We have all heard the saying "if you're not liberal when you're young, you have no heart. If you're not conservative when you're older, you have no brain." It is true to an extent that younger people seem to be more liberal in their beliefs. However, the liberalism of the current generation of young people does not come from the heart, but rather the teachers and textbooks in our education system.

During my orientation at Miami University this year, the over arching theme was “open mindedness.” I heard speaker after speaker talk about “following the path you want,” “choosing a major that you like,” and “finding who you really are.” The irony here is that a majority of teachers, professors, and other education administrators are trying their hardest to undermine that exact process. Whether it be through textbooks or lectures, the goal of many lessons and sometimes entire courses, is to choose beliefs for the student and close their minds to one doctrine— liberalism.

It does not just begin once students reach the college level. The indoctrination begins early on with innocent five year olds on the kindergarten level. Public schools are strict about one thing, eliminating God from the classroom. I remember in first grade a kid telling our teacher that he thought God created the world. She quickly said, “we don’t say god here.” She acted as if the child had said a curse word. With as liberal and secular as the education system was when I was in elementary school, things have only gotten worse. You may have heard of the children’s book And Tango Makes Three. This story features two male pigeons that fall in love and are given a baby pigeon to raise together. You would expect that the public schools would not support a book that promoted a certain belief, seeing as how they are so quick to eliminate anything about God. But it is not about fairness or neutrality, it is about liberalism. Even with the books openly pro gay message, many public schools use And Tango Makes Three as required reading for elementary students. Ironically the book has even won the “Living the Dream” award. So now our elementary students know all about gay life styles and how they demonstrate “living the dream.”

Understandably, with all of this time dedicated to teaching students about gay life styles, the public schools had to cut some of their curriculum— they chose math and science. The numbers show that by the end of high school, American students fall from the 92nd percentile in science to the 29th percentile. Our American fourth-graders are only beaten by South Korea and Japan in science, but by 12th grade, the only countries the American students can beat are Lithuania, Cyprus and South Africa.

Things really pick up as our students reach college. Personally, I was expecting to be confronted by the liberal indoctrination, but what took me by surprise was a required reading for my friend’s English 111 class. The book is called Open Questions—Readings for critical thinking and writing. In this book there is a series of various short stories, essays, and cases presented to the reader. However, they all tend to be promoting far left views. For example, one short story my friend was required to read was “Marriage as a Restricted Club.” In this essay, the female author talks about her plans to marry the woman she has been living with for six years. Okay, that’s not so bad, but then it compares the ban on gay marriage to how African Americans were treated during the time of segregation in our country. It also compares it to how Jews have been unfairly treated throughout history. The unbelievable part is the fact that this story is supposed to be demonstrating an example of “logical comparisons.” Another story they were required to read was “‘Benjamin Saenz’ Exile: El Paso, Texas.” This reading was required for purely analytical sake. The story glorifies the illegal alien as the hero, and makes the immigration control out to be evil; actually calling them, quote, “Nazis.”

So from Kindergarten to College, and from the teacher to the textbook, students now days are sure to run into some form of liberal indoctrination. The key is for students to be ready for it. Don’t let the education system decide your values— that decision is up to you alone. The goal of universities is supposedly to give you a liberal arts education; but watch out, they have a tendency to drop the word arts from the equation.