What if you were on a ship going down slowly, and knew that if the load were lighter more people would/could be saved? This was the first of many "Values Clarification Exercises" I participated in during my teenage years in Minnesota. I was a newcomer in school at the end of the previous year in 1973. I returned to school in the fall and something strange had occurred. All of the ninth grade English teachers had changed their names to their maiden names, left their bras at home (liking tight turtleneck sweaters - it's Minnesota dontchaknow), put Ms. in front of their new names and taught us girls how to roar...boys how to observe girls roaring. We also played the values clarification game.
Values clarification teaches that behavior should be the result of free, uninfluenced, autonomous choice, based on personal analysis of a given situation coupled with the moment's emotions and desires. Phew. What it meant for me was that I, and my classmates, were to decide who was to live and who would have to die. The fun began by everyone "opening up and getting to know one another". Like "group"...and I hate group, still. "They" (from now on, "They", will be our beautiful and braless NewFeminists) wanted us to reveal what was important to us, or cherished. Then a multitude of moral dilemmas were thrown at the class. Questions became increasingly personal and difficult. Casual polls were taken and minority classmates were pressured to abandon their convictions and join the crowd. Also, sharing personal information with other classmates demanded personal comparisons be made - which always breeds discontent - and usually "we" took that home. I see now that was the intent. And this is only part One of the "Exercises"!!!
Later we were encouraged to publicly affirm our positions on various subjects such as drug use and abortion and our right to not go to church with our parents. The teachers bombarded the students with a host of new and more challenging dilemmas and various solutions. All of this, and more was to prepare us for the ultimate decision making moment of our young lives. We were on a ship which was slowly going down. Many and various "types" of people were on the ship. Each day a new problem arose and someone "had to go".... they would be eaten or thrown overboard, depending on the day, of course. Who was more important to keep? The doctor, the cook? the fisherman, the child? Well, even though we were children ourselves everyone reluctantly agreed that the child should go first.
WhywhyWhy am I thinking about values clarification after all these years? I think it is because I was recently reminded that in that very same school year, those very same jigglyMsTeachers asked me to play Anne in their play Diary of Anne Frank. After all the cleaning up of scattered values, we were encouraged to agree with Anne that, "Despite everything, I believe that people are really good at heart." I was ...a curious new young feminist, for sure.
The obvious contradiction did not escape me then, and is still alive and kicking it seems. The Doctrine of Changing of Values (or abandoning them), even, is devouring our children... and all of us. Our children are expected to accept everything and everyone as reasonable as long as "no one is hurt". But then "hurt" must be newly defined. People are demanding that I agree to change the definition of marriage. Some people want me to vote for drug tests for welfare recipients. Some folks want me to agree that all the illegal aliens in our land of freedom must be sent "home". Some people want me to be outraged that a former-heavy-drinker is getting a liver transplant.
Some of my friends want me to believe that despite all the murder, stealing, rape and war, that people are really good at heart.
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