Cultural Osmosis
by Kernon Gibes
My sister-in-law was giving an IQ test to my daughter. You know — the usual sort of battery of questions. Nothing unusual or interesting about it, I suppose. She had to explain what various words meant, or repeat back a series of numbers from memory, or detail how two things were similar or dissimilar.
Occasionally there are controversies over the proposition that standardized tests have a cultural bias. I always assumed that such arguments were aimed at explaining why, for example, various minorities score poorly relative to other groups. The idea that there's actual much truth to these allegations was the furthest thing from my mind as I went about my business, only remotely registering the firing of questions at my dear eight-year-old's side of the table. And then I heard it.
"Explain why it's important for the government to inspect meat before it is sold to the public."
What?
Say again?
My mind raced. What might she say? Would she answer: to give jobs to bureaucrats who otherwise might not be able to hold down a job?
The test continued:
"Describe the sorts of problems caused when science and technology advance too fast."
Huh?
What was that?
What was her answer? Would she say: that people who believe that society owes them a living might be displaced from an unneeded, outmoded occupation?
It seems that there is a cultural bias to some of the questions after all! But it wasn't the culture of a cadre of dead white males — it was the cultural of the "nanny state."
Parents can take various active steps to combat socialistic ideology, but these tend to be effective against concerted, overt statist indoctrination. The presumptions of the nanny state, though, are omnipresent. They are like the air we breathe. Even questions on an IQ test invoke these unquestioned and unquestionable assumptions.
The ideas of statism don't have to be taught with anything approach rigor or evangelism. They permeate our cultural. In the absence of inoculating Enlightenment ideas, they seep into the souls of the unsuspecting. By a kind of conceptual osmosis, they diffuse from the media, movies, magazines, and yes, even IQ tests, into the minds of the young. The question is not whether the government should or should not be inspecting meat. The question is only why they should inspect meat before it is sold to the public. And if you don't know the correct answer? Well — then — let's knock a few points off your score. You dummy.
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