Society’s actions reflect its priorities

If a door-to-door encyclopedia salesman came to my door naked, I would have difficulty focusing on the value of the encyclopedias. I probably would not understand why this person chose to complete his rounds without clothing, but I would notice he was naked.

For some reason, our society has chosen not to recognize situations that are equally obvious. Everyone says they love their children and would do anything to strengthen their chances of success, yet their actions indicate the exact opposite.

Well over 100 years ago, we decided as a society that learning farming skills and supporting the family farm were more important than academic pursuits. With this belief, we decided to dismiss school during the summer to reflect society’s priorities. That may have been rational 100 years ago, but the world has changed.

We say education of our children is a high priority, and yet state-supported major universities may pay their coaches 10 times more than their best teacher. Our actions accurately reflect our priorities.

While both are government employees, the manager of our sewage-treatment plant gets more status and pay than our best teachers. Medical schools are difficult to get into, but “teacher colleges” do much advertising to attract students.

We want to protect our children from harm so we personally arm ourselves with military-style weapons — not for hunting or sport shooting, but because we have the right to own virtually any kind of weapon. We know this number and variety of guns in society increases the chance that a family member will be killed, but we still must value all gun rights far more than we value our children’s lives. Thousands of children continue to die while our elected representatives reflect society’s judgment that any regulatory action would be inappropriate.

In today’s political environment, otherwise-responsible parents are supporting movements that encourage young people to not obtain health insurance. I can only assume this means many people see making a political statement as more important than young people’s health.

To me, all of the above statements are obvious. Many of our emperors have no clothes, but we have chosen not to raise this fact. If that naked salesman comes to my door, I will send him down the road. Many people would never notice.