Child Abuse In Wales

Vernon Coleman





Nationalism can morph into child abuse into countries where schoolchildren are forced to learn a language not for their own benefit but for the pleasure of the nationalists who insist upon it being taught. In Ireland, schoolchildren are required to learn Gaelic (or Irish as it is now known). In Wales, schoolchildren are required to learn Welsh. Who outside Ireland speaks Irish? Who outside Wales speaks Welsh? I am passionately enthusiastic about people enjoying and expressing their individuality and having pride in their nationality. It is a wonderful thing that people are keeping Welsh and Irish alive. But it is another thing altogether to make the learning of these languages compulsory. Children who are compulsorily taught Irish and Welsh at school will be forever disadvantaged.

Even worse (and almost unbelievably) there are schools in Wales where children are not simply taught Welsh but are actually taught in Welsh.

It seems to me that these children are utterly doomed.

The ones who don't spend their own lives teaching Welsh to another generation of unfortunates will be destined to do menial bureaucratic work for their local civil service. Education is (or should be) for the benefit of the child not the parent or the political activist.

Surely, if parents and children really cared about their children they would make Irish and Welsh optional subjects - the sort of thing children choose to stay after school to learn?

I fear that forcing children to learn Irish or Welsh (instead of Chinese, Spanish or French) is, quite simply, child abuse. I suspect that the people who do it are using the children for their own political purposes.

To my astonishment, whenever I have made this argument in the past I have been accused of some species of racism and of wanting to suppress individuality. I am surprised that those who advocate the compulsory teaching of secondary languages - or worse still, the teaching in secondary languages - cannot see the harm they are doing.

Won't a child who is taught any science subject in Welsh always be at a disadvantage when compared with a child who is taught science in English - simply because the vast majority of scientific textbooks and journals are published in English? Won't a child whose first language is Welsh be at a disadvantage if he or she chooses to live and work outside Wales?

I am unbelievably enthusiastic about people keeping languages and culture alive. But it should be something which is done voluntarily - not something which is compulsory.


Copyright Vernon Coleman January 2007 Home