|
| As property tax payer on ag land in two states (iowa, mn) it never ceases to amaze me how much money goes to schools each year. its a significant cost per acre. I used to jokingly call it extortion. However, i recently learned that an unnamed popular social media farmer influencer from west central Minnesota was homeschooled. His content includes him and his father "telling farmings story" After his content being filtered to me and discovering he is a product of his families own homeschool curriculum... I somehow I have become more at peace with offering up thousands to public schools. Public school teaches humility in ways a homeschool curriculum never could. You stand in line with kids whose families have nothing. You sit next to kids whose parents work two jobs. You deal with people who don’t care who your grandparents were or how much land/iron your last name is attached to. And eventually you learn a simple truth, bragging about generational wealth doesn’t make you impressive...it makes you look childish. Public schools, at minimum, expose you to people who are richer than you, poorer than you, smarter than you, funnier than you, and absolutely unimpressed by you. That exposure does something miraculous.. it prevents the development of the personality type best described as a 30 something toddler who can't get over his families success. Toddler because he screams like one... his mothers curriculum never taught him what an indoor voice was. (another thing public school naturally takes care of). Can't get over his families success because day after day he is repeatedly almost out of breath saying "WOOWWWW" as he pans across the grain setup or machinery line. After seeing his father start to post alongside son I see how being raised in a microcosm of arrogance would produce a 30 something who screams like toddler and say WOWW when he looks at the grain leg everyday. He learned to be impressed with himself from his father who clearly can't get over panning across the 24 row planters and grain setups with his phone daily.
And the worst part isn’t even the arrogance. It’s the way he makes videos mocking the people who actually do the work.. the hired hands doing task work/menial jobs like power washing.. the people running equipment, laying under equipment fixing things, loading grain, doing the daily grind that keeps the place moving. There’s something especially ugly about a kid born into generational wealth cackling like a hyena while he films people who depend on the job for a paycheck. I feel like there was a humble grandparent in the generations before who probably milked cows and raised hogs who would hit him with a shovel if he saw him mocking/cackling like a hyena at a hired hand covered from head to toe in mud. Public school would’ve corrected that fast. Because in a real classroom, the kid you’re mocking today is the kid sitting next to you tomorrow. The kid you think you’re better than might be smarter than you, tougher than you, or just more well- liked/ popular than than you. And you learn pretty quickly that humiliating people for doing work isn’t funny it just makes you look small. That’s the lesson he missed. Not math. Not history. Just basic social awareness. The ability to recognize that respect is earned by how you treat people, not by how many acres or quadtracs your last name is connected to. It appears there is enough generational wealth to buffer him from having to enter the real world in his lifetime where respect is earned. Before anyone says, “Well, he’s more successful than you because he started an online channel,” it’s worth remembering that popularity and personal development have never been the same thing. The internet has made that distinction almost historic in scale. A person can accumulate sponsorships, followers, and ad revenue while still possessing the emotional regulation of a toddler. Social media measures attention not character....it rewards volume, exaggeration, and spectacle long before it rewards humility, self awareness, or dignity. You can absolutely become a wildly successful online personality while remaining, in every meaningful human sense, an exhausting and deeply underdeveloped /toxic person. History is full of court jesters who drew crowds. That didn’t make them wise. Popular youtubers can be abject failures as humans. That’s why so many actual working farmers cringe at this influencer/influencers families behavior. Not out of jealousy, but secondhand embarrassment. Anyone who has been through tough days on the farm knows that this isn't "telling agricultures story" I fear that this is what the publics perception of farming really is. So this year as I hand off more dollars per acre to public schools than ever. I have a little less regret and a little more respect for the institution. yes the curriculum may be questionable, the teachers over paid.. public schools may not teach cursive anymore, but they still teach something far more important.. how not to grow up into a self-absorbed 30 something year old who screams like a toddler. | |
|
Property Taxes on Farmland... A case FOR public schools
