Turns out I was a lazy bastard who didn't do any walking today. I plan to go out for a full, conscience-cleansing walk tomorrow—somewhere between 18K and 25K along a local path. Earlier today, while I sat in the shadows of my studio, I wrote the following post for the r/Homeschool sub on Reddit:
I still consider myself new to Reddit (been on for only a few weeks—don't be fooled by my fallacious "cookie day" notation—I did not join Reddit in 2020, and I have no idea where Reddit got that notion from); been here for a bit under a month. Am learning a lot from the parents/homeschoolers who post here.
I've also ventured over to the teachers' subreddit... and I have to say that it's like night and day. Here at the homeschool sub, you've got people who excitedly post things like "Look at this new thing I did!"—be it a teaching strategy or whatever. Over at the teachers' sub, though, at least 7 out of 10 posts are some version of "I'm quitting." Gloom and doom.
Let me unpack that, though. First, I don't blame a teacher for quitting. I'm a former teacher myself, and I know how thankless the job can be: the bad-egg students fling shit upwards at you; the parents and administration (always kissing the parents' asses) fling shit downwards at you. There's no escape, and to survive, you have to be relentlessly, almost pathologically positive. Who can maintain that? So I don't blame the people at the teachers' sub for expressing a desire to quit. That said, the teachers' subreddit is not what I'd call an environment brimming with positivity.
Second, I think the teachers' sub is actually great in how it serves as a living testament to why people choose homeschooling to begin with. As that subreddit (and its negativity) grows, the evidence that homeschooling may be a better path grows with it. Now, homeschooling isn't something you just blithely jump into, obviously, and it's not for everyone, nor is it the only educational alternative. But it's a legitimate alternative just the same. And I think that's great!
Anyway, I'm starting to think of this homeschool message board as my "home" subreddit; it's the first subreddit I visit and the last one I leave. I find the place educational, and as I said, I enjoy the overall positivity here. I'm not saying that every post here needs to be relentlessly positive; homeschooling has its nasty aspects, too, and people should feel free to vent here or anywhere. My point, though, is that, assuming people post on Reddit by choice, then it's obvious the majority of the people in this subreddit choose to be positive. And that says something.
Just wanted to put that out there. Thank you.
Kevin Kim, Think Like a Teacher
For as much as Reddit is considered a cesspit, I see people on it who are sincerely trying. I've had only one unpleasant encounter on the r/Homeschool boards—someone who didn't like the idea of me flogging my book, which I actually understand: people who sell stuff come off as parasites. I stayed civil, invited that person to provide me with constructive suggestions as to where—off Reddit—I might sell my book... and I haven't heard from that person since. Meantime, the above comment has sparked some interesting reactions from former teachers who left teaching so they could homeschool, and they haven't looked back. I wasn't joking about how educational the r/Homeschool board has been; I had no real clue about the panoply of resources available to parents out there. If I do a second edition of my book, I'll try to incorporate some of what I've learned.
That said, I've seen a slew of YouTube videos about how Reddit has become largely a playground for fat masturbators in basements and for kid-loving pervs (the current term for such people seems to be "groomer"). Reddit, as a medium, may be dying, but a bit like Twitter, it's dying very slowly. It's as if I had happened upon the Roman Empire a few years after the barbarians had begun to breach the walls. Well, I'll enjoy it and learn from it while I can, I guess. Reddit has a few years of life left in it.
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