Indoctrinate: Flipping The Script On The New Culture War

An image of a sign in an article about the the word indoctrinate that says, "dumbed down, brainwashed, misled and divided."

You’ll often hear the word indoctrinate going into the 2024 presidential election. But it’s time to flip the script on the words indoctrinate and indoctrination. The word indoctrinate means to teach a person or a group a set of beliefs without question.

Think about what’s happened over the last few years. Many Republican politicians and conservatives use the word indoctrination like it’s some proven practice. There was and is media coverage and school boards discussing gender identity, transgender students, and how public schools indoctrinate kids around these issues.

It Didn’t Come Out Of Nowhere

Millions of dollars were spent putting out messaging in conservative media by conservative groups, running ads on Facebook and other platforms. Moms for Liberty and the Heritage Foundation, and other conservative activists were brought together to create this crisis.

And that’s what it is, a manufactured crisis. But a manufactured crisis is not going to have any desired result without the millions of dollars being dumped into putting out misinformation about what’s happening in public schools. The people doing this want an entire country of indoctrinated citizens.

Teachers are just trying to teach the subjects they teach. Staff are just trying to support students. They are not indoctrinating our children.

Republicans Are The Ones

Republicans are the ones who have been doing the indoctrination, and we need to call it out. Many Republican politicians and their conservative supporters have accused public school teachers of engaging in indoctrination. They are using things like Critical Race Theory. CRT is not taught in a single K through 12 public school in America.

What they do is take Critical Race Theory and conflate it with diversity, equity, and inclusion. But you and I know every great teacher you ever had always modeled diversity, equity, and inclusion. And, of course, Republican politicians and conservatives bundle that into the word wokeness.

Republican politicians indoctrinate millions of supporters into beliefs they don’t question. Well, it’s time we flip the script. We need to use the word indoctrination when we talk about them. Messaging is important.

We have a year to prepare for the November 2024 presidential election, and you’ll often hear the words indoctrinate and indoctrination. Republican politicians and conservatives base their use of the word on a foundation of lies. We can use the word on them, too; we know it’s based on fact.