The Pashas of Public School

Parents walk their children to school in Montreal in a file photo. Paul Chiasson/The Canadian Press

Commentary

It’s a state religion.

The priests are teachers’ unions, bureaucrats, education academics, and “equity consultants.” It doesn’t even pretend to be ideologically neutral anymore: Children are taught gender ideology starting in the fifth grade, but may graduate unable to read at grade level. They will learn that America is evil, but never even hear about the Federalist Papers. Canadian students won’t recognize a Bible story, but will be fluent in climate activism and “decolonization.” Heretics are punished by the Holy Office of Human Resources.

But that isn’t even the biggest problem.

Suppose that you belong to a minority religion—a Baptist, for instance, whose faith has no truck with the dominant religion. Suppose further that you and your church decide to build your own school.

If you do, you must still pay taxes for the public schools that you aren’t using. In an enlightened jurisdiction like Alberta, the state may allow you to have a portion of your taxes back to pay for teachers—but only a portion. Infidels must pay twice for education.

Forget Critical Theory. This is what oppression of a minority really looks like.

It also violates international law: We ratified the Convention Against Discrimination in Education in 1962. It says that no government can offer funds to one kind of school without offering the same funds to all of them. Well, we may have signed the treaty, but we lied through our teeth. With a trillion dollars in annual spending at stake, you’d better believe we mean to discriminate.

There’s a proper name for this kind of tax: Jizya.

In the Ottoman Empire, it was a tax that unbelievers (or dhimmis) had to pay. It was designed to encourage unbelievers to convert to the state religion. And it works perfectly well in North America today: Conversions are booming, in spite of the threat from a ginger-haired apostate who gained control of our southern neighbour. Above all, the jizya benefits the pashas who serve as its mullahs.

Listen to the arguments made by self-proclaimed “public education advocates.”

1. “Private schools serve the rich.” That’s a lie. “Private” school parents make sacrifices to have schools of their faith, or to escape failing public schools. The real elite? They send their kids to selective public schools—the International Baccalaureate and AP schools, the gifted academies, whose gates are guarded by entry exams. Public education has its own gated communities.
2. “Private Schools are unfair because they charge tuition.” Why, yes—they must, because the government won’t fund them. If you defund independent schools and then attack them for needing tuition, it’s no different from a thief blaming his victim for her poverty.
3. “Private schools are exclusive.” Yet, wealthy neighbourhoods always have better schools. And in the most aggressive public districts of Canada, they take pride in having “magnet schools.” But they don’t pick students based on mission, like an arts or religious  school; children are selected based on test scores – or perhaps their address.
4. “Private and charter school funding takes money away from public schools.” But every child who leaves the public system lowers costs—though not all their funding money follows them. Still, wherever any funding goes to independent schools, the sheikhs demand that it stops.

Now, we saw this sort of thing in the old days. America’s Blaine Amendments tried to prevent fair funding because the Protestant ruling class of the time openly wanted to stop Catholics from having their own schools. But what underlies the current religious oppression?

It’s not about kids. It’s about control.

The pashas of public education enforce ideological conformity, and silence dissenters.  But they also demand tribute. Fewer children in public schools mean less forced union dues to benefit the education unions. And while they control the school boards, the pashas demand that every shekel goes to them—not to heretics.

The Ottoman Empire ended the jizya in 1856. We should probably emulate them.

It’s time for fair funding, across North America.

It’s time to purge the pashas of public school.

John Hilton-O’Brien is the Executive Director of Parents for Choice in Education, www.parentchoice.ca

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.