The spirit of indifference

Save for a few welcome exceptions, today’s political discourse at all levels is awful. From politicians to political staffers; political reporters and commentators across all media; political party communicators, activists, public policy non-profits — the bulk of all this messaging is negative, emotionally and physically draining, and culturally corrosive.

My background in government, politics, and writing is strong enough for me to recognize political ineptitude, lies, and spin. If we define the word “ignorant” as “lacking knowledge, information, or awareness about a particular thing,” I worry about Americans ignorant in government and politics. That includes young and mature adults as well as kids in their early school years.

I am more convinced than I was 20 years ago that America needs a return to mandatory teaching of school kids on how US government is designed to work, and of the responsibilities and rights of every US citizen in making our government work. In short, our citizenry needs to learn civics.

What I see as a great challenge in re-introducing civics lessons are generations of living Americans who have never studied civics, who don’t know the topic exists. Many of these people are voters. Many are elected officials or people reporting on elected officials. Too often, when it comes to lawmaking and government we have the blind leading the blind.

I know this from my own work experience, and because I was largely ignorant of civics when I first started working for the Maine Legislature.

Since leaving the State House I think often of the need for civics education, especially when alone with my thoughts. Last week while driving Maine back roads I was thinking over the situation. “Somebody needs to do something,” I said aloud.

Of course, my initial response was, as it is usually, “Why don’t you, Scott K. Fish, do something?”

Always my thoughts of “doing something” circle around my designing and hosting civics courses. If I put together a basic civics course — what would it look like? Soon my motivation grinds to halt: Do I have the time? What’s the right venue for presenting the course? What about advertising? Do I have the money?

Strangled with detail-itis.

Ideally, civics should be taught objectively, without political twisting or activist additives. Realistically I don’t know if that objectivity is possible in our present political climate. To the extent it is possible, I think public schools are exactly the correct place for objective civics teaching.

My view of civics teaching is: give young and older students the understanding, the knowledge, the tools to then make up their own minds about politics, politicians, and public policy. Or as writer/professor David Gelernter said in his book, “America Lite,” “We want to go back to telling the truth.”

This morning, thinking maybe it isn’t necessary for me to reinvent the wheel, for the first time, I looked online to see what, if any, civics courses are already offered. To my delight I found several civics courses, some designed for teachers, some for children — and online civics courses, it seems, for many audiences.

“The simple tasks of citizenship — taking an earnest part in home duties, helping the unfortunate of one’s neighborhood, earning one’s living, voting intelligently — are such seemingly commonplace acts that many persons believe it makes little difference how well or ill they do them.”

That paragraph, in the Preface to a 1925 Maine public school civics textbook, is a true today as it was 94 years ago. Maybe moreso.

The Preface continues, “This spirit of indifference is the nation’s greatest danger, for a nation succeeds or fails not on the battlefields, but in the preceding and succeeding years, in the homes, schools, and places of work.”

That’s still true. And with that sentiment in mind I will comb through several online civics courses and let you know in a future column what I find.

Scott K. Fish has served as a communications staffer for Maine Senate and House Republican caucuses, and was communications director for Senate President Kevin Raye. He founded and edited AsMaineGoes.com and served as director of communications/public relations for Maine’s Department of Corrections until 2015. He is now using his communications skills to serve clients in the private sector.