Back to Basics is Backwards
It’s weird — I don’t want to keep shitting on conservatives.
But here we are. Again.
If you’re a conservative in Ontario and you’re upset about the education system your kids are stuck in, stop blaming the usual boogeymen.
It’s not LGBT content.
It’s not “liberal indoctrination.”
It’s not political correctness poisoning their innocent little minds.
None of that is what’s keeping your kids from thriving.
The real problem?
Conservative policies that keep dragging education backwards.
The obsession with cursive over computer literacy.
The outdated discipline models.
The constant calls to “get back to basics,” which is just code for turning the clock back to when *we* were kids — as if that was some golden age of learning.
Let’s be honest: our education wasn’t that great.
I couldn’t sit still.
I couldn’t focus.
Half my friends never made it out of high school.
And these are the days you want to return to?
If anything *was* better back then, it had nothing to do with phonics worksheets or multiplication drills. It was the social stuff. The human stuff.
We had field trips.
Overnight excursions.
Game days.
Assemblies.
Music programs.
Real money in classrooms.
Actual resources.
That’s what made school special. That’s what created memories.
That’s what made kids feel connected enough to try.
And that’s exactly what’s been gutted — by the same people who now want to pretend that “wokeness” is the issue.
Conservatives always expect schools to do more with less and magically produce better outcomes. It doesn’t work like that. It has never worked like that.
And let me be clear — it’s not the teachers.
Well… sometimes it is. Every profession has its duds. But most of the time, they’re doing the best they can with what they’ve got. And what they’ve got isn’t much.
If you’re sick of the lazy photocopied worksheets your kid brings home — the ones they call “science” — don’t blame the teacher. They’re basically handed a room and told, “Teach.” That’s it.
There are no resources.
There is no structure.
The curriculum isn’t a curriculum — it’s a checklist. Literally a point-form list of topics to “cover.”
Not lessons.
Not experiments.
Not experiences.
Just bullet points.
Your child’s education relies almost entirely on the ability, creativity, and stamina of the individual teacher standing in front of them. That’s it. No system, no scaffolding, no support.
I teach karate. Our system is built so that anyone with basic qualifications can share what we do. The structure is strong. The curriculum is complete. The lessons practically teach themselves — and when you pair that with amazing people who care, we produce new black belts twice a year.
Imagine if schools were built like that.
Imagine if teachers had that kind of support.
Imagine if the system actually helped them succeed instead of setting them up to fail.
But we don’t have that.
We just blame them for the mess politicians created.
And don’t even get me started on Doug Ford.
The very first thing he did in his first term was roll back the sex-ed curriculum to something like 1997.
Nineteen-ninety-seven.
Our kids have supercomputers in their pockets.
They’re dealing with bullying that follows them home, 24/7.
They’re navigating sexting, explicit content, predators, identity, boundaries — real, modern issues.
And the answer — according to Doug — was to pretend none of it exists.
Make it make sense.
But hey, I didn’t vote for him.
Did he even go to college?
Oh right — he flunked out.
Nepo baby energy.
How is *this guy* qualified to make decisions about education?
He should do what he did during COVID:
step to the back of the stage
and let the adults do the work.
But what do I know?
I just do this stuff for a living.
So go ahead — fact check me.