Quote:
Originally posted by sugar and spice
Close-minded DOES equally uneducated. You don't have accept other beliefs as your own, but if you refuse to learn about them entirely then you have no idea what's going on. There's a huge difference between promoting the ideologies of the KKK and just letting your child know that they are out there, that some people believe them, and here's why they think they are justified -- in addition to letting them know that there are plenty of people who think quite a bit differently, and you are one of them.
In fact, exposing your child to different viewpoints can actually help you to strengthen your belief in your own. When my parents were teaching me, they said things like, "We think that women should have equal rights to men, and here's why, etc.. There are other people who think that they shouldn't, and this is why they think that. We disagree with that because blah blah . . . but you can decide what you think on your own." They bought me magazines with a feminist bent and more traditional ones, supported me when I wanted to be a housewife or a teacher or an astronaut. By exposing me to different theories, I wasn't surprised when confronted with the fact that, hey, some people don't like independent women. If my parents hadn't taught me that, I would have been much more surprised by an alternative viewpoint and more likely to accept their theories since I hadn't previously heard my parents debunk them. By the time I was ready to think critically I had enough exposure to the issues that I was ready to decide what I liked and didn't like about feminism and anti-feminism on my own.
You can decide what you want your children to be exposed to for a while, but you can't protect them from the real world forever. So it's best that you expose them to alternate ideas while you're still around to influence. Otherwise someday they'll just get smacked in the face with reality and probably not be able to handle it.
The thing I think that's so funny about this whole thing is that the woman who called Dr. Laura clearly has a lack of faith in the superiority of her own beliefs if she's so scared that one trip to a mosque is going to be enough to derail all the ideas that this girl has grown up with and been taught to embrace. I mean honestly, what are they going to do to her on one half-day trip to a mosque? Corrupt her? Convert her? Murder her? If she thinks that one day at mosque is enough to derail everything that she's grown up with, she obviously needs to be focusing on what's wrong with her own belief system that makes her think it's going to be so easily corrupted.
There are way too many people who are unnecessarily afraid of things that they wouldn't be if they would just open their eyes to them instead of "protecting" themselves from them.
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Being closed-minded does NOT equal uneducated. I would venture to say that most people are closed-minded about something. For example, most people I know are closed minded, one way or another, about the abortion issue. A lot of people are closed minded about race issues, gun control, affirmative action, etc. the list could go on and on. Some people view others as being closed-minded simply because they hold a different viewpoint on an issue, usually thinking of themselves as being tolerant or liberal minded. That type of person, and their self-proclaimed tolerant worldview, is quite often the most intolerant when it comes to accepting others views. Disagreeing with someone on an issue does not necessarily mean that you are closed-minded, however, not allowing him or her the privilege of having a differing view more than likely does.
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