villified. The attitude exhibited by white middle class parents (including one in my own family) was undignified and demoralizing since the students pick up on the expressed attitude and that is the education that the parents want their children to have. "Intellectual, conscientious people (educators) are silly, stupid, and all the work they do can be easily deconstructed & dismissed", type thing.

There were a few particular instances of examples of Common Core content that were popular social media discussion topics. One was a critical thinking exercise having to do with Holocaust denial, which exists, and the teachers' intention was to introduce the students to the possibilty of internet users who misrepresent established, verifiable historical facts in order to acquire reinforcement for bigotry, etc. It is an important possibility that should be presented to students that are expected to use the internet for research, but a very sensitive subject. It was that fact that it was a sensitive subject is what provided the fodder for the "critics". It was obvious in the lesson plan that the teachers made every attempt to make it very clear that the denial was the focus of the critical thinking exercise and that was evident with the resources that were provided to confirm the event's historical reality since they were all legitimate, substantiated websites. One was the relevant section of "about.com" and the other was hosted by the British government. ("Conservatives" in the U.S. are notoriously xenophobic!) The website example for the denial was obviously amateur (created in c. IE7, era) and wouldn't render correctly in common newer browsers (see blurred screencapture below). The teachers eventually retracted the entire exercise. (There probably is a copy of the original assignment existing online, but of course there lacks the additional context. The teachers acted in good faith but there's always the ad hominem!)

The other examples that were popular to create controversy over were mathematics exercises. Common ones were examples of various ways substraction of relatively large numbers (for example) could be accomplished that are not used in everyday life, but intend to reveal the consistant logic ("you can check your work", is the way my father puts it & he taught math for awhile in the USAF). I created an example which is included below this paragraph. The point (obviously) is to present the subject to students has fun and interesting. The (middle-class white) parents hate the idea that education can be fun and interesting since education is only necessary to make lots of money and that is the example that they want to set & want their children to enjoy their inherited white privilege. The other popular controversy was about Spatial reasoning because the exercises in the workbooks didn't appear to be perfect. Parents with no college degree in education insisted that the exercise was pointless. It occurred to me that the type of instruction was probably included in the older generations' education curriculum but none of us recall it. In any event, I cannot have any interaction with the young family member of mine that was so vehemently crtical of the exercises since the person never would acknowledge my explanation and adequate defense of the educators' work.

I think the controversy and details surrounding the Common Core education program would be great content for a contemporary social science lesson since it exemplifies "cancel culture" attitudes. I truly understand however that the local politcal clique will stay true to form & I get ignored. Elsewhere I've pointed out that along with my military service (I received medical discharge, Honorable, because of my ankle reconstruction surgery), but I also worked in construction plumbing and the work was strenuous & sometimes dangerous. Most of my oldest friends are already dead. My parents' first son died a month after he was born due to medical error. I'm the last man of my family's branch of lineage. I'm a good person, and compassionate so it does take me a bit of time to quantify the idea of white people wanting to make money in the political realm and so thereby avoid doing any actual work. When I was a young man I had violent crimes committed against me and that is not my only personal assessment but people with masters degrees and decades of experience in the human/social services field. They also pointed out to me that considering my history, I have not had the same opportunities that most other people had in my demographic. These educated people explained to me that I was disadvantaged. I've still helped some people out though, and yet I still have people that would never do the same while stigmatizing & judging me as deserving violent attacks. Evil is as evil does. (I finally had to accept that nobody cares about what happened to Miki Manigualt even though she had an apartment in the City of Northglenn for awhile.)

One other point that I may have mentioned elsewhere, but probably not expressed this concisely. One of my old counselors, a five & half foot Black man with a MSW from Regis College, came straight out and told me that he knew that white people can be abusive to other white people; intentionally so, because it's a way to feel superior to other people without appearing racist. Oftentimes they will target those white people who are not racist ... can't beat them then join them, ideology. The other thing that was pointed out to me by my counslors was that since physically abusing somebody isn't easy to get away with if the people know each other, there's an alternative way and that is to cause the tormented person to defend themselves and that action can be misinterpreted as aggressive. The person then is stigmatized as a violent criminal, it doesn't matter to them who started it. The tormented person can then be targeted with vigilantism violence and, as with the previous scenario, any defensiveness can be intentionally misconstrued & embellished as aggression... merely the willingness to resort to physical violence in self-defense is what can be exploited. The idea, of course, is that the person is supposed to be completely passive and "turn the other cheek" since that is what their posit is that they're Christian so that is what's expected of them, that they allow themselves to be physically abused. Of course if the tormented person then feels accepted because of willingness to fight back then they might learn to feel more comfortable in that stereotypical role. How the person maintains that facade they create to interact with the world becomes their persona. The first person that I think of now is MaKhia Bryant. MaKhia was a tall Black adolescent girl who was shot & killed by local police in 2021 because she was brandishing a (kitchen) knife. The context of the incident is what is tragic because there was a break-down in the human services "safety-net" where there got to be too many unlicenced, & therefore uneducated, caregivers involved. There's a Wikipedia article about her and it mentions that the police action was ruled as a justifiable homicide, but from a sociology perspective I would point out that every adult present at the scene shared culpability.

Note: This lady, Dr Paula J. Caplan, has passed away but she was highly respected in the international "trauma-informed" community. She knew who I am though, and we had a message exchange. I told her that the idea of "restorative justice" (practices that emphasize repairing the harm caused to victims and the community by offenses) sounds great in theory but people will want to get creative and one example is "public humiliation" (like forcing a person to hold a sign up in public stating they did wrong and are being punished- "scarlet letter" type thing) ... Paula replied to me saying that she understood my point.

My recommended reading ...

Here's 20 Books That Inspired Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and I've read some of them including Aristotle "Politics", & "Ethics"; but also Plato "The Republic" (which I include an excerpt from on other sites of mine); "A Treatise of Human Nature", "An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding", "An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals" David Hume; "A System of Logic" John Stuart Mill; "From Socrates to Sartre: The Philosophic Quest" T.Z. Lavine; Plutarch "Fall of the Roman Republic" Plutarch; and the first book by Paulo Freire. There's a book on the French Revolution mentioned in Dr. King's list, but I've read "Tale of Two Cities" Charles Dickens, which is popular historical fiction novel set in the era that gives fairly accurate depiction of the event. Also "Heart of Darkness" Joseph Conrad, but I've seen a documentary since then that gave an accurate description of the era in the Congo and the rubber harvesting brutality. I've also recently read "Discourse on Inequality" Jean-Jacques Rousseau, & Norman R. Yetman: "Voices From Slavery: 100 Authentic Slave Narratives".

I've also read some by my favorite author, Fyodor Dostoevsky, "The House of the Dead", "Crime and Punishment", & "The Brothers Karamazov", which is an author from the same era & region as Leo Tolstoy, and I've read his "War & Peace". Also "The Agony and the Ecstasy : a biographical novel of Michelangelo" Bill Peters; "Before the Pharaohs: Egypt's Mysterious Prehistory" Edward F. Malkowski; "All about Jesus" Roger Quy; and "Who Wrote the Bible?" Richard Elliott Friedman. "A Degree in a Book: Philosophy: Everything You Need to Know to Master the Subject - in One Book!" Peter Gibson. Those are some relevant historical & philisophical works, anyway. "Airframe and Powerplant Mechanics Handbooks" FAA and ATB, and "Dianetics" L. Ron Hubbard, too.

Ok fine... Also: "The Onion Field" Joseph Wambaugh; "In Cold Blood" Truman Capote; "Murder on the Rails: Boxcar Serial Killer" William Palmini; "The Story of My Life" Helen Keller; "Alive" Piers Paul Read; "Learning Empathy: The Memoirs of An Autistic Savant" Matthew Weatherford; "The Myth of Mental Illness" Thomas Szasz; "My Name Is Bill: Bill Wilson - His Life and the Creation of Alcoholics Anonymous " Susan Cheever; "Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions" (Bill Wilson); "10-Minute Social Psychology - The Critical Thinker's Guide to Social Behavior, Motivation, and Influence To Make Rational and Effective Decisions" Albert Rutherford; "Sybil" Flora Rheta Schreiber; "A Short History of Greek Philosophy" John Marshall; "An Introduction to Philosophy" George Stuart Fullerton; "A Sociology of Mental Health and Illness" Anne Rogers & David Pilgrim; "The Wrong Way Home: Uncovering the patterns of cult behavior in American society" Arthur J. Deikman M.D. (which I quote below), "Mad in America: Bad Science, Bad Medicine" Robert Whitaker; "The Grass Is Always Greener over the Septic Tank" Erma Bombeck; "Mr. T: The Man with the Gold: An Autobiography" Mr. T; "Isaac's Storm: A Man, a Time, and the Deadliest Hurricane in History" Erik Larson; "Transform Now Plowshares" Megan Rice, Gregory Boertje-Obed, & Michael Walli; "Never Trust a Naked Busdriver" Jack Douglas†.
† Jack Douglas was a comedy writer for The Jack Paar Show and The Dick Van Dyke Show. In the book he included an anecdote about being in the car racing circuit with James Dean. Jack Douglas was a few miles behind James when he wrecked his car. They would often drive their road racing sports cars from one city to another to race. (I found the book at my paternal grandmother's house.)

In general fiction I've read: "The Stand", "Skeleton Crew", "The Dark Tower Series", "Different Seasons", "Gerald's Game", "Needful Things", "The Dead Zone", "The Talisman", "Christine", "Carrie", "The Tommyknockers", "'Salem's Lot" (and others) Stephen King. Also, "Swan Song" Robert R. McCammon; "The Dream Master" Roger Zelazny; "Nineteen Eighty-Four" & "Animal Farm" George Orwell. "The Third Policeman" Brian O'Nolan; "The Rainmaker", "The Client", "The Firm" & a few others by a few by John Grisham; a couple by Patricia Cornwell; Dean Koontz; and Clive Barker. "Fail-Safe" Eugene Burdick & Harvey Wheeler. "Lord of the Flies" William Golding; "Shane" Jack Schaefer; "Pride and Prejudice" Jane Austen; "Of Mice and Men" John Steinbeck; "The Assyrian" Nicholas Guild; "The Dogs of War" Frederick Forsyth; "Three Men in a Boat" Jerome K. Jerome; "The Coral Island: A Tale of the Pacific Ocean" R. M. Ballantyne; "Audrey Rose" Frank De Felitta; "Skinwalkers" Tony Hillerman; "The Amityville Horror" Jay Anson; "The Exorcist" William Peter Blatty; "Flowers in the Attic" V.C. Andrews; "The Alchemist" Paulo Coelho; "The Devil's Advocate" Morris West; and "The Piano Tuner: A Novel" Daniel Mason. I've read other various classics too, i.e., "Tom Sawyer" & "Huck Finn" Mark Twain; and my grandma gave me subscription to "Hardy Boys" series. I also read "Stuart Little" & "Charlotte's Web" E. B. White; and "Little Women" Louisa May Alcott, and even "The Catcher in the Rye" (of course) J. D. Salinger. Also "The Hunt for Red October" Tom Clancy, & something by Clive Cussler.

I've also read more speculative fiction too..., "Incarnations of Immortality" (series) Piers Anthony; "The Chronicles of Narnia" (series) C. S. Lewis; "The Farseer Trilogy" Robin Hobb; "The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant" Stephen R. Donaldson; and "Dune" Frank Herbert; "Brave New World" Aldous Huxley; "Ender's Game" Orson Scott Card; "Stranger in a Strange Land" Robert A. Heinlein; "The Time Machine" H.G. Wells; "The Hobit" J. R. R. Tolkien, "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" J. K. Rowling; "Earthsea" Ursula K. Le Guin; & also some Isaac Asimov, but long ago.

Some other books I read when I was young was "Pippi Longstocking" Astrid Lindgren; "James and the Giant Peach", "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" and "Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator" Roald Dahl. I didn't know those last three were from the same author. When I was in counseling I remember bringing up the Roald Dahl books, saying that I remembered them and they were influential for me. That probably led into me talking about the fact that I only had one friend from my childhood who had similar propensity for reading. My friend was still alive at that time and was one of few people who understood the trauma I experienced in my past. My friend was also one of few people that I know who considered spirituality as part of our reality in this world. I really think that it's a luxury for people who never worry about, or even mock & deride, religious beliefs. It seems to me that oftentimes people, like my own family members, want to undermine my faith by pressuring me into sabotaging my life. Of course once I did and I give up my faith by becoming embittered as a result they would make it a point to be obvious about their "piousness" & "devotion" (which they never expressed much prior, with exception of my mother). The point would be to shame me and utterly destroy my posit that I am a good, compassionate, and productive man. They could get people to sympathize with them and villify me so as to justify their past maltreatment of me. Christian faith is silly & embarrassing, unless a person is using it to achieve some worldly goal like destroying a trauma'd person's feelings of self-worth and/or make lots of money.

The reality is that there are some people who have to consider some other as inferior in order to feel better about who they are. Unfortunately the law in our country tends to sympathize with that domineering ideology, and reinforces it, but there are also people who work in law enforcement who understand that. The television crime-drama, Law & Order would often make reference to sociology aspects in their storylines, i.e., the occassions where "mental illness" was brought up there would be a point to remind viewers that more often than not there couldn't be any doubt that people categorized as such suffered abuse in their past and so other family members may be deceptive. There are "Republicans" who vehemently oppose anything derived from social science that provides explanation as to why people will sometimes engage in self-defeating behavior. There is a non-intellectual posit that to be "enlightened" a person needs to only understand the two main motivators for human ambition, sex and violence, and so those people will project onto an intellectual person that whatever they're attempting to communicate about is regarding one of those two ideas. There'll be a point to imply that everything the intellectual talks about is really about one of the two core subjects. It'll be insisted that what is said is some parapraxis that's related to sex but the intellectual person isn't self-aware enough to know that. Whatever they said "didn't make sense" and are told to rephrase their communication and then they're ridiculed & mocked by "the happy people". The intellectual people can often not appear happy and it's better to be a happy person, is the (mostly secular & hedonistic) accepted ideology. Those non-intellectual people (who succumb to the tendency to treat some other people as inferior) will inevitably pass that ideology on to their children and with the cultural aversion to obvious racism the people that are accepted scapegoats are those who have been victimized in their past. That victimization would most often include a denial of Fourteenth Amendment, U.S. Constitutional right to equal protection of law and that's traumatic for the person in & of itself since they get scapegoated.

I had a therapist who was a five & half foot (nearsighted) Black man with a masters in social work from Regis. He had decades of experience in the human services field with a string of acronyms after his name to show for it, and he said directly to me that he understood that I was abused as a child and victimized by series of unprovoked violent attacks against me as a young man. He said that he knew that I didn't have the same opportunities as others in my demographic (of "white male") and so I was "disadvantaged". He also said that it's myth that racist white people will always treat other white people well and treat people of color badly since if the white person isn't racist then they are an enemy. A person of color may inadvertantly align against the outcasted (non-racist) white, and that would be utilized. If a non-racist white person can be made to sabotage their life somehow, cripple themselves or commit criminal acts to where their acceptance in society is diminished, then their values about equality can be repudiated and dismissed. As result of the disgrace they'd be forced into becoming more positive about being white. He said that in my past there exists evidence (for me to see) that there were numorous attempts made by other people against me that were along those lines, not direct attacks but manipulation to try to force me into giving up values which are closely intertwined with my feelings of self-worth. One of the anecdotes that I told my counselors about my past was the time I was forced to walk off a job because the crew wanted me to reinforce their scapegoating of an indigenous man as a result of 10k worth of damaged caused by a newly hired white employee. (I most likely told the site supervisor what happened since, as a veteran, I didn't have any qualms about talking to authoritive people in civilian sector.) Experiences like that were "par for the course" for me in my life, is the point!

In July of 2015 a local licensed real estate broker, who rented apartments out in a complex he owned in a bordering city, lied in Adams County civil court in his case against me. I realize how difficult that is to accept for the vast majority of people, but those who believe me would figure there was some good reason for him to lie against a disabled person, and a veteran, or otherwise why would he bother? If it's just about not "losing face" and to enable to continue making money off an investment without doing what is necessary to correct the problems with the complex. The problems the aging structures had were the reason why the previous owner opted to sell, that much gets obvious if the subject is scutinized closely. I have the transcripts of the case available here.

I mention that 2015 case here because it was what caused me to "give up" and go homeless. I could've avoided losing my housing voucher but would've had to compromise my values & principles. It was difficult for me because an organization that had been tremendous help to me had betrayed me by sympathizing with this landlord. I had requested that my housing cordinators conduct an inspection of my unit so they could see first hand that I had no heat in the month of April. They refused saying that they couldn't. Ironically I got the VA VASH (veteran supported housing) personnel to spot inspect one of my units more recently. (It was only a two year old building and failed inspection because of an inoperable handicapped door opener that the management was refusing to repair.) Anyway, the same organization that assisted me (for years before they cracked under the pressure) owned numerous properties that they would use as transitional housing residences. (I once spent a weekend cleaning one by myself using my own money for supplies.) The point here is that the post the city made about the meeting concerning the property which was to be utilized for similar housing (that I, myself, have lived in as humilating as many people would consider that admittance) got many comments regarding people's concern that sex offenders would be living at the property. That can be a legitimate concern for people but there is major misconseption to where people are under the assumption that there wouldn't be enough people to populate the residence who are not sexual offenders that are in need of the supported housing. Anytime "mental illness" is brought up in culture it is immediately associated with violence or sexual offence, and yet there's countless people that protest Scientology because they wouldn't force a young woman, Lisa McPherson, into psychiatric treatment. The same Scientology protesters will use the term "mentally ill" in their group discussions like the people labeled as such are the scourge of the earth. Of course I'm expected to align with anyone against Scientology, but when protesters deliberately engage city police, making it a vendetta against them, is contrary to social equity since the police are taxpayer funded and may be needed elsewhere. Resorting to sensationalism while coat-tailing other activists' success, insisting on support of their posit or villified and effectively threatened, lacks integrity. It's really akin to what the current right-wing political cult does, and of course they even tie in Christianity for a good dose of hypocrisy.
That which has been is what will be,
That which is done is what will be done,
And there is nothing new under the sun.
~ Ecclesiastes 1:9 NKJV

The Colorado General Assembly - House of Representatives candidate, Mark P. Bromley, posted to his Facebook timeline on August 14, 2024 that he was experiencing difficulties with selling his book. From what I could gather he blames government for his lack of writing talent and correlates the issue with election conspiracy. Those who know a bit about literature know that there have been numerous great, renowned authors who lived and died in abject poverty.

The plain text of his post.

A system of government that makes it hard to publish and get any income from your writing is not a nation of freedom but a nation of oppression, persecution, and tyranny.
I wrote the book Yoranthium A Book Series Book One Lost Hope two years ago. It should not be this difficult to sale and distribute a real Novel over 485 pages. I should be making some income off of my work. It is a demonstration that the USA is getting more and more like a BRICS Global Socialist nations with how hard it is for a self published author to get recognition in the USA. Compared to many authors I am notable and worthy of recognition. 485 page NOVEL is not a minor accomplishment. It exceeds many novella writers.
It is also equally oppressive and persecution that the tyranny of democrats refuses to acknowledge my educational accomplishments while running for public office. I know for a fact I'm more talented, I'm a statesman, skilled and educated more than the people I have ran for office against since 2019. But that is the thing about forced slavery in the USA. When your government is suppressing your KSA's to favor unamerican politicians and polarized political agendas of elected tyranny. One of the reasons I can say I am more educated is because I have held Highly technical and skilled professional licenses in engineering of automotive, construction, aviation, aerospace, space technology, and passed examinations for Nuclear power plants. Serving in highly skilled leadership roles in the US Navy on two aircraft carriers forward deployed.
Even Wikipedia had refused to acknowledge me for my book and I know for a fact I'm more notable than the trash democrat elected I have ran against since 2019. Hell I'm talked about apparently all over the USA where ever those elected idiots go. I've been in newspapers since I worked with the raves in Denver, and took a job with Homeland Security back in the 2000's and since 2019 when the democrats want to lie and deceive to manipulate elections in Colorado.
Why is it so hard for me to make a minor income from my published book Yoranthium A Book Series