The teacher-doctor analogy

Teachers absolutely hate it when people outside their profession criticize them. They have proven themselves completely intolerant of outside perspectives. To defend themselves, they have embraced an analogy comparing themselves to doctors. They point out that patients never tell doctors how to do their jobs.



There are some quirks to this analogy due to different types of work that doctors are performing. Generally speaking, doctors will listen to their patients to help establish any condition that needs to be addressed. Additionally, patients frequently have a say in such things as which medication they take and which procedures to run. There is no question whatsoever that doctors listen to their patients more than teachers listen to students.

There are definitely limitations to the feedback doctors are willing to take, but the teachers' argument is absurd. They want to silence their critics. To win over the public, they compare themselves to a profession that is more willing to listen than they are.

If you really want an analogy, we can do better. Teachers are very rigid in their ways. They have lesson plans that they apply to entire classes. If a student doesn't learn well, teachers are quick to blame the student. When a teaching style clearly does not fit with a learning style, the student is expected to change his or her learning style to match the teacher.

Imagine for a moment that you had a nasty case of the flu. Things become so bad that you decide to go to the doctor. Your doctor starts treating you for a broken leg. You're not supposed to speak up. If you do, your doctor will blame you for having the wrong condition. He or she will then demand that you change your condition from a flu to a broken leg.

That scenario is absurd. For pretty much the same reasons, so is the scenario consistently provided by the teaching profession. The biggest difference is that one scenario is physical and the other is mental. That is why it is so much easier to see the absurdity in the version of the story that features doctors.

---

UPDATE 7/21/2022

Since I originally wrote this, I have decided to add to this concept. There are additional issues with this comparison that I didn't originally address.

Learning is a natural process. This can be seen with how students learn to walk and talk. Generally speaking, the health care industry is unnatural, requiring more learning to develop expertise. Imagine for a moment being trapped in an environment in which you breathing was tightly constrained because you had to turn to a breathing expert to tell you precisely how and when to breathe. I don't care how much expertise someone has in breathing. This would be completely unacceptable.

Although doctors make a lot of decisions about what is best for your physical health, they have never taken primary responsibility. Doctors frequently give patients choices. Of course, doctors are only involved in a small minority of your physical life. When it comes to your health, you are the person who makes most decisions. You decide how much and which types of exercise you engage in. You get to make your own decisions regarding what food you eat. Even with doctors involved, you are primarily responsible for your own physical health. By contrast, teachers minimize your right to make educational decisions for yourself.

There are also issues with competence. If you had a doctor who did more to harm patients physically than help, there are a lot of patients who would want more control. In schools, teachers are doing far more to cause mental harm than help. Seriously, if you thought that a doctor was going to kill you, do you think you would just sit there and take it? Because of the implications, I don't think doctors can get away with anywhere near the level of incompetence typical of the teaching profession.

I knew more about education than any of my teachers when I was in high school. I'm not saying that to be cocky, but rather to acknowledge that my teachers knew absolutely nothing. Of course, I never said this in class due to the culture of fear that every one of my teachers promoted. Incompetence isn't isolated. Even our nation's secretary of education has proven that he lacks understanding of concepts that should be viewed as fundamental such as the difference between learning and memorizing.

There's also more that can be done if a doctor does harm. Have you ever heard of malpractice? There's absolutely nothing similar that has been applied to teachers. Teachers are far more sheltered than doctors. If they insist on being treated more like doctors, why don't we introduce lawsuits for maleducation. Good luck getting teachers to agree with that.