The recent demonstrations by parents against the teaching of critical race theory and the failed attempt by Governor Ducey to ban it, warrants a more careful analysis and public discussion of the issues. As a parent I expect children to be "woken up" in the classroom in whatever subject being studied. Stimulating and open debate about key historical events is vital to a student's intellectual and emotional maturity and growth. The key factor here is the objectivity of the teacher. We expect teachers to be well-trained and well-educated. To stimulate good discussion a teacher might "provoke" students by pretending to express unusual ideas outside the norm to get them thinking. This is acceptable. Our schools should not become the propaganda tool of the establishment. Two teachers teaching the same subject may also differ in their interpretation of the facts and this is valuable so that students are encouraged to make up their own minds based on those facts. If a teacher is merely the proponent of a particular set of political values or historical interpretations and beliefs then how far off is that from brainwashing?

There should be controversy. We accept that a Christian school based on Lutheranism or Catholicism will teach its own particular version of the religion. I once heard a story of a Religious Education teacher at a well known Catholic school in Phoenix who explained to her students that if they failed to believe in the divinity of Christ, they were likely to go to hell to which one bright student replied, "Well, I don't believe in hell. I'm Jewish." A good lesson for everyone concerned. Imagine the outburst of vitriol in 19th Century when Charles Darwin published The Origin of Species and how long it was before anyone dared teach his ideas in a school. The whole aim of education should be to make students "think." Healthy debate in the classroom, where children are encouraged to listen as much as to speak, is educationally appropriate and necessary.

The alarm expressed by some at the idea of "woke culture" seems out of place. Why is it bad that someone may have woken up to ignored or suppressed ideas? The teaching of slavery comes up frequently as a "woke" topic and causes controversy. But the fact is that slavery was instrumental to the founding of America because there weren't enough people to pick the tobacco or the cotton. As an institution it made money and it was cruel and degrading and ran counter to the Constitution. People need to be less fearful of ideas which might make them or their ancestors look bad. What complicates "woke culture" even more is that every country teaches its children its own version of the past. It's a sensitive topic and school text books are carefully chosen and monitored for what is deemed "correctness." We are supposed to learn the good not the bad. But individual knowledge is never static and our own store of it changes from cradle to grave, helping us grow up and see and understand life more fully. It is part of our moral digestion. So, if you teach the truth about the Holocaust, as you should do, you must do the same for Hiroshima or Wounded Knee or My Lai.

The idea of being "woke" isn't really new. The last three thousand years are full of examples of periods when people woke up to new ideas and were transformed. The Greek awakening created our world. Christianity woke millions up with its compassion and changed the Roman world. The Renaissance woke up Western Europe from its medieval slumbers and then the Enlightenment in the 17th century did the same, setting off the scientific revolution. So being "woke" is surely not a sin or to be rejected but part of a wider process which brought us all to this point in time. Our universities are actually there for that purpose. Our professors and lecturers are hopefully the most "awake" people in their discipline.

Ignorance can be a prison. Growing up in England, I was never made to think seriously about England's colonial past or how the big country houses were often built and paid for from the profits of slavery and colonization. I learned about Kings and Queens but nobody asked me whether it was right The Queen is the largest legal land owner in the world. I loved movies about the Wild West but never learned until later they might be construed as exercises in propaganda to justify the ethnic cleansing of native Americans. Only by questioning and learning do we achieve a better understanding of the past and our world and as members of a democracy hopefully become better equipped to bring about and accept meaningful change. Otherwise, along with society, we are in danger of stagnating in our prejudices and ignorance.

"What did you learn today?" was a parental question which echoed through my childhood. I have tried to retain the habit. Learning should be exciting and transformative. How will it change me? Yesterday I read a statement by Wittgenstein, probably the most significant philosopher of the 20th century, confessing, "How hard I find it is to see what is right in front of my eyes." So simple and yet makes you look at life differently. What am I not seeing? A Nobel prize was awarded this year for the discovery of "asymmetric organocatalysis"? What's that? Those fighting "woke culture" surely cannot want us all to fall back into the darkness of ignorance. Isn't "Woke culture" part of a personal journey on the road to enlightenment? Being "woke" must be more interesting than staring at a blank wall. In the same book, Wittgenstein wrote "Our greatest stupidities may be very wise." Given the political scene of late I'm " woking" hard on the meaning of that.