Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Consequences of Aliteracy

I currently have a professor who has mentioned the topic of aliteracy in the U.S. several times.  Aliteracy is when a person knows how to read, but chooses not to.  It turns out that aliteracy is a growing problem in the U.S.  Evidently, even a significant percentage of highly educated Americans are too apathetic to take time to read.  This includes those in high positions, like CEOs.  Obviously, this is related to the education problem we have in the U.S.  I have identified some less obvious problems that are very likely caused by this epidemic of aliteracy.

One problem I have noticed is that most small business owners in the U.S. do not seem to have any knowledge of labor law.  In addition, a vast majority of lower level retail managers (below store level) do not know labor law either.  The result is that small business owners won't ask your sexual orientation (which is only prohibited in a few states) in an interview, but they will ask if you are a student, if you have a family, and if you have transportation to work, even though all of these are prohibited by Federal law.  In addition, companies like WalMart (I have seen this myself) often have signs up stating that they will not hire anyone who will not work on Sundays, even though Federal law considers this to be religious discrimination, unless the business can prove that hiring the person would cause "undue hardship."  (Given their profit margins and size, WalMart would have an extremely hard time convincing a judge that having a few employees who will not work Sundays would cause undue hardship.)

Anyhow, I have had personal experience with these problems, and I always stand up for my legal rights, because if no one does, then they will never learn.  Also, I am protected by anti-retaliation laws that prohibit any kind of disciplinary action based on my assertion of my rights.  Thankfully, I have never been challenged on this (I have caused my managers some grief, but they know better than to doubt that I know what I am talking about).

So, the point of all of this is that aliteracy is, among other things, destroying many of our legal rights.  First, business owners and managers are too lazy to take the time to learn how they are supposed to treat employees.  Second, employees are too lazy to learn their legal rights.  So, in my experience, most workplaces for entry level jobs often treat their employees in ways that are illegal, and the employees, while they recognize the unfairness of the treatment, do not realize that they can do something about it.  The only times that anything is done about this is when someone like me overhears something clearly illegal going on and reports it (and, I have done this before, resulting in around $15,000 in fines to a company that was violating child labor laws designed to protect minors).  People in a truly literate civilization do not jump into legally complex arenas, like business ownership or management, without doing their research to make sure they are operating within their legal limitations.

I have argued in the past that reading is the single most important skill that students can learn in school.  I would like to add an addendum to that statement.  First, reading is the most important skill that schools can teach our children.  Second, however, if the methods they employ to teach reading discourage the actual use of that skill, then the skill has little value.  Thus, reading is the most important skill that schools can teach our children, but for this to be effective, it must be taught in a way that encourages liberal use of the skill.  There is no skill that has any value if it is rarely or never used, and reading is no exception.


Stay tuned.  I am not finished on this subject.  It turns out that New Zealand has the highest literacy rate and  lowest aliteracy rate in the world.  I am currently researching their program for teaching reading, and it looks very promising.  I will be posting an article on my findings in the near future.

Lord Rybec

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