A New School Year Begins

There is no doubt in my mind that education is not what it once was. And no, this is not about to become a screed about the lowering of academic standards. Rather, it is only a recognition that like just about everything else, education has become a commodity, its value measured almost exclusively by its ability to lead to a good-paying job.

What's wrong with that, one might ask? While having a job that remunerates well is a desirable outcome, in my view, as a retired high school teacher, it should be one of the end results of a good education, not education's raison d'etre.

The classical notion of education, as a process whereby we gain the tools with which to interpret the world, is now considered a quaint notion, one that may be pursued by the wealthy, but one that has no practical place in the 'real world'. In other words, acquiring the tools for critical thinking, as opposed to the learning how to design something or to enter the business world, is largely considered to be a time-waster, something that will not serve one in good stead. That is how far we have deviated from and declined from real education.

And, at the risk of sounding like a wild-eyed radical, that departure serves the corporate agenda very well. Universities, once a breeding ground fermenting new ideas whose goal was to make us better as a society and as a species, has become so debased that it is now largely there to maintain the status quo, not to rock the boat. It no longer holds the potential for infusing society with new intellectual blood, but rather has become the silent enabler of the corporate aim, to serve the god of unfettered capitalism that masquerades as the friend to all.

So, on this first day back to school for so many, what can the average person do, hungry for change and challenge to what has become the status quo that has betrayed countless millions of North Americans? She and he can become educated and acquire critical thinking skills through the rigours of reading and informed discussion.

Here are a few suggestions to start off:

The Trouble with Billionaires – Linda McQuaig and Neil Brooks
The Shock Doctrine – Naomi Klein
The Death of the Liberal Class – Chris Hedges

One warning to those who haven't read these works: approaching them with an open mind will inevitably lead to agitation, outrage, and a changed world view. Like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, you will now begin to see 'the man behind the curtain.' I do not advise perusal at bedtime, unless the prospect of insomnia inspires no fear.

Animal Shows, Human Nature, and Chris Hedges

I recently had the pleasure of watching a Nova special on PBS entitled The Last Great Ape, which profiled the bonobo ape, an endangered species found exclusively in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Aside from its intelligence, the most remarkable aspect of the bonobo is that its matriarchal culture operates on co-operation, not the confrontation and violence that defines its chimpanzee cousin’s way of life. The program tells us that the two species diverged about two million years ago. Given the fact that we all evolved from a common primate ancestor, the program reminds us that human society has elements of both species in its makeup, both the capacity for terrible aggression and life-affirming co-operative behaviour.

So why is this so important to appreciate? I just read a thought-provoking book by Chris Hedges called I Don’t Believe in Atheists, the thesis of which is that both religious fundamentalists and the new atheists (people such as Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens,) are equally dangerous in that both cling to ideologies that ignore some basic truths about human nature. While the fundamentalists prescribe a very narrow set of beliefs as the way to salvation, condemning all others to the fiery pit of hell, scientist- atheists such as Hitchens and Harris argue for the perfectibility of humanity through scientific progress, going so far as to advocate the extermination of Muslims because of the extremist element responsible for terrorism. What makes both polarities so dangerous is the intolerance of all opposing beliefs, the arrogant belief in the absolute truth of their own positions, and the failure to recognize that humans, by their divided animal nature, can never achieve perfection, either through the acceptance of religious or scientific doctrine.

I found both the program and the book refreshing. As implied in the Nova documentary, and made explicit in Hedges’ book, until we confront and completely acknowledge the immutability of the animal side of our natures, real progress (but never perfectibility) in the human condition is not achievable, and we will be forever susceptible to those demagogues, both religious and secular, who try to convince us that salvation is to be found in a set of beliefs, a set of actions, or a ‘final solution.’