Read!
If you want to open your mind, read!
If you want to travel through time and space, read!
If you want to learn about other people and other cultures, read!
If you want to supercharge your creativity and imagination, read!
If you want to learn how other people see the world, read!
If you want to travel through time and space, read!
If you want to understand history, read!
Some people think these are dangerous activities. They want to control what students think. They censor books. They remove them from school libraries and public libraries. They forget that young people today have access to the Internet, which is not censored.
Live dangerously! Read books!
Diane Ravitch's blog 
“At the same time, the lower and middle classes begun to develop an interest in reading since they could afford personal religious texts. Since reading spurs the formation of intellectual opinions, a large part if the population now began to read their own personal bibles and form their own opinions, which didn’t always align with that of the religious authority figures.”
(I also recall people could finally READ the laws and now understood how they were being manipulated). I love how your blog makes me THINK. I know from my studies, once the printing press (another interesting read) came to be, the “powers at play” didn’t like the serfs “understanding things.” There are many articles on this subject, and you can READ this one to start or do an Internet search to find out the Chinese were far ahead of Gutenberg. Why do we need to study history? The printing press and now AI. To learn. READ ON! https://digitalcommons.wou.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1002&context=history_of_book
Does that include reading credible news and information sources that usually disagree with your existing opinions? You recently wrote on this blog that you don’t do that. Or is anyone who disagrees with you automatically not credible?
Read books! Websites are not books. Huckleberry Finn is not a news and information source. It’s a book.
I’ve read 1000+ serious books in my lifetime, but I also read a wide variety of serious publications, print and online. Just reading books will leave you very uninformed about current events. Only reading to reinforce your existing opinions will keep you in an ideological bubble.
Of course, but reading fictional literature is important. And going to libraries and book stores is important. Having libraries and keeping them free of censorship is important. We read about that, and we read things written by people who want to restrict libraries and close public schools, but we stand up to them with what we write.
You’re a snarky thing aren’t you. I’ve read Diane’s comments on what she reads and I just don’t see what you’re saying. Unless of course you’re referring to her comments abut propaganda, known liars and manipulators. You learn nothing from those fools except what game they’re up to. I admit I havent read all her stuff, so for grins let’s see your examples wo taking the comments out of context.
I read The NY Times, the LA Times, the Denver Post, the Washington Post, the Orlando Sentinel, the Miami Herald, the Houston Chronicle, the Boston Globe, the Tennessee Yonder, the Mississippi Free Press, Politico, The Hill. These are newspapers, not opinion journals. I stay informed. What do you read?
👍
I read the NY Times, the WSJ, The Atlantic, National Review, Commentary, the Nation, The New Republic, Mother Jones and numerous others. All the publications you list have an obvious left-of-center emphasis; my reading list is much more diverse. You again confirm that you only read publications that reinforce your existing opinions.
I read the Wall Street Journal too! Their news articles are excellent. Their editorials are tilted towards the interests of the 1%.
Betsy, sweetheart! What do you read that doesn’t confirm your existing opinions? Please! Let us know. The whole range, please! Enquiring minds need to know.
Betsy, you think the NY Times is left of center? Bwah ha ha. Its non-leftiness is especially evident its education coverage, which is fairly worshipful of the charter sector.
Who’s that trip-trapping over my bridge?
Interesting that the blog has had this deluge of posts by people with different names with almost identical unwarranted claims about the blog’s host. How would these morons have any notion of the breadth and diversity of Diane’s news reading? I am, for example, by any lights a progressive, but I read a wide variety of news and opinion. I like to know what the regressives are thinking, saying, plotting. I suspect that the same is true of Diane. It’s pretty odd when people like an argument this bad so much that they keep parroting it.
Bob Shepherd,
You may be the only regular commenter on this blog who reads anything close to a diversity of opinion and news sources. Diane Ravitch recently admitted in her own words that she doesn’t read “rightwing” news sources. Whenever anyone links to a non left-wing outlet, she dismisses the outlet with ad hominem attacks. I’ve never commented here before today, but this point has been obvious for the two years that I’ve read this blog. And you demean yourself with your adolescent caricatures and stereotypes. There are many right-of-center people who are easily your intellectual equals or superiors.
I don’t read Steve Bannon or alex Jones. Do you? Since you don’t like my reading list, please share what you read every day.
Please, Betsy, share your reading list!
AGAIN, Ms. Kinny, how on Earth could you possibly have any clue what people who visit this blog read or don’t read unless they have specifically told you or have provided information available from only one source? Obviously, you cannot know this, so your criticism is just, well, ridiculous. It’s like me claiming that you didn’t really understand Vasiliy Grossman’s Stalingrad. I have no idea whatsoever whether you have read Grossman’s novel, so why on Earth would I think myself qualified to make such a comment? I’m not. I don’t have access to that information.
Obviously
Funny that a new contributor shows up daily to criticize me for not reading rightwing swill.
Swill is far too generous a term. Four letters will do nicely.
I just think it reveals the power of Diane’s influence. these trolls are obviously not just under the bridge, but under water…
Diane, you really should follow Ms. Kinney’s advice and incorporate a lot more white supremacist, racist, sexist, classist, nationalist material into your “reading” in the interest of broadening your perspective to include the crackpot, the moronic, and the propagandistic. Not-so-Bright Bart. The Daily Storm Trooper. Info Wars and The War Room and other tough guy war-themed stuff. Pravda Social. Rupert Murdoch’s The Wall Street Journal of Oligarchical Apologetics and Propaganda. The White Nationalist Review. Transcripts of Russian propaganda television and CNN Town Halls with Don the Con. The poetic works of Matt Gaetz and Josh Hawley. The collected essays on political epistemology of Margorie Taylor Greene.
And ofc it is hilarious that these people would think Diane’s list of credible, centrist news sources left-wing. LOL.
Again, I am a progressive, and I read and listen to reich-wing crap all the time. I pride myself on this. For example, I know the central texts of the Bronze Age to Neoplatonist to Medieval constellations of superstition collectively referred to as “Christianity” far better than do most of the actual adherents to one of the many varieties of this superstition. Anyone who had actually paid attention to Diane’s blog over the years would have found there a lot of dissection of views put forth by folks on the right. I find myself wondering where this particular troll talking point originated.
Omigod. What a terrible assignment to read all that dreck!
lol
Ugh! “Great posts worth seeing from Bob Shepherd:
Why Is Christianity So Weird?”
Dr. Ravitch, I am surprised that you would post such an offense diatribe about God that are so offensive to believers. Such blasphemy makes me shutter…cry! Bob Shepherd should read Walt Whitman’s Poem “Miracles”. Walt Whitman believed he was surrounded by miracles. Bob Shepherd should not write about what he is so ignorant and closed minded about.
“A mouse is a miracle to stagger sextillions of infidels, and the running blackberry would adorn the parlors of heaven”
If my memory serves me correctly
And gee, thanks, Mary D. I’m proud of that one. LOL.
By gosh, by gee, by golly (and every other euphemism). Ya forgot to include a link to the offensive post. So, here:
Warning: May contain material objectionable to adherents of the local ancient tribal superstitions.
What Whitman celebrates, ofc, are the “miracles” of nature, including those created by people, who are also creations of nature. So, he is co-opting this religious language for his secular purposes. As Whitman says of the animals whom he admires,
“They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins,
“They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God”
–Song of Myself, 32
And here, a little essay on real versus fake wonders:
So, thanks, Mary, for mentioning me and Whitman in the same breath. I am a HUGE fan of Whitman!!! ❤
Walt has a message for you, Mary, from across the ages:
WHOEVER you are holding me now in hand,
Without one thing all will be useless,
I give you fair warning before you attempt me further,
I am not what you supposed, but far different.
From his Calmus Poems, in Leaves of Grass, one of his many celebrations of romantic love between men
Whitman on spiritualism:
“It seems to me nearly altogether a poor, cheap, crude humbug.”
And Mary, I think that you meant shudder, not shutter.
Also, Diane is not responsible for everything that people post. Obviously. A diversity of opinion appears here.
I thought news was factual. That is what I learned in journalism class in high school. Due to yellow journalism years, the profession developed the ethical ideals that used to be important. Lately, we have certain “news” platforms that give very little news but a lot of opinionated analysis.
Reblogged this on Lloyd Lofthouse and commented:
Reading is dangerous for MAGA zombie fascists, Traitor Trump, and Ron DeSantis, et al. MAGA zombie Fascism cannot survive when the people are avid readers and lifelong learners.
You got that right, but, decades ago, Leonard Leo the Kochs and the American Enterprise fascists planned the end of a democratic government; they had all the time they needed, but what was needed MOST was an uninformed ,ignorant electorate— and a bullhorn.
So they began the assault on public schools decades ago, and we are only now seeing the tail end of this success, as they push vouchers and charter schools to educate only those who they want to hear their propaganda— their chant about WOKE, and CRT, and the Deep State … so they can ban books and end the real teaching of history., while promoting racism.
As their money bought the tv media, and the paper news media, so our exhausted, ignorant citizens would hear the 24/7 media narratives that they were pushing,
BUT then… along came the internet– and a TRANSFORMATIONAL era of technology!
LIKE ALL TRANSFORMATIONAL ERAS, the result would not be recognized for decades or even millennia.
The Internet is not just a dark , unregulated place where Trump, eMTGreene, and her iil can operate with impunity, and liars like Santos abound and push their fantasies, it is where the unhappy men who crave violence and conflict so they they can grab a gun and kill THE ENEMY, thrive and organize. Proud “boys’ indeed, not thinking men here, or grasp the meaning of the constitution, and WE THE PEOPLE!
AS a result, no one reads and thinks anymore..
They are fed the narratives of the billionaires who have purchased our Congress , and out Supreme Court…and are going after the trifecta…the White house… so we can get another Barr for our judicial system and all our safeguards can be eradicated.
NO reading required.
So simple
So easy. A process!
Read!! Then Think! Then talk about what you read, maybe write your take-away , and read again !
Like I always say, it is the Critical ANALYSIS of what we read, that grows the intellect— and the ability to THINK!!
I facilitated this PROCESS for fifty years as a teacher.
My success — as Harvard pointed out when my practice was chosen as the NYC cohort for the New Learning Standards – was because the children learned to do the process of critical thinking—- thus, every single one in the room learned! Harvard pointed out, that teachers who KNOW WHAT LEARNING LOOKS LIKE enable kids to learn a Process!!
Yes. It’s a Process!!!
It’s not about the materials or the teaching, or the tests !!! That’s the narrative sold to an ignorant public in eighteen thousand school systems !
People are clueless as to how children learn.
But a process is easy to learn
Easy to do— if some political entity doesn’t direct a teacher to use the crap that big business is selling in order to destroy public education.
A simple process: read, think, talk, write… and read again !!
Thank you Dr. Ravitch! Indeed, reading is an amazing tool to get to know the world in a depth manner. Even if one takes small doses of time at our own pace to do it, reading can be the best food to fortify our minds in the long run.
Yes – rooted in our anti-literacy laws! Plantation owners new teaching enslaved people to read would bring liberation. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0AwYaWehZ0
But don’t teach that in Flor-uh-duh!
And yet, many Europeans disobeyed these laws.
Dr. Ravitch, I love your posting on the importance of reading.
“The differences in reading potential are shown not to be strongly related to poverty, handedness, dialect, gender, IQ, mental age, or any other such difficult-to-alter circumstances. They are due instead to learning and experience – and specifically to learning and experience with print and print concepts.” Adams, Beginning to Read: Thinking and Learning
I thought it was fundamental!
Betsy sounds like an AI bot parroting shopworn disinformation.
There have been several of these lately, from people going by various online names, each making the same bizarre claim–that Diane reads only stuff, all written by left-wingers, that confirms her preexisting biases. It’s a bizarre claim because they couldn’t possibly know what she reads beyond the tiny portion of that reading that she shares, and all the more bizarre because Diane famously switched sides–moved from one side of the political aisle to the other. Diane is a scholar. She reads extremely widely. I know that she has read The Black Book of Communism, for she has written about this. Hardly a left-wing publication. LOL. Whether she visits the Fox News Opinion pages (as I do), I haven’t any notion. How could I? I am not a mind reader. Betsy and Erica and the other trolls aren’t, either. But ofc there are many progressive intellectuals who have read, and do read, the right-wingers. Yes, I have read Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations and Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom. Yes, I listen to Bannon’s War Room podcast. Yes, I often pour over articles on the Cato website. For years, I read transcripts of most of Trump’s rally speeches because I amused myself by writing parodies of them (as if they didn’t already parody themselves). OBVIOUSLY, one can be a progressive and simultaneously keep up with what the knuckle-draggers are saying. Some of us have to do that in order to write what we write about what they are up to.
I first started wondering about this when someone showed up here, making this claim about Diane, under the name Erica Adams, which led me to think, did some troll create a WordPress profile under this variant of the name of the New York mayor? You know, as though I created a WordPress profile under the name Rhonda Santis? I’ve never done that. I write under my own name, right out in the open. I have some of these trolls who show up on my site, as well, under assumed names. What led me to think that this was a concerted trolling attack was that the same bizarre charge was made by different people in pretty much the same language on different days.
Reply in moderation. Here, an extension of that reply.
Not that I haven’t written under pseudonyms before. I’ve done that a few times over the years, and I’ve worked as a ghostwriter on a lot of titles.
Is Betsy whatever another instantiation of Erica Adams from a few days ago?