Talk:Lies to children

Examples

I feel like we need a few more, please add ones as you see fit.Samstr (talk) 02:51, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

As the BON who posted the "Everything about every religion ever", I admit I put near zero effort into my addition. However I do feel there is quite a bit a validity in my point about lies to children and religion, even if I was a bit hyperbolic. 208.29.163.248 (talk) 23:23, 24 October 2014 (UTC)

I'm afraid that I read it as sarcasm. I thought that you were saying that religion wasn't lies. So tpp hyperbolic for me. Rewrite it in. please. but see if you can find a way of making it more aah… obvious. Cheers! Scream!! (talk) 23:51, 24 October 2014 (UTC)

Personally I would like to see more examples for religion. Perhaps something about souls or the afterlife? I went to a Unitarian church so I honestly don't know what sort of things they talk about in Sunday schools. (We just learned about every major world religion, I knew what every religion believed, except for the Unitarians.)

Ummm....

"Lies to children" is an idiom coined by specific people with a specific meaning. I don't think that the current text of the article represents it correctly. It seems that it takes the literal meaning of the phrase too seriously and then tries to shoehorn all kinds of misconceptions-taught-in-US-schools under that label.--ZooGuard (talk) 10:48, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

The article as it stands now seems more like funspace material than serious material, yes. Nullahnung (talk) 10:59, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

I was thinking much the same, but maybe essay space? It's a trivia list, not an article. ΨΣΔξΣΓΩΙÐ^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 11:25, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

That makes sense to me. I think it could still be a useful topic for an article, but perhaps it should be expanded to focus more on reasons that these misconceptions are taught, rather than what they actually are. I suppose I got a little bit carried away with specific misconceptions when I really should have focused on general oversimplifications.^{— Unsigned, by: Samstr / talk / contribs} 16:19, 25 October 2014‎ (UTC)

Puritans

Hey everyone, why was the Puritan stuff in history removed? American history books tend to gloss over a lot of the darker parts of the Puritan's history (killing Quakers, oppressing Catholics in the US, slaughtering Irish and Native Americans, etc.) Wouldn't it be more accurate to say they left England because they couldn't persecute others rather than they were persecuted?--BlackProg (talk) 11:52, October 25, 2014

No, not really. It's just replacing one cosy oversimplified narrative with another. Wẽãšẽĩõĩď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 12:10, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

Ah okay, thanks man!--BlackProg (talk) 12:25, October 25, 2014

told to children

Aren't these more "popular misconceptions"? Are elementary schoolchildren really taught about quantum entanglement?

Also this is a bit America-centric. For example, every British schoolchild knows that the US entered the war just when it was about to end that the only important people on the side of God were the British.--Bob^{"I think you'll find it's more complicated than that."} 14:33, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

See the "Ummm" section above.--ZooGuard (talk) 14:38, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

So shall we yank it? ΨΣΔξΣΓΩΙÐ^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 00:40, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

PRODding.--ZooGuard (talk) 16:25, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

The whole article is a bit of a mess and doesn't really cover Cohen/Stewart usage - which is the principle one as I understand it. In particular the last section is just plain wrong. There's a huge difference between the "electrons are like planets orbiting the positron/neutron core" lie and Mommy and Daddy aren't getting divorced because of you - which when I told my son that was certainly not a lie.

I know, I know, I shoudn't just complain but should rather get in there and fix it but, right now, I haven't got the resources. Doxys Midnight Runner (talk) 16:33, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

Yes, that was the gist of my section above and that's why I've just proposed the article for deletion. ("PRODding" is Wikipedian jargon. I tend to forget that most people don't follow Wikipedia drama.)--ZooGuard (talk) 16:40, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

Cleanup efforts

I've moved the off topic jokes about lies told to children to Fun:Lies to children. The article still needs work, though. Currently, it's just a list, and quite a few things on the list are misconceptions rather than oversimplifications. ShapeshiftingLizard ~▲~ hear me roar ~▲~ 02:49, 7 November 2014 (UTC)