“I feel ashamed that so many of us cannot imagine a better way to do things than locking children up all day in cells instead of letting them grow up knowing their families, mingling with the world, assuming real obligations, striving to be independent and self-reliant and free.”

—  John Taylor Gatto

Source: A Different Kind of Teacher: Solving the Crisis of American Schooling, Berkeley Hills Books (2000) p. 97

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update Jan. 26, 2022. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "I feel ashamed that so many of us cannot imagine a better way to do things than locking children up all day in cells in…" by John Taylor Gatto?
John Taylor Gatto photo
John Taylor Gatto40
American teacher, book author 1935–2018

Related quotes

Jane Austen photo

“I cannot help hoping that many will feel themselves obliged to buy it. I shall not mind imagining it a disagreeable duty to them, so as they do it.”

Jane Austen (1775–1817) English novelist

Letter (1813-11-06) on the reprint of Sense and Sensibility [Letters of Jane Austen -- Brabourne Edition]
Letters

Bobby Fischer photo

“I would rather be free in my mind, and be locked up in a prison cell, than to be a coward and not be able to say what I want.”

Bobby Fischer (1943–2008) American chess prodigy, chess player, and chess writer

Radio Interview, May 24 1999 http://www.geocities.jp/bobbby_b/mp3/F_07_3.MP3 <br class="br">1990s

Tommy Lee photo

“Imagine how frustrating it is, being completely locked up and watching your family leave, your wife and children, and not being able to do anything about it.”

Tommy Lee (1962) American drummer

http://www.drdrew.com/article.asp?id=393.

Paul Theroux photo

“I cannot make my days longer, so I strive to make them better.”

Paul Theroux (1941) American travel writer and novelist

“Goodness," I babbled, "but how awful for you. Not drinking, I mean. I mean, imagine getting up in the morning knowing that you're not going to feel any better all day.”

Kyril Bonfiglioli (1928–1985) British art dealer

Source: The Mortdecai Trilogy, Don't Point That Thing At Me (1972), Ch. 13.

Alice Meynell photo

“The mothers of all ages are those who have suffered because others suffered; for each of them, self is less sensitive than the sense of her child. Self is not locked up in the maternal heart, there to be cherished, as it is by the egoist, or to be crushed and silenced, as it is by the Saint. In the mother, self is not lost, but loses all its evil by the passionate personal love that distributes it among sons and daughters. Perfect self-less love would perhaps be distributed through the multitude, but a mother is not perfect: nature has so much use for her—separate, family use—that she cannot let her go free from irrational, indispensable partialities and limitings, even injustices, all serving the turn of the race.”

Alice Meynell (1847–1922) English publisher, editor, writer, poet, activist

Source: Mary, the Mother of Jesus: An Essay (1912), Ch. IV. "The Mother", p. 40

“There is some irony in the fact that children imagine that parents can do what they want, and parents imagine that children do. "When I grow up..." parallels "Oh to be a child again..."”

Shulamith Firestone book The Dialectic of Sex

http://books.google.com/books?id=YnY10fNqqp4C&q=%22There+is+some+irony+in+the+fact+that+children+imagine+that+parents+can+do+what+they+want+and+parents+imagine+that+children+do+When+I+grow+up+parallels+Oh+to+be+a+child+again%22&pg=PA102#v=onepage
The Dialectic of Sex (1970)

Charles Bukowski photo

“there were these people
on the ground,
they were reaching up their
arms and trying to pull me
down
but
they couldn't do
it.

I felt like pissing on
them.
they were so
jealous.
all they had to do was
to work their way
slowly up to it
as I had
done.

such people think
success grows on
trees.

you and I,
we know
better.”

Charles Bukowski (1920–1994) American writer

"transport"
The Last Night of the Earth Poems (1992)

Nora Ephron photo

“Reading is escape, and the opposite of escape; it's a way to make contact with reality after a day of making things up, and it's a way of making contact with someone else's imagination after a day that's all too real.”

Nora Ephron (1941–2012) Film director, author screenwriter

“We do live, all of us, on many different levels, and for most artists the world of imagination is more real than the world of the kitchen sink.”

Madeleine L'Engle (1918–2007) American writer

Section 2.2
The Crosswicks Journal, A Circle of Quiet (1972)

Related topics