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Staunch advocates of freedom will reply: Soso what? Who needs crop-picking skills? In all honesty: anyone who wants to pursue a vast range of occupations. Owning a plantation requires knowledge of how to pick crops. Overseeing crop pickers requires that knowledge, too. So does being a crop-harvesting engineer or a field inspector.
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One popular alternative to slavery is called ‘freedom’. As with all practices, this one varies. But essentially, freedom means the slave does what he wants. He works on whatever he wants, for as long as he wants. If he askswants you to teach him something, you teach him. Yetoblige. But if he decides to go on long walks all day, the principled response based on freedom is: ‘Let him.’
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First, picking crops is extremely unfun for almost everyone. Only a handful of slaves really enjoyenjoys it. I’m a strong guy, and I’ve picked acres of crops, yet I’ve never really liked it.
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I hope my articlethe above shows that Caplan is a tyrant who has no idea what freedom means. He presents himself as someone who cares about freedom, as this reasonable guy who wants to strike a balance between the approach of “staunch” advocates of freedom and that of its critics. As a result, his primary concern isn’t freedom at all. Instead, he wants to *grant* freedom on *his* terms: as his child, do math for 2 hours and he will grant you freedom for the rest of the day. He wants to prescribe predefined goals and assuage *parents’ guilt* for using coercion. His concern for their guilt (presumably especially his own)own as a parent) rather than *children’s freedom* betrays him. Whenever someone from the 1860s showed concern for the guilt some slaveholders may have felt for whipping their slaves, rather than showing concern *for the slaves who were being whipped,* one immediately knew whose side that person was on, no matter how much he pretended to care about freedom. SameThe same goes for anyone’s accidental confession in not immediately recognizing the pretense: you could tell they were on the perpetrator’s side.

The opening quote of this article, from *Mad Men*, illustrates this dynamic.my point. The show is set in the 1960s, in the middle of the civil-rights movement. The partner of an advertising firm, Bertram Cooper, is on his way out of the office when he notices that a black employee now sits at the front desk. So he approaches his office manager, Joan Harris. The full scene goes:
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> Cooper: Well, I’m all for the national advancement of colored people, but I do not believe they should advance all the way to the front of this office. *Under[*Under his breath:*breath:*] People can see her from the elevator.
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> Cooper: Requesting. *Leaves.*↵
>[*Leaves.*]↵
> Harris: *Covers[*Covers her face in disgust.*↵
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Becausedisgust.*]↵
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Because he wants to make exceptions, you can tell immediately that Cooper does not actually support the “national advancement of colored people”. He’s lying, whether he realizes it or not. It’s just like Caplan pretending when he says “We should have a strong presumption against paternalism […]. The value of math, however, is great enough to overcome this presumption.” (Link removed.) Caplan might as well be saying: ‘I’m all for the liberation of children, but I do not believe they should be liberated to the point they don’t have to do math!’↵
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Yet *Madmath!’↵
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What if Cooper felt guilt over his error? Not remorse, and without correcting it or recognizing it as an error, but guilt: the kind of guilt that demands others repeat the error so it can hide in a sea of evil and say: ‘I’m not the worst of them.’ For whom would you feel sympathy – for him or for the black employee whose career he hindered? And depending on your answer, whom would you encourage and whom would you betray?↵
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*Mad Men* highlights even more than that. While virtually all of the show’s viewers recognize the horror in how black people were treated back then, viewers fail to see that same horror in how our treatment of children has *not* meaningfully changed since. I suspect it’s noteven something the creators of the show intended to convey – but they did, to some. In several ways, black people were better off even in the 60s1960s than children are today: Harris strongly implies that what Cooper requests is illegal,illegal – title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 forbids discrimination based on race at the workplace – but there is no law against forced education of children to this day. On the contrary, in many jurisdictions, the law *demands* such force. [Even the UN demands it.](/posts/the-right-to-education-is-bad) In addition, I understand that psychological and scientific ‘findings’ justifying segregation were receding by the 60s,1960s, yet Caplan references both psychology and medical science to justify – and pawn off responsibility for – his desire to deny children freedom. Also, Cooper doesn’t pretend that his ‘request’ is for the black employee’s own good, whereas Caplan does just that when it comes to children.
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Freedom is indivisible and absolute. It allows no compromises whatsoever. You cannot balance freedom: it’s all or nothing. There are better and worse forms of slavery, but only one type of freedom. Caplan is a good example ofmakes the Randian insighterror of compromising on basic principles. Rand identified that [eveneven the smallest compromise on basic principles or in moral matters is a complete surrender](http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/compromise.html):
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An honest man who steals once in a while is not an honest man. A free man who has to pick crops 1-2 hours a day is not a free man. A free child who has to learn math 1-2 hours a day is not a free child. Such are the ‘compromising’ effects of mixed premises and mixed principles. The whole point of unschooling is (or should be!) freedom – not productivity, career choice, or “merits”, or that freedom “works” or whatever. After all, the reasoning behind abolition was *not* that free men are more productive than slaves (although usually they are). Mix freedom and forced math lessons and you end up with no freedom at all. Like abolition + picking crops, Caplan’s rotten concept “Unschooling + Math” is a textbook example of mixed premises, and so his vices destroy his virtues. Caplan makes the same old mistake of striking a ‘balance’ between good and badevil and making himself look reasonable in the process. He dresses up this alleged balance using, again, the term “keyhole solution” and derides the principled, uncompromising stance toward freedom as “staunch”. What is a “staunch” opponent of slavery but *right?*

In moral matters,matters of morals and truth, one has to aim for nothing less thanshort of absolute purity. Those of us who have fully understood and integrated the moral truth that the universality of freedom applies to children just as much as it does to adults, recognize Caplan’s error with lightning speed – and judge accordingly.

If society progresses in the way I hope, Caplan’s article will age exceptionally poorly. As it deserves. Do not mistake him for an advocate of freedom.

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Yet *Mad Men* highlights more than that. While virtually all of the show’s viewers recognize the horror in how black people were treated back then, viewers fail to see that same horror in how our treatment of children has *not* meaningfully changed since. I suspect it’s not even something the creators of the show intended to convey – but they did, to some. In several ways, black people were better off even in the 60s than children are today: Harris strongly implies that what Cooper requests is illegal, but there is no law against forced education of children to this day. On the contrary, in many jurisdictions, the law *demands* such force. [Even the UN demands it.](/posts/the-right-to-education-is-bad) In addition, I understand that psychological and scientific ‘findings’ justifying segregation were receding by the 60s, yet Caplan references both psychology and medical science to justify – and shiftpawn off responsibility for – his desire to deny children freedom. Also, Cooper doesn’t pretend that his ‘request’ is for the black employee’s own good, whereas Caplan does just that when it comes to children.
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> Cooper: Well, I’m all for the national advancement of colored people, but I do not believe they should advance all the way to the front of this office. *Under his breath:* People can see her from the elevator.
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An honest man who steals once in a while is not an honest man. A free man who has to pick crops 1-2 hours a day is not a free man. A free child who has to learn math 1-2 hours a day is not a free child. Such are the ‘compromising’ effects of mixed premises and mixed principles. The whole point of unschooling is (or should be!) freedom,freedom – not productivity, career choice, or “merits”, or that freedom “works” or whatever. After all, the reasoning behind abolition was *not* that free men are more productive than slaves (although usually they are). Mix freedom and forced math lessons and you end up with no freedom at all. Like abolition + picking crops, Caplan’s rotten concept “Unschooling + Math”, which he, again, dresses up with the term “keyhole solution”,Math” is a textbook example of mixed premises, and so his vices destroy his virtues. Caplan makes the same old mistake of striking a ‘balance’ between good and bad and making himself look reasonable in the process. He dresses up this alleged balance using, again, the term “keyhole solution” and derides the principled, uncompromising stance toward freedom as “staunch”. What is a “staunch” opponent of slavery but *right?*
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If society progresses in the way I hope, Caplan’s article will age exceptionally poorly. As it deserves. Do not mistake him for an advocate of freedom.

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This post is a satirical rebuttal of Bryan Caplan’s article [‘Unschooling + Math’](https://www.econlib.org/unschooling-math/). I want to showcase how his article reads to someone who believes uncompromisingly that children should be free. Read his first, then mine. Imagine that the following was written by someone from the early 1860s who chimes in on the debate around abolition and almost, but not quite, advocates freedom for slaves, chiming in on the debate around abolition.↵
↵
---↵
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Oneslaves.↵
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---↵
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One popular alternative to slavery is called ‘freedom’. As with all practices, this one varies. But essentially, freedom means the slave does what he wants. He works on whatever he wants, for as long as he wants. If he asks you to teach him something, you teach him. Yet if he decides to go on long walks all day, the principled response based on freedom is: ‘Let him.’
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Overriding a child’s preferences for his benefit is a contradiction in terms. If learning math is such a good idea, persuade your child. If you fail, thenfail – even if you succeed – not learning math is his prerogative, just like it is yours not to pick crops, even though people in the 1860s considered it an extremely useful skill. Free people will naturally learn whatever math their own unique problem situation requires, when it requires it, from the basics up to more advanced skills. The scope and timing is going to be different for everyone. But the reason most people don’t do that today is that teachers ruin their relationship with math: a self-fulfilling prophecy. If a teacher leaves children no other way to assert their freedom than to reject math, then that is what they will do, and the teacher has no right to be surprised or to complain.

Caplan writes about children: “Every day, like it or not, you have to do 1-2 hours of math. No matter how boring you find the subject, you’re too young to decide that you don’t want to pursue a career that requires math.” This isn’t just offensive to children, but even to *mathematicians:* to Caplan, math is not a wondrous area of exploration and creativity, but necessary toil – just like picking crops back in the 19th century. He says himself that he has “never really liked” the “piles” – piles! – of math he has done. Clearly, this has been a torturous experience for him, so why should the next generation be spared this coercion? Worse, he implies that some amount of force is warranted to impose his edict on children since he won’t let them disagree. So… how much force? Does he advocate yelling at one’s child? Maybe taking away privileges and toys? Withholding love and affection? Or would he go even further? He does not specify: bad ideas hide in the unstated, as philosopher Ayn Rand explains.[^1] There’sexplains:↵
↵
> % source: Ayn Rand. *Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal* (p. 159). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.↵
> When opposite basic principles are clearly and openly defined, it works to the advantage of the rational side; when they are *not* clearly defined, but are hidden or evaded, it works to the advantage of the irrational side.↵
↵
There’s the injustice and coercion hidden in Cooper’s ‘request’ to remove a black employee from the front desk for being black, and in Caplan’s “keyhole solution” to “require” children to do math for being children. Telling children they’re “too young” not to do math compares to telling black people they’re too dark-skinned not to pick crops. Until you understand this, you do not understand freedom. Caplan doesn’t understand it.
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> % source: Ayn Rand. *Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal* (p. 161). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.”↵
>Ibid. (p. 161).↵
> If an individual holds mixed premises, his vices undercut, hamper, defeat, and ultimately destroy his virtues. What is the moral status of an honest man who steals once in a while?

An honest man who steals once in a while is not an honest man. A free man who has to pick crops 1-2 hours a day is not a free man. A free child who has to learn math 1-2 hours a day is not a free child. The whole point of unschooling is (or should be!) freedom, not productivity, career choice, or “merits”, or that freedom “works” or whatever. After all, the reasoning behind abolition was *not* that free men are more productive than slaves (although usually they are). Mix freedom and forced math lessons and you end up with no freedom at all. Like abolition + picking crops, Caplan’s rotten concept “Unschooling + Math”, which hehe, again, dresses up with the term “keyhole solution”, is a textbook example of mixed premises, and so his vices destroy his virtues. He derides the principled, uncompromising stance toward freedom as “staunch”. What is a “staunch” opponent of slavery but *right?*
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If society progresses in the way I hope, Caplan’s article will age exceptionally poorly. As it deserves.↵
↵
[^1]: Rand writes: “When opposite basic principles are clearly and openly defined, it works to the advantage of the rational side; when they are *not* clearly defined, but are hidden or evaded, it works to the advantage of the irrational side.” In: *Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal* (p. 159). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.deserves.

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Caplan writes about children: “Every day, like it or not, you have to do 1-2 hours of math. No matter how boring you find the subject, you’re too young to decide that you don’t want to pursue a career that requires math.” This isn’t just offensive to children, but even to *mathematicians:* to Caplan, math is not a wondrous area of exploration and creativity, but necessary toil – just like picking crops back in the 19th century. He says himself that he has “never really liked” the “piles” – piles! – of math he has done. Clearly, this has been a torturous experience for him, so why should the next generation be spared this coercion? Worse, he implies that some amount of force is warranted to impose his edict on children since he won’t let them disagree. So… how much force? Does he advocate yelling at one’s child? Maybe taking away privileges and toys? Withholding love and affection? Or would he go even further? He does not specify: bad ideas hide in the unstated, as philosopher Ayn Rand explains.[^1] There’s the injustice and coercion hidden in Cooper’s ‘request’ to remove a black employee from the front desk for being black, and in Caplan’s “keyhole solution” to “require” children to do math for being children. Telling children they’re “too young” not to do math compares to telling black people they’re too dark-skinned not to pick crops.↵
↵
Freedomcrops. Until you understand this, you do not understand freedom. Caplan doesn’t understand it.↵
↵
Freedom is indivisible and absolute. It allows no compromises whatsoever. You cannot balance freedom: it’s all or nothing. There are better and worse forms of slavery, but only one type of freedom. Caplan is a good example of the Randian insight that [even the smallest compromise on basic principles or moral matters is a complete surrender](http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/compromise.html):
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Caplan writes about children: “Every day, like it or not, you have to do 1-2 hours of math. No matter how boring you find the subject, you’re too young to decide that you don’t want to pursue a career that requires math.” This isn’t just offensive to children, but even to *mathematicians:* to Caplan, math is not a wondrous area of exploration and creativity, but necessary toil – just like picking crops back in the 19th century. He says himself that he has “never really liked” the “piles” – piles! – of math he has done. Clearly, this has been a torturous experience for him, so why should the next generation be spared this coercion? Worse, he implies that some amount of force is warranted to impose his edict on children since he won’t let them disagree. So… how much force? Does he advocate yelling at one’s child? Maybe taking away privileges and toys? Withholding love and affection? Or would he go even further? He does not specify: bad ideas hide in the unstated, as philosopher Ayn Rand explains.[^1] There’s the injustice and coercion hidden in Cooper’s ‘request’ to remove a black employee from the front desk for being black, and in Caplan’s “keyhole solution” to “require” children to do math for being children.↵
↵
Freedomchildren. Telling children they’re “too young” not to do math compares to telling black people they’re too dark-skinned not to pick crops.↵
↵
Freedom is indivisible and absolute. It allows no compromises whatsoever. You cannot balance freedom: it’s all or nothing. There are better and worse forms of slavery, but only one type of freedom. Caplan is a good example of the Randian insight that [even the smallest compromise on basic principles or moral matters is a complete surrender](http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/compromise.html):
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Caplan writes about children: “Every day, like it or not, you have to do 1-2 hours of math. No matter how boring you find the subject, you’re too young to decide that you don’t want to pursue a career that requires math.” This isn’t just offensive to children, but even to *mathematicians:* to Caplan, math is not a wondrous area of exploration and creativity, but necessary toil – just like picking crops back in the 19th century. He says himself that he has “never really liked” the “piles” – piles! – of math he has done. Clearly, this has been a torturous experience for him, so why should the next generation be spared this coercion? Worse, he implies that some amount of force is warranted to impose his edict on children since he won’t let them disagree. So… how much force? Does he advocate yelling at one’s child? Maybe taking away privileges and toys? Withholding love and affection? Or would he go even further? He does not specify: bad ideas hide in the unstated, as philosopher Ayn Rand explains.[^1] Just likeThere’s the injustice and coercion hidden in Cooper’s ‘request’.↵
↵
Freedom‘request’ to remove a black employee from the front desk for being black, and in Caplan’s “keyhole solution” to “require” children to do math for being children.↵
↵
Freedom is indivisible and absolute. It allows no compromises whatsoever. You cannot balance freedom: it’s all or nothing. There are better and worse forms of slavery, but only one type of freedom. Caplan is a good example of the Randian insight that [even the smallest compromise on basic principles or moral matters is a complete surrender](http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/compromise.html):
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Caplan writes about children: “Every day, like it or not, you have to do 1-2 hours of math. No matter how boring you find the subject, you’re too young to decide that you don’t want to pursue a career that requires math.” This isn’t just offensive to children, but even to *mathematicians:* to Caplan, math is not a wondrous area of exploration and creativity, but necessary toil – just like picking crops back in the 19th century. He says himself that he has “never really liked” the “piles” – piles! – of math he has done. Clearly, this has been a torturous experience for him, so why should the next generation be spared this coercion? Worse, he implies that some amount of force is warranted to impose his edict on children since he won’t let them disagree. So… how much force? Does he advocate yelling at one’s child? Maybe taking away privileges and toys? Withholding love and affection? Or would he go even further? He does not specify: bad ideas hide in the unstated, as philosopher Ayn Rand explains.[^1]↵
↵
Freedomexplains.[^1] Just like the injustice and coercion hidden in Cooper’s ‘request’.↵
↵
Freedom is indivisible and absolute. It allows no compromises whatsoever. You cannot balance freedom: it’s all or nothing. There are better and worse forms of slavery, but only one type of freedom. Caplan is a good example of the Randian insight that [even the smallest compromise on basic principles or moral matters is a complete surrender](http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/compromise.html):
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Because he wants to make exceptions, you can tell immediately that Cooper does not actually support the “national advancement of colored people”. He’s lying, whether he realizes it or not. It’s just like Caplan pretending when he says “We should have a strong presumption against paternalism […]. The value of math, however, is great enough to overcome this presumption.” (Link removed.) Caplan might as well be saying: ‘I’m all for the liberation of children, but I do not believe they should be liberated to the point they don’t have to do math!’↵
↵
In somemath!’↵
↵
Yet *Mad Men* highlights more than that. While virtually all of the show’s viewers recognize the horror in how black people were treated back then, viewers fail to see that same horror in how our treatment of children has *not* meaningfully changed since. I suspect it’s not even something the creators of the show intended to convey – but they did, to some. In several ways, black people were better off even in the 60s than children are today: Harris strongly implies that what Cooper requests is illegal, but there is no law against forced education of children to this day. On the contrary, in many jurisdictions, the law *demands* such force. [Even the UN demands it.](/posts/the-right-to-education-is-bad) In addition, I understand that psychological and scientific ‘findings’ justifying segregation were receding by the 60s, yet Caplan references both psychology and medical science to justify – and shift responsibility for – his stance on children.desire to deny children freedom. Also, Cooper doesn’t pretend that his ‘request’ is for the black employee’s own good, whereas Caplan does just that when it comes to children.
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This post is a satirical rebuttal of Bryan Caplan’s article [‘Unschooling + Math’](https://www.econlib.org/unschooling-math/). I want to showcase how his article reads to me.someone who believes uncompromisingly that children should be free. Read his first, then mine. Imagine that the following was written by someone from the early 1860s who almost, but not quite, advocates freedom for slaves, chiming in on the debate around abolition.
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Caplan writes about children: “Every day, like it or not, you have to do 1-2 hours of math. No matter how boring you find the subject, you’re too young to decide that you don’t want to pursue a career that requires math.” This isn’t just offensive to children, but even to *mathematicians:* to Caplan, math is not a wondrous area of exploration and creativity, but necessary toil – just like picking crops back in the 19th century. He says himself that he has “never really liked” the “piles” – piles! – of math he has done. Clearly, this has been a torturous experience for him, so why should the next generation be spared?spared this coercion? Worse, he implies that some amount of force is warranted to impose his edict on children since he won’t let them disagree. So… how much force? Does he advocate yelling at one’s child? Maybe taking away privileges and toys? Withholding love and affection? Or would he go even further? He does not specify: bad ideas hide in the unstated, as philosopher Ayn Rand explains.[^1]
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An honest man who steals once in a while is not an honest man. A free man who has to pick crops 1-2 hours a day is not a free man. A free child who has to learn math 1-2 hours a day is not a free child. The whole point of unschooling is (or should be!) freedom, not productivity, career choice, or “merits”, or that freedom “works” or whatever. After all, the reasoning behind abolition was *not* that free men are more productive than slaves (although usually they are). Mix freedom and forced math lessons and you end up with no freedom at all. Like abolition + picking crops, Caplan’s rotten concept “Unschooling + Math”, which he dresses up with the term “keyhole solution”, is a textbook example of mixed premises, and so his vices destroy his virtues. He derides the principled, uncompromising approachstance toward freedom as “staunch”. What is a “staunch” opponent of slavery but *right?*
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This post is a satirical rebuttal of Bryan Caplan’s article [‘Unschooling + Math’](https://www.econlib.org/unschooling-math/). I want to showcase how his article reads to me. Read his first, then mine. Imagine that the following was written by someone from the early 1860s who was on the fence about freeingalmost, but not quite, advocates freedom for slaves, chiming in on the debate around abolition.
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I hope my article shows that Caplan is a tyrant who has no idea what freedom means. He presents himself as someone who cares about freedom, as this reasonable guy who wants to strike a balanced approach, butbalance between the approach of “staunch” advocates of freedom and that of its critics. As a result, his primary concern isn’t freedom at all. Instead, he wants to *grant* freedom on *his* terms: as his child, do math for 2 hours and he will grant you freedom for the rest of the day. He wants to prescribe predefined goals and assuage *parents’ guilt* for using coercion. His concern for their guilt (presumably especially his own) rather than *children’s freedom* betrays him. Whenever someone from the 1860s showed concern for the guilt some slaveholders may have felt for whipping their slaves, rather than showing concern *for the slaves who were being whipped,* one immediately knew whose side that person was on, no matter how much he pretended to care about freedom. Same goes for anyone’s accidental confession in not immediately recognizing the pretense: you could tell they were on the perpetrator’s side.
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Caplan writes:writes about children: “Every day, like it or not, you have to do 1-2 hours of math. No matter how boring you find the subject, you’re too young to decide that you don’t want to pursue a career that requires math.” This isn’t just offensive to children, but even to *mathematicians:* to Caplan, math is not a wondrous area of exploration and creativity, but necessary toil – just like picking crops back in the 19th century. Far worse,He says himself that he has “never really liked” the “piles” – piles! – of math he has done. Clearly, this has been a torturous experience for him, so why should the next generation be spared? Worse, he implies that some amount of force is warranted to enforceimpose his edict on children since he won’t let childrenthem disagree. So… how much force? Does he advocate yelling at one’s child? Maybe taking away privileges and toys? Withholding love and affection? Or would he go even further? He does not specify: bad ideas hide in the unstated, as Ayn Rand explains.[^1]
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Staunch advocates of freedom will reply: So what? Who needs crop-picking skills? In all honesty: anyone who wants to pursue a vast range of occupations. Owning a plantation requires knowledge of how to pick crops. Overseeing crop pickers requires that knowledge.knowledge, too. So does being a crop-harvesting engineer or a field inspector.
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In some ways, black people were better off in the 60s than children are today: Harris strongly implies that what Cooper requests is illegal, but there is no law against forced education of children to this day. On the contrary, in many jurisdictions, the law *demands* such force. [Even the UN demands it.](/posts/the-right-to-education-is-bad) And at leastIn addition, I understand that psychological and scientific ‘findings’ justifying segregation were receding by the 60s, yet Caplan references both psychology and medical science to justify – and shift responsibility for – his stance on children. Also, Cooper doesn’t pretend that his ‘request’ is for the black employee’s own good.↵
↵
Overridinggood, whereas Caplan does just that when it comes to children.↵
↵
Overriding a child’s preferences for his benefit is a contradiction in terms. If learning math is such a good idea, persuade your child. If you fail, then not learning math is his prerogative, just like it is yours not to pick crops, even though people in the 1860s considered it an extremely useful skill. Free people will naturally learn whatever math their own unique problem situation requires, when it requires it, from the basics up to more advanced skills. The scope and timing is going to be different for everyone. But the reason most people don’t do that today is that teachers ruin their relationship with math: a self-fulfilling prophecy. If a teacher leaves children no other way to assert their freedom than to reject math, then that is what they will do, and the teacher has no right to be surprised or to complain.

Caplan writes: “Every day, like it or not, you have to do 1-2 hours of math. No matter how boring you find the subject, you’re too young to decide that you don’t want to pursue a career that requires math.” This isn’t just offensive to children, but even to *mathematicians:* to Caplan, math is not a wondrous area of exploration and creativity, but necessary toil – just like picking crops back in the 19th century. Far worse, he implies that some amount of force is warranted to enforce his edict since he won’t let children disagree. So… how much force? Does he advocate yelling at one’s child? Maybe taking away privileges and toys? Withholding love and affection? Or would he go even further? He does not specify: bad ideas hide in the unstated, as Ayn Rand explains.[^1]
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An honest man who steals once in a while is not an honest man. A free man who has to pick crops 1-2 hours a day is not a free man. A free child who has to learn math 1-2 hours a day is not a free child. The whole point of unschooling is (or should be!) freedom, not productivity, career choice, or “merits”, or that freedom “works” or whatever. Mix freedom and forced math lessons and you end up with no freedom at all. Like abolition + picking crops, Caplan’s rotten “Unschooling + Math”, which he hides behinddresses up with thepretty term “keyhole solution”, is a textbook example of mixed premises, and so his vices destroy his virtues. He derides the principled, uncompromising approach as “staunch”. What is a “staunch” opponent of slavery but *right?*
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At first, freedom sounds like social-desirability bias run amok: ‘Oh sure, every slave *loves* to learn, it’s just society that failsslaveholders who fail them!’ And I hate social-desirability bias, so I’m tempted to reject freedom.
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Almost every slaveholder is horrified by the idea of freedom. Dr. Samuel A. Cartwright [says](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drapetomania) that slaves only flee captivity because they are mentally ill. Even most slaves reject the idea of freedom. Advocates insist, however, that freedom works. Psychologistsit works, and psychologists eloquently defend the merits of freedom.its merits. According to advocates of freedom, slaves area slave is naturally curious. Given freedom, theyOnce freed, a former slave won’t just learn basic skills; they’llskills, they argue – he’ll ultimately find a calling.
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In moral matters, one has to aim for nothing less than absolute purity. Those of us who have fully understood and integrated the factmoral truth that the universality of freedom applies to children just as much as it does to adults, recognize Caplan’s error with lightning speed – and judge accordingly.
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An honest man who steals once in a while is not an honest man. A free man who has to pick crops 1-2 hours a day is not a free man. A free child who has to learn math 1-2 hours a day is not a free child. The whole point of unschooling is (or should be!) freedom, not productivity, career choice, or “merits”, or that freedom “works” or whatever. Mix freedom and forced math lessons and you end up with no freedom at all. Like abolition + picking crops, Caplan’s rotten “Unschooling + Math”, which he hides behind the pretty term “keyhole solution”, is a textbook example of mixed premises, and so his vices destroy his virtues. He derides the principled, uncompromising approach as “staunch”. What is a “staunch” opponent of slavery but *right?* In*right?*↵
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In moral matters, one has to aim for nothing less than absolute purity. Those of us who have fully understood and integrated the fact that the universality of freedom applies to children just as much as it does to adults, recognize Caplan’s error with lightning speed – and judge accordingly.
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An honest man who steals once in a while is not an honest man. A free man who has to pick crops 1-2 hours a day is not a free man. A free child who has to learn math 1-2 hours a day is not a free child. The whole point of unschooling is (or should be!) freedom, not productivity, career choice, or “merits”, or that freedom “works” or whatever. Mix freedom and forced math lessons and you end up with no freedom at all. Like abolition + picking crops, Caplan’s rotten “Unschooling + Math”, hiddenwhich he hides behind the pretty term “keyhole solution”, is a textbook example of mixed premises, and so his vices destroy his virtues. He derides the principled, uncompromising approach as “staunch”. What is a “staunch” opponent of slavery but *right?* In moral matters, one has to aim for nothing less than absolute purity. Those of us who have fully understood and integrated the fact that the universality of freedom applies to children just as much as it does to adults, recognize Caplan’s error with lightning speed – and judge accordingly.
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Caplan writes: “Every day, like it or not, you have to do 1-2 hours of math. No matter how boring you find the subject, you’re too young to decide that you don’t want to pursue a career that requires math.” This isn’t just offensive to children, but even to *mathematicians*:*mathematicians:* to Caplan, math is not a wondrous area of exploration and creativity, but necessary toil – just like picking crops back in the 19th century. Far worse, he implies that some amount of force is warranted to enforce his edict since he won’t let children disagree. So… how much force? Does he advocate yelling at one’s child? Maybe taking away privileges and toys? Or would he go even further? He does not specify: bad ideas hide in the unstated, as Ayn Rand explains.[^1]
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I hope my article shows that Caplan is a tyrant who has no idea what freedom means. He presents himself as someone who cares about freedom, as this reasonable guy who wants a balanced approach, but his primary concern isn’t freedom at all. Instead, he wants to *grant* freedom on *his* terms: do math for 2 hours and he will grant you freedom for the rest of the day. He wants to prescribe predefined goals and assuage *parents’ guilt* for using coercion. His concern for their guilt (presumably especially his own) rather than *children’s freedom* betrays him. Whenever someone from the 1860s showed concern for the guilt some slaveholders may have felt for whipping their slaves, one immediately knew whose side that person was on, no matter how much he pretended to care about freedom. Same goes for anyone’s accidental confession in not immediately recognizing the pretense: you could tell they were on the perpetrator’s side.
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An honest man who steals once in a while is not an honest man. A free man who has to pick crops 1-2 hours a day is not a free man. A free child who has to learn math 1-2 hours a day is not a free child. The whole point of unschooling is (or should be!) freedom, not productivity, career choice, or “merits”, or that freedom “works” or whatever. Mix freedom and forced math lessons and you end up with no freedom at all. Like abolition + picking crops, Caplan’s “Unschooling + Math”Math”, hidden behind the term “keyhole solution”, is a textbook example of mixed premises, and so his vices destroy his virtues. He derides the principled, uncompromising approach as “staunch”. What is a “staunch” opponent of slavery but *right?* In moral matters, one has to aim for nothing less butthan absolute purity. Those of us who have fully understood and integrated the fact that the universality of freedom applies to children just as much as it does to adults, recognize Caplan’s error with lightning speed – and judge accordingly.
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