Ep 79 - The PragerU Exception

There is a funny thing that happens when conservatives talk about education. The moment a school teaches something they do not like, the word “indoctrination” comes flying out like it was sitting by the door with its shoes on. A book with a gay character? Indoctrination. A lesson about systemic racism? Indoctrination. Climate science? Indoctrination. A teacher acknowledging that America’s history contains both ideals and atrocities? Apparently, also indoctrination.

Indoctrination, but approved.

But then along comes PragerU, a conservative media organization that is not actually a university, creating videos and classroom-ready materials for children, and suddenly the same people who can smell “indoctrination” in a library display from three counties away become very calm. Now the language changes. Now it is “supplemental.” Now it is “optional.” Now it is “traditional values.” Now it is just “education.”

That is the PragerU Exception. Indoctrination is dangerous when someone else does it. When their side does it, it gets a worksheet.

PragerU is not a university in the way most people understand that word. It is not an accredited institution. It does not offer degrees. It is a conservative media nonprofit that produces polished, educational-looking videos about politics, history, religion, economics, race, culture, and American identity. Adults can watch that if they want. Adults can choose their own media diet, even when that diet consists mostly of ideological snack cakes.

The problem begins when that same style of content is repackaged for children and promoted as classroom material. PragerU Kids offers videos, lesson plans, worksheets, and other resources aimed at young audiences. Some states have opened the door to those materials in various ways, including as optional or supplemental resources. That distinction matters. It is not accurate to say PragerU has replaced public education or that every classroom is using it. But it is equally dishonest to pretend that optional classroom material has no influence at all.

Classrooms give things authority. A video shown in school does not feel to a child like a random political clip from the internet. A worksheet handed out by a teacher does not feel like campaign literature. A lesson inside a school building carries a message: this is something worth learning. That is why standards matter. That is why context matters. That is why source and framing matter.

And that is why the conservative shrug over PragerU Kids is so revealing. These are the same people who have spent years insisting that schools are corrupting children. They have attacked teachers, librarians, school boards, books, curriculum, Pride flags, DEI programs, and honest conversations about race. They have treated public education as if it were a shadowy operation run by radicals with tote bags and dry erase markers.

Yet when an openly conservative organization creates child-friendly materials that promote a right-wing worldview, suddenly everyone is supposed to relax. The panic vanishes. The emergency lights go dark. The people who were ready to interrogate a picture book now discover the subtle beauty of supplemental education.

That is not principle. That is preference.

The issue is not that conservative ideas should be banned from schools. They should not be. Students should learn about conservatism, liberalism, socialism, libertarianism, religious movements, secular arguments, civil rights, labor movements, capitalism, democracy, dissent, and the many arguments that have shaped public life. A real education does not protect students from disagreement. It prepares them to understand it.

But that is different from handing children political conclusions dressed up as neutral lessons. It is different from presenting one side’s worldview as “common sense” while labeling everyone else’s worldview as propaganda. It is different from claiming to oppose indoctrination while promoting ideological materials because the ideology happens to be yours.

Look at some of the ideas PragerU has promoted. One of its videos advances the concept of “suicidal empathy,” the idea that empathy, when misdirected, can become dangerous or even fatal to Western civilization. There is a reasonable conversation to be had about how good intentions do not automatically make good policy. Compassion still needs judgment. Policy still needs evidence. But when empathy itself is framed as a civilizational threat, something deeper is happening.

That framing teaches suspicion toward compassion, especially when compassion is directed toward immigrants, refugees, the poor, incarcerated people, LGBTQ people, people experiencing homelessness, or anyone whose suffering requires society to look beyond personal blame. It does not simply say, “Think carefully.” It suggests, “Be careful who you care about.”

That is a moral lesson. And it is a political one.

Then there is PragerU’s handling of slavery and racism, which has drawn serious criticism. One widely criticized PragerU Kids cartoon about Christopher Columbus included an animated Columbus defending slavery by saying that being taken as a slave was better than being killed. That kind of framing is not just clumsy. It is morally warped. When teaching children about slavery, the first obligation is not to protect the reputation of historical figures. The first obligation is to tell the truth clearly.

Yes, history requires context. Yes, slavery existed in many societies. Yes, people in the past lived within different systems of thought. But context is not the same thing as softening. Context helps students understand how something happened. Softening helps them feel less troubled that it happened. Those are not the same.

American slavery was not a minor blemish on an otherwise untouched national portrait. It was central to American law, wealth, land, politics, policing, and race. It shaped the Constitution. It shaped Congress. It shaped the courts. It shaped who could build wealth, who could vote, who could move freely, who could own property, and whose body could be treated as capital. And after slavery came Black Codes, convict leasing, Jim Crow, lynching, segregation, redlining, voter suppression, and discrimination that did not magically disappear because America eventually learned how to write nicer speeches.

So when educational material rushes too quickly toward “everyone did slavery” or “America helped end slavery,” without forcing students to sit with the specific American system and its long aftermath, that is not balance. It is reputation management.

Children are not just learning facts. They are learning moral weight. If slavery is presented mainly as something old, global, and resolved, then later conversations about systemic racism sound exaggerated. If racism is framed as mostly finished, then civil rights demands sound like grievance. If America is moved too quickly into the hero role, then the people asking for accountability start looking like the problem.

Capitalism gets a similar treatment. PragerU often presents capitalism as freedom, innovation, opportunity, and prosperity. And to be clear, capitalism has produced enormous innovation and wealth. Markets can coordinate activity in powerful ways. Entrepreneurs can solve real problems. Competition can improve goods and services. A serious economics lesson can say all of that.

But a serious economics lesson also has to say more than that. Capitalism has also produced exploitation, child labor, unsafe working conditions, union-busting, wage theft, monopolies, environmental harm, regulatory capture, medical bankruptcy, and grotesque inequality. Markets do not automatically protect human dignity. People do that. Laws do that. Unions do that. Regulations do that. Democratic pressure does that.

If students are taught capitalism only as freedom and innovation, without the drawbacks, failures, abuses, and tradeoffs, they are not getting economic education. They are getting salesmanship.

These examples are not random. Together, they form a worldview. Empathy is noble, but dangerous when directed toward the wrong people. Racism happened, but its continuing effects are often overstated. Capitalism is freedom, and government intervention is usually suspicious. America is exceptional, and the people asking uncomfortable questions are often the ones being divisive.

That worldview belongs in public debate. Adults can argue over it all day long. But when that worldview is packaged for children as educational material, and promoted by the same political movement that accuses everyone else of indoctrination, the hypocrisy becomes impossible to ignore.

This is also not a short-term project. The goal is not necessarily to make a child come home tomorrow reciting a PragerU talking point at dinner. The goal is slower than that. It is to shape what feels normal early. What feels patriotic. What feels radical. Who seems trustworthy. Who seems dangerous. Which version of history sounds honest, and which version sounds hostile.

That is why the right fights so hard over schools. They understand that education shapes assumptions. They understand that early stories matter. Their problem was never that children are being shaped. Their problem was who gets to do the shaping.

A child taught that capitalism simply equals freedom may grow into an adult who hears regulation as tyranny. A child taught that racism is mostly a past-tense problem may grow into an adult who hears racial justice as resentment. A child taught that empathy can become dangerous may grow into an adult who mistakes cruelty for realism. A child taught that criticism of America means hatred of America may grow into an adult who treats honest history as betrayal.

That is the long game. Not instant conversion. Not cartoon brainwashing. Something more durable: framing the starting point before the argument begins.

The answer is not to replace conservative propaganda with liberal propaganda. The answer is honest education. Teach students arguments from across the spectrum. Teach them evidence. Teach them context. Teach them how to recognize omission. Teach them that patriotism does not require amnesia, economics does not require worship, and morality does not require suspicion toward the vulnerable.

PragerU can make conservative media. Parents can show it at home. Adults can watch it, share it, criticize it, or build their worldview around it. That is part of living in a free society. But when that content is designed for children, packaged for classrooms, and promoted by the same people who have spent years terrorizing teachers over “indoctrination,” it deserves scrutiny.

Because the standard cannot be: honest history is political, but patriotic mythology is not. Inclusion is political, but exclusion dressed up as tradition is not. Climate science is political, but fossil-fuel-friendly doubt is not. Teaching the failures of capitalism is political, but praising capitalism without its victims is not.

That is not a philosophy of education. That is a double standard with a lesson plan.

They were never against indoctrination. They were against losing control of it. And PragerU is the exception that proves the rule.

SOURCES

PragerU FAQ stating it is not accredited and does not offer degrees - https://www.prageru.com/faq

PragerU educator resources page describing free K-12 lesson plans, videos, and worksheets - https://www.prageru.com/educator-resources

PragerU Kids page for parents and teachers, listing lesson plans, worksheets, books, and K-12 resources - https://www.prageru.com/parents-teachers

PragerU state announcements page promoting state-level education approvals, partnerships, and resource access - https://www.prageru.com/state-announcements

WUFT/Tampa Bay Times reporting on Florida approving PragerU materials as supplemental resources for public schools - https://www.wuft.org/education/2023-08-07/controversial-prageru-curriculum-approved-for-florida-classrooms-but-its-unclear-where-it-will-be-used

PBS NewsHour segment on criticism of PragerU’s educational videos, including slavery and Columbus content - https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/why-critics-are-alarmed-about-the-influence-of-pragerus-educational-videos

CapRadio/NPR report on PragerU’s push into classrooms and criticism of its Columbus video - https://www.capradio.org/news/npr/story?storyid=1234491074

PragerU video “Suicidal Empathy,” featuring Gad Saad - https://www.prageru.com/videos/suicidal-empathy

PragerU Capitalism 101 page explaining its pro-capitalism framing - https://www.prageru.com/capitalism-101

PragerU video “Why Capitalism Works” - https://www.prageru.com/videos/why-capitalism-works

Americans United investigation request regarding PragerU curriculum in Florida and Oklahoma - https://www.au.org/the-latest/press/investigation-prageru-curriculum-florida-oklahoma

Tennessee Lookout article on PragerU gaining an educational foothold in several states - https://tennesseelookout.com/2023/11/03/controversial-prageru-videos-gain-educational-foothold-in-a-handful-of-states/

PragerU Idaho standards-aligned content page - https://www.prageru.com/lesson-plans/idaho-standards-aligned-with-prageru-content