Original sin and the wrath of progressive educators

Katharine Birbalsingh is no stranger to controversy. Dubbed 'the UK's strictest head-teacher', she is a co-founder of Michaela Community School, based in Wembley, one of London's most disadvantaged areas. The principles by which the school is governed are unashamedly conservative and traditional: rote learning, teacher-centred lessons, a classical, knowledge-heavy curriculum and tight discipline. Silent corridors and sanctions for minor infractions figure among its more controversial policies. The overall moral and philosophical orientation of the school is often perceived as being diametrically opposed to the progressive ‘orthodoxy’ of the education world. Shortly after the school was founded, some discontents went as far as to picket outside the school and intimidate pupils. 

Progressive ire notwithstanding, the school is currently oversubscribed, despite the presence of many other schools in the same area. Exam results have been outstanding so far. Visitors to the school (myself included) note that its atmosphere is calm and purposeful, and that its pupils are welcoming, well-behaved and well-spoken. The contrast with state schools in similarly impoverished neighbourhoods, where poor behaviour and even chaos and violence are the rule rather than the exception, could not be greater. 

A few days ago, Ms. Birbalsingh tweeted the following:

The tweet was met with an avalanche of outrage, including insults and calls for her resignation, with politicians and educators joining the fray. But this recent incident is still worth reflecting on, because it shines a clear light on the profound chasm that separates Ms. Birbalsingh’s supporters from her detractors, and more broadly, social conservatives from progressives. The disagreement isn’t over tedious technicalities. As a Scottish politician noted disapprovingly, her comments were “the opposite of my world view”. A person’s ‘world view’ has to do with how they conceive of Reality and their place in it, and with what they consider to be a good human life. While not religious herself, Ms. Birbalsingh self-consciously appealed to a Christian teaching about what it means to be human: the doctrine of ‘original sin’ holds that human beings are innately inclined towards evil. Or, to paraphrase St Augustine, our loves are naturally disordered. We naturally tend to love ourselves and our own selfish interests more than our fellow men and women and their well-being, and more than God, who is Goodness itself. Augustine mercilessly mocked the supposed ‘innocence’ of children: “It can hardly be right for a child, even at that age, to cry for everything, including things which would harm him; to work himself into a tantrum against people older than himself and not required to obey him; and to try his best to strike and hurt others who know better than he does.” Confessions

We may laugh at the antics of young children, but they often stem from the same psychological drives that lead adults to use and abuse one another.

Ms. Birbalsingh may not share the Christian hope of full redemption from sin through Christ. But she firmly believes (as would have Augustine) that the corrosive effects of original sin can be limited, if children are “habituated” into choosing the right from a young age, through a robust moral education. Explicit boundaries and high expectations may not eradicate sin at its root, but they may go some way towards cultivating self-control, and reordering our desires and inclinations towards the Good.

Original sin is a distinctly Christian notion, but despite a few (misguided) accusations of religious indoctrination in the responses to her tweet, I suspect there is more to the inflamed reaction to her comments than mere anti-Christian animus. Ancient Platonic and Stoic philosophers taught that true happiness consisted in a kind of reconciliation to Reality, whereby human beings recover their proper place in the kosmos, a divinely-ordered, hierarchical universe. This means fully embracing what makes us distinctively human, that is, our rational soul. Though subject to the powerful forces of emotion and desire like animals, we are uniquely capable of ruling over these ‘passions’ through knowledge and the intellect. But this capacity is a mere potential in young children, who behave just like brute beasts if left to themselves. Their humanity must be actualised through education, by which they learn to be fully human, a long and arduous process. Christianity joins Hellenistic philosophy in affirming the profound mismatch between what we objectively ought to be and what we naturally are (though it is sceptical as to the sufficiency of moral education alone).

It is precisely this point that Ms. Birbalsingh’s progressive opponents cannot countenance, and which they find so offensive. Their vision of the good life is best captured by popular slogans like ‘be yourself’, ‘you do you’ ‘believe in yourself’. The good life, in their view, is the authentic life, which naturally springs from our inclinations, rather than being forced out of us by the dictates of headmasters or priests. To suggest that there is a pre-existing, transcendent standard, of which our natural selves fall well short and to which our lives ought to be aligned through education, is the height of cruelty.

When moral disagreements run so deep, one can hardly hope that the cultural battles currently dividing Western societies will soon come to an end. But if we can’t resolve our differences, we can at least try to articulate them.