Countering the Bonnor/Greenwell proposal; and the authoritarian left

Published: Tue, 10/03/23

RSA Daily

For atheists, rationalists and secular humanists in Australia

Wednesday, October 4, 2023

Rationale, the magazine of the Rationalist Society of Australia

Good morning ,

Australia is unusual in the western world for having three schooling systems: govt schools, Catholic schools and 'independent' schools (actually, mostly Anglican schools). The emergence of these systems - and how they became funded by our governments - has long historical roots, but it's led to inequalities that are now so entrenched that people have lost sight of the history.

Chris Bonnor and Tom Greenwell have been spruiking their 'solution' to these inequalities for about a year now, including at an RSA webinar. Their proposal is to fully fund Catholic and independent schools, allowing them to retain their religious character, but forcing them in exchange to open up their enrolments and stop charging fees.

In our lead story, Trevor Cobbold hits back.

Lead stories

Fully Funding Private Schools is No Solution to Inequity in Education

Hear, hear! The proposal by Chris Bonnor and Tom Greenwell to fully fund private schools (subject to them not charging fees and not being 'selective') runs contrary to the whole principle that government schools should be secular. Their proposal gives in to the religious lobby: It "explicitly permits private schools to promulgate their religious beliefs and values and to discriminate against students and teachers who do not share these beliefs."

We had Chris Bonnor explain his and Greenwell's proposal at an RSA webinar a while ago and I pushed back then (from about 54 min mark). I thought then and I still think their proposal would only entrench state-sanctioned and state-funded religion. Not on.

Fighting ideological repression by the Authoritarian Left

Practical tips for those in insititutions where the 'ideological left' is fighting for dominance:

Educate yourself; knowledge is power.

Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so we may fear less.

Use all existing means of resistance, but first and foremost, the official ones.

Mechanisms of resistance are available through existing institutions, even if the institutions themselves are failing to protect their mission [101]. These mechanisms can be exploited to change the institution from within.

Don’t play their game: You can’t win.

We are trained to seek compromises and solutions that bring different groups on board; we seek consensus. That is a fine approach under normal circumstances, when all agents are acting in good faith. But we must recognize that we are up against agents who are driven—knowingly or unknowingly—by an ideology whose goal is to take over the institution. Every compromise with them brings them closer to their goal [1,3,74,98,123]. Therefore, we must stand our ground.

Focus on truth, not partisanship. Do not fear verbal attacks.

When you take on CSJ, there is something you will need to come to terms with: you are going to be called names, and your views and beliefs are going to be distorted and misrepresented. These are standard tactics of the CSJ movement. Since the adherents of CSJ have adopted an ideological, rather than a rational, worldview, they cannot rationally defend it; so they use the only tools they have: personal attacks and strawman arguments. They will call you transphobe, racist, misogynist, alt-right, Nazi, etc., no matter what you say or do. They will use deliberate misrepresentation of your expressions to subvert and discredit them. They will use the “Motte and Bailey” trick to derail conversations. Learn about these tactics so that you can anticipate, recognize, and counter them.

Do not apologize.

We cannot stress this enough. Your apology will be taken as a sign of weakness and will not absolve you—in fact, it will make matters worse. Apologies to the illiberal mob are like drops of blood in the water to a pack of sharks. Additionally, your apology can be interpreted as an admission of guilt, which can come back to haunt you in the event you need to defend yourself legally or in an administrative proceeding.

Build a community and a network.

In Australia??