"The government has convinced parents that at some point it's no longer their responsibility. And in fact, they force them, in many respects, to turn their children over to the public education system and wrest control from them and block them out of participation of that. That has to change or education will not improve in this country"
About this Quote
Santorum’s quote isn’t really about curriculum; it’s about custody. The argumentative engine here is a familiar conservative populist frame: the state has not merely built schools, it has quietly repossessed children. Words like “convinced,” “force,” “wrest control,” and “block” turn education policy into a story of coercion and dispossession, casting parents as rightful owners and government as an interloper with bureaucratic muscle. That’s why the line lands: it converts a messy, incremental system (zoning rules, attendance laws, union contracts, federal standards) into a clean moral drama with villains, victims, and an urgent demand for reclamation.
The subtext is a referendum on authority in American life. “Public education” isn’t just a neutral institution; it’s a proxy for secular expertise, cultural liberalism, and the suspicion that elites are shaping children’s values. By insisting parents have been “blocked out of participation,” Santorum primes the listener to feel not merely dissatisfied but shut out, a politically potent emotion that turns policy debates into identity politics: whose kid is this, whose culture is being transmitted, whose norms win?
Context matters, too. Santorum rose as a culture-war Catholic conservative in an era when battles over sex ed, evolution, school prayer, and later Common Core and “parental rights” legislation increasingly defined education talk. His closing ultimatum - “That has to change or education will not improve” - is strategic: it ties academic outcomes to a governance shift, smuggling privatization-friendly conclusions (choice, vouchers, homeschooling, local control) into what sounds like a commonsense plea for involvement. The point isn’t incremental reform; it’s to re-legitimize parental sovereignty as the default setting and make the public system defend its very right to exist.
The subtext is a referendum on authority in American life. “Public education” isn’t just a neutral institution; it’s a proxy for secular expertise, cultural liberalism, and the suspicion that elites are shaping children’s values. By insisting parents have been “blocked out of participation,” Santorum primes the listener to feel not merely dissatisfied but shut out, a politically potent emotion that turns policy debates into identity politics: whose kid is this, whose culture is being transmitted, whose norms win?
Context matters, too. Santorum rose as a culture-war Catholic conservative in an era when battles over sex ed, evolution, school prayer, and later Common Core and “parental rights” legislation increasingly defined education talk. His closing ultimatum - “That has to change or education will not improve” - is strategic: it ties academic outcomes to a governance shift, smuggling privatization-friendly conclusions (choice, vouchers, homeschooling, local control) into what sounds like a commonsense plea for involvement. The point isn’t incremental reform; it’s to re-legitimize parental sovereignty as the default setting and make the public system defend its very right to exist.
Quote Details
| Topic | Parenting |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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