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Meditation 1073
American Taliban

by: John Tyrrell

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For all my criticism of the Catholic Church, I have generally regarded it as having a great deal of respect for education, including higher education. And many of its universities are among the best in the world. In general, most of those universities are as open to women as they are to men.

This of course is in contrast to Islamic extremists, such as the Taliban, who are opposed to education, particularly for women, and do everything they can to keep women uneducated and underfoot. At least the Catholics are quite different.

Well not all Catholics! This week I encountered the Catholic website Fix The Family, which claims "Everything we share here is faithful to the teachings of the Holy Roman Catholic Church. We are 100% faithful to the Vatican and the Holy Father, Pope Francis." And this week, the website's lead article was: 6 Reasons (+2) to NOT Send Your Daughter to College by Raylan Alleman.

Now what are those six+2 reasons:

1. She will attract the wrong types of men.
   Oh yes - you don't want to risk your daughter running into one of those awful men who are attracted to educated women.
   
   
2. She will be in a near occasion of sin.
   Which of course she wasn't while going to high school - or perhaps you're not supposed to send her there either.
   
   
3. She will not learn to be a wife and mother.
   Which of course she will learn by being kept at home* and being (ab)used as an unpaid maid instead of going to university.
   
   
4. The cost of a degree is becoming more difficult to recoup.
   There are a lot of alternatives for keeping the cost of a degree down. But is the point true? It varies by institution, but here's what one university's study found:
   
   A new study by the Fiscal and Economic Research Center at UW-Whitewater shows a UW-Whitewater graduate earns more than someone who enters the workforce with only a high school diploma. The average annual income of UW-Whitewater alumni is $73,000, while the average annual income of high school graduates is $38,350.
   
   The increased income after four years of college allows graduates to quickly recover the cost of tuition and income lost while attending
   UW-Whitewater. Although tuition costs are higher now, today’s graduates are able to recover the cost of a college education in six-and-a-half years compared to the 12 years it took college graduates from 30 years ago. 
   
   So time to recoup is decreasing, not increasing.
   
   
5. You don’t have to prove anything to the world.
   And what about the young woman proving something to herself, such as she's the intellectual equal to any man.
   
   
6. It could be a near occasion of sin for the parents.
   The argument presented here is just an extension of point 4 - cost. It should not merit its own number.
   
   
7. She will regret it.
   Maybe. But most likely she will not. It's far more probable she will treasure the experience for life.
   
   
8. It could interfere with a religious vocation.
   From what I've seen of Catholic religious vocations today - they want educated women. Not uneducated homebodies. A thoroughly dishonest point.
   

I don't know how much support Fix The Family has from the Catholic hierarchy, but their views on the place of women in society are little better than the Taliban. Quite reprehensible.

Note:

* In response to someone who asked "So, please, what is an 18yo girl to do then? Bag groceries till a prince charming comes along to give a few kids?" the author of the article (and co-founder of the website), Raylan Alleman , replied:
" It doesn't take that much $ for a girl to live at home with her parents until she meets Mr. Right. It's much better for your morals as well. Think about this: What would you do if you could do ANYTHING you want and didn't feel like you HAVE to go to college? So the only reason you're going to college is to get a husband? That's a pretty expensive dating game, which often fails."

Simply, Alleman is assuming with an obsolete '50s mindset that women only go to college to snag a potentially successful husband, and not for an education. His solution seems to be to keep the young woman at safely locked up at home (got to protect her morals) until daddy brings a Mr. Right home he has personally selected.

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