Chris Ward
Human Ecology Essay - Draft 2.1
Fall 06/07 - September 15th 2006
Sustainable Education: Human Ecology, Science, and Technology
“The impending destruction of mankind…man cannot violate or transgress the bounds of his humanism, or his human limits without tragic consequence.” Karel Čapek - Utopian R.U.R. (1920)
I will get straight to the point. If we are to avoid the bleak, resourceless, polluted and war-torn future that many suspect awaits all of our future generations (if they are even to exist), there must be some significant changes made in how our educational system of today operates at the most fundamental of levels. One significant, but so far unappreciated formula to revitalize and remake positive once more the potential fate of the humankind, is the manipulation of the tendencies of the masses by way of injecting a dose of a Human Ecological approach to education into the standardized education models of the world. With Human Ecology becoming a fundamental source for the education of the future generations, it might, just maybe, still be possible to reclaim our children’s future for them once again.
Currently the public school education system churns through hundreds of millions of students each year, each one destined to be an active citizen of the world in one way or another. Each individual has millions of opportunities in his life to work toward sustaining a world of abundant natural resources, clean water, and calm and negotiable relations, of which are the three most fundamental elements of the human species survival. While on the other hand, each individual has an equal number of opportunities to bring destruction upon his own world and destroy the chances for survival of the future generations too. It is truly “each unto his own,” but the effects are communal.
It is without a doubt that the choices each person makes throughout their lives are highly influenced by the education received during the first 16-25 years of their lives. It also seems reasonable then, that the education of the people can be analyzed and corrected where errors in logic, or the right’s and wrong’s, relative to the morals we must have to position our choices more in favor of our ultimate survival, and to keep the more consistently on the side where the ultimate survival of the future generations is valued over personal gain and competitive arrogance. Otherwise, choices which are self-centered and destructive are likely to continue dominating the lives of the masses in full-force, as we see they are now across the globe, and they will do so at the loss of the unborn generations to follow. We must exploit this knowledge that we have then of our ability to influence through education to create a natural tendency amongst humans to draw a larger proportion of our choices from the former way of thinking rather the latter.
Honestly though, there is a lot of work to be done. However regretfully, I can only say that even after an incredibly simple and superficial analysis of the current state of public education, I have to admit to myself that its state is quite pitiful. The reality is that, although it might quack like a duck, it slithers like a snake, and drains the lifeblood from us all like a leech. It’s a horrible contradiction in terms to even call the average public, tax-funded school “a house of education.” When really what it is, is a perfect example of an oxymoron.
The public school system is (in America at least) built around a tradition to teach how to follow orders, and not how to learn. Very rarely do we leave the catch phrases on posters, synthesized and summarized text-books, uncreative exams and quizzes, and incredibly monotonous and mindless motions of copy, paste, and memorize, except for, of course, that really cool fifth grade science fair project!
It also lacks a sense of what is right and wrong, relative to how the human species must live in order to continue surviving on this earth through the infinite possible generations we still have to come. Although however, it does in fact talk a lot of the “right’s, wrong’s” and other morals of student conduct such as keeping quite unless spoken to, asking permission from an authority to use the restroom, no missing school without an authorities permission, keeping your shirts tucked in, ceaseless competition against all others, and no sharing information! And this of course is followed up with a full range of uncreative and rather harsh punishments for any “misbehavior.” Of which none of the rights or wrongs actually correspond truly to either the nature of humankind or the nature of the world in which we inhabit. Instead however they correspond to a false nature of authority and dominance that expects absolute submission and control. This is not human ecology.
Another interesting, but unfortunate fact is that the average education models of today demand that all humankind respect their authority without question, while claiming their own thrown as the most important thing in our lives. Saying loudly and clearly, if we did not have “them,” (the education systems and the authorities within the education systems known as teachers) we would be as good a dead. This, in my opinion, is a completely ignorant, arrogant, disrespectful, and a horribly destructive and violent lie. We are human. We have survived millennia already without any formal or standardized school systems in place. In fact, it is my belief quite to the contrary, that the school system itself, as it has developed and come to be over time what it is today, is a major cause (if not the root cause) of why we are in the rather gloomy place we are with respect to our future chances of survival on this planet as is. It is all the contradictions that that can be found in and around what is today the standard education model, which brings me to say “it might quack like a duck, but it sure ain’t one”. Garbage in, garbage out.
Take for a concrete example the average public school cafeteria, which I use as a simplified analogy to represent the base standards that the rest of the education system can be assumed to abide by. It is a disgraceful image of the nature of what we face.
The food is of some of the lowest quality available ever in our history. Mostly manufactured, mass produced, and frozen, it occurs very often that students complain of horrible stomach cramps after consuming it. Students are also left with few alternatives to choose from, except for those who are lucky enough to have parents who have the time, money, and patience enough to prepare food for them everyday to bring on their own, and teach them on their own that eating healthy is one of the first most fundamental aspects to be appreciated in life.
However, even with outside influence, enduring 16 or more years in inescapable close proximity of this “food” and environment influences and teaches even the most health-minded students to except and expect the low quality standards of food and health for the rest of their lives. For everyone else, fast-food diets and candy bars unquestionably become the new standard for which they will live with the rest of their lives, and face all of the consequences too.
Alternatives that are often available in place of the standard “tray lunch” are also much of the same, horribly fattening, and sweet, fried, or worse still, generally packaged and branded. Therefore it is not only unhealthy for lack of nutritious value, loaded with sugar, preservatives, or lacks in the color green or any natural flavor, it is also purchased from non-local, branded manufacturers at the lowest price possible. A lesson in economics that teaches the future leaders of the world that cheating consumers out of quality and investing outside of ones own community for a higher gain in personal economy are standard and acceptable choices to make. It also teaches the consumers that these qualities are of little or no importance at all. The negative consequences are hardly even made known. And it unfortunately also draws acceptance from an early age to the corruptive techniques of marketing and branding, causing mindless purchasing and consumption of goods by name and brand alone. If it is what they grow up doing without vision of alternatives, it becomes an accepted standard of life. “We are what we eat,” as the old saying goes.
The social environment of the cafeteria is also an interesting and pitiful example of how the public school system teaches our children how to act with arrogance and disrespect towards our own kind. Consider how natural it is for us to look at a cafeteria worker (cleaner, cook, cashier, etc) and see them as something of a lower class. It is natural because this is how the school system itself treats them by way of lower wages, less respectful treatment, and fewer choices for how to creatively work or improve upon their own work for the benefit of their clients, who in fact are their own, and our own children. They are not respected in positions of authority, but instead they are basically given position of mindless laborers, and nothing more.
Even leaving you with only a few examples of how even in the environment which our public schools provide their students, we can easily see how it denies to the growing generations the ability to see and vision choices that might invite greater opportunity to grow and create a world which acts to sustain life rather than constantly increase mindless consumption. Instead, it teaches that it is best to leave consumption unchecked and unthought of, and the responsibility of any consequences should be left to be dealt with in the distant future rather than the present.
This leaves us with the famous philosophical “chicken or the egg” question too. It is hard to blame the destructive consequences on the consumers when there are few viable alternative choices given. It seems only natural to get accustomed to expect nothing more than the weekly lunch menu, or the treatment of the workers, or the standards of destructive economic models when we are forced to endure them for so many years without choice. Plus, since self-responsibility, self-reflection, autonomy of choices, respect, and individual and communal health are not made to be priorities in the place that hails itself to be the house of learning, who is to blame in the end, the person being forced to live in the system, or the owners of the system itself?
The answer to this question, as with most philosophical questions is mute. It does not really matter in the end because what matters is what is happening today and the prospects of the future. If we are to continue into the future for many more generations to come, an integration of responsibility into life itself and the empowerment of the growing minds of the future as both creators and consumers in the ways of sustainable and responsible living for the future must be made. If we are to avoid the pitfalls of exhaustive and destructive consumption, I believe it is essential that responsibility and mindful sustainability must be reconnected throughout all aspects of education on a personal level, rather than being isolated into some general category such as Ethics 101 or as is in many cases, left out completely. We can not continue to abstract responsibility and sustainability into course themes. It must become the fundamental basis of the education system itself.
My proposition therefore is to integrate into the current education system an approach such as the one Human Ecology provides into the standard methodology and curriculum of teacher training, faculty and staff relationships to the educational process and to the students themselves, and to the formulation of the education models from which the students will exploit to share understanding and knowledge of the worlds inner-workings across all disciplines. Students should be the masters of their own education, and the human ecological model is an approach which destroys the traditional view of student as learner, and teacher as master. Students are encouraged to cross disciplines and integrate theory and practice using hands on learning methods that enable and encourage students to find and exploit their own personal ambitions and understandings of right and wrong through practical and self motivated experiential learning. While students are as well encouraged through the educational process, the curriculum, and the environment in which they learn, to integrate consciousness and respect of the environment and the people in it, as well the realization of the impact we as individuals and as a community have on the eminent future ahead of us (a future which can not be avoided, but can be destroyed if our top priorities are the budget and concerns of authority rather than the health and survival of our progeny).
There is little room for contradiction, and although it’s hard to avoid, Human Ecology is a method which teaches by way of representing matters as closely as possible to the ways are, and trusting students to have the capacity to make choices which meet the needs of the future generations as opposed to being a living hypocrisy and walking contradiction. There is no reason to hide reality behind a veil of hypocrisy, we are all human, and we all make mistakes. We must take for ourselves the responsibility for our mistakes that might hurt our chances of communal survival, but we must learn to correct them together.
I know that to have a education system that models the standard citizen to be full of respect and self-responsibility, so that he might make more choices only after considerable thought has been put into understanding the effects of each choice made to make choices more consistently that are sustainable over the long-term might seem a little far fetched and Utopian. However, please, first just consider the fact that even young children are able to learn such concepts even before they can even read.
Authors of children’s books around the world have taken the lead in ensuring that children are taught how to be responsible from as early an age as their parents begin to read to them. In even the most simple of bed-time stories and fairy tales have general themes such as proper disposal of and the minimization of waste, cause and effect, staying healthy, respecting others and the like that are seamlessly woven in and out of the texts. Each one teaches children how to simply be responsible and treat the world and all the creatures in it with love in their own way. They also teach them how to live and act sustainably so that we can live together in harmony and work together to keep our species alive. Children learn to take care of themselves, while also taking care of the world in which they live. They learn to eat green vegetables instead of those that come from a can, keep their environment clean, help others, share, treat people in the way they would like to be treated, recognize the effects of their choices and try to choose wisely, collaborate to solve problems, and not make things or say things that could hurt others, etcetera.
The numerous themes which children encounter on a daily basis in their years before they begin there sentence to schooling and their ability to understand and act upon the simple concepts these texts have in them, leads me to believe that the challenge of raising future generations of youth to grow up with the mentality of sustainable living and responsibility through choice is indeed feasible. We just need to dedicate ourselves to keeping these themes in all the texts we read, whether for night-time tales or mathematical and scientific text-books. Moreover, we need to keep them around the students in all the environments were they learn. Nobody learns what is directly taught while in a state of hypocrisy. They only learn that hypocrisy is the norm, so what is being taught can justifiably be ignored.
On this note I would like to clarify and conclude that I do not intend to suggest that the Human Ecological perspective is the final solution to the world’s problems, nor a guarantee for the survival of the human race. Rather, I believe that many seeds of possibility lie within Human Ecology for rebuilding a more sustainable world. By exploiting the natural human desire for personal survival along side the natural tendency to be highly influenced by the environment in which we live and the “education” we receive, the new strong, sustainable roots the world needs to disrupt the growth of destructive consumption, and immoral and inhuman technological progress has much more opportunity to sprout and take hold. It is in our children’s best interest to do so, even if we can not yet still know their names of feel the warmth of their skin. Sustainability and responsibility must become part of who we are, and with Human Ecology you can learn to quake like a duck and actually be one too.
Posted by drpoo as College Of The Atlantic, Peace Works!, Personal Endeveavors at 2:45 PM PST
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Some quotes, and perhaps a thought or two on a book from which the article “The Seven-Lesson Schoolteacher” comes from.
“Networks like schools are not communities, just as school training is not education. By preempting fifty percent of the total time of the young, by locking young people up with other young people exactly their own age, by ringing bells to start and stop work, by asking people to think about the same thing at the same time in the same way, by grading people the way we grade vegetables — and in a dozen other vile and stupid ways — network schools steal the vitality of communities and replace it with an ugly mechanism. No one survives these places with their humanity intact, not kids, not teachers, not administrators, and not parents.”
“If performance within these narrow confines is conceived to be the supreme measure of success, if, for instance, an A average is considered the central purpose of adolescent life — the requirements for which take most of the time and attention of the aspirant — and if the worth of the invidial is reckoned by vicoryt or defeat in this abstract pursuit, then a social machine has been constructed which, by attaching purpose and meaning to essentially meaningless and fantastic behavior, will certainly dehumanize students, alientate them from their own human nature, and break the natural connection between them and their parents, to whom they would otherwise look for significant affirmations.”
“It [compulsory schooling] divides and classifies people, demanding that they compulsively compete with each other, and publicly labels the losers by literally de-grading them, identifying them as “low-class” material. And the bottom line for the winners is that they can buy more stuff!”
This one is impossible not to comment on, considering the truth and sickness of the whole idea. The rest I’ll let speak for themselves.
We are told the main reason to be succesful in school (not necessarily learn) is for the rewards after it that will be more likely graspable. That reward, money…more stuff. Not a stronger family, not more critical minds, not justice or peace, not healthier communities. Money. More stuff. WTF!?
There was always a thorn in my side while at school, and it digs deeper all the time, but now it at least reveals its true self more clearly.
“Schools stifle family originality by appropriating the critical time needed for any sound idea of family to develop — then they blame the family for its failure to be a family. It’s like a malicious person lifting a photograph from the developing chemicals too early, and then pronouncing the photographer incompetent.”
“The heart of a defense for the cherished American ideals of privacy, variety, and individuality lies in the way we bring up our young.
Children learn what they live.
Put kids in a class and they will live out their lives in an invisible cage, isolated from their chance at community; interrupt kids with bells and horns all the time and they will learn that nothing is important; forace them to plead for the natural right to the toilet and they will become liars and toadies; riducle them and they will retreat from human association; shame them and they will find a hundred ways to get even. The habits taught in large-scale oragnizations are dealy.”
“This was once a land where every sane person knew how to build a shelter, grow food, and entertain one another. Now we have been rendered permanent children. It’s the architects of forced schooling who are responsible for that.”
-Chris
Posted by drpoo as Peace Works!, Personal Endeveavors at 10:28 PM PST
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Alright guys, here are some photos of last night in Merida. Carnival is happening now all around! And i just came to see what was happening in Merida. But after i post this, i´m on my way back to Baca, and i´ll take some photos of what carnival is like there.
Enjoy
-Chris
Posted by drpoo as College Of The Atlantic, Photo Album, Peace Works!, Personal Endeveavors at 2:58 PM PST
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A few more photos (and 2 short videos, maybe) for you all to enjoy. By the way, you should be able to download the Video files and play them in your media player…i don´t know why it wouldn´t work that way…i´ll check it out anyway to see what can be done about getting things to work.
Well, the photos of the Maya Internacional…it´s hard to tell but these women are old! I mean, it was really incredible. The women on the right hand side of the photo is almost 90 years old! And she jams out on the saxaphone, violen, percussion, and she dances too! hehe. That was a fun concert. These women have been impressing the people of Yucatan and the people all over the world for over 40 years now! I bet some of the old men that were in the audience still have crushes on these women as they did when they were teenagers!
Then…there are the cave photos. All that stuff you see us pointing to is pieces of cermics, dating a anywhere from 500 to a thousand years…it´s hard to say. At the end of the 2 hour trek in the cave, there are well preserved large ceramic pots, that were also used by the Mayas way back when. Pretty neat stuff. It was 4 of us that went caving that day. It was a semi dificult route we took, nothing impossble, but i definately felt at times that i was being “reborn” and i laughed to myself and the others thinking about how it would be that we could return through the same way we entered. Hehe. Somehow though we did, and got damn dirty doing it.
Then there are the photos of the family i´m staying with in Baca, and some photos of the library i´m helping out while i´m there. Right now is Carnival time, so everyones making their costumes…and there are no computers in the library, as can be seen…hopefully there will be soon.
…
That´s all folks!
-Chris
Posted by drpoo as College Of The Atlantic, Peace Works!, Personal Endeveavors at 2:47 PM PST
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Wow, strange to say it, but i have many doubts about the idea of being rich. The meaning to me is that the wealth i have above that which is necessary for survival, takes away from others in the world and makes it that much harder for them to survive. When we depend on money as we do today - a world wide phenomenon with globalization and the destruction of local farming practices - every dollar that is not in circulation is a a piece of human life locked up from all to starve.
Anyway. I had a thought. There is a LOT of money in circulation. Mostly it is concentrated in a very small number of hands…but it is there.
I know i can get rich, very rich if i wanted to (unlike most of the people in the world, whom do not have this option available to them). Is it justified to get rich (… how ? business of course …) if the conscience is always aware of the significance of the money? And if there is a goal to redistibute the money into more hands for the future?
My idea is that in my hands, money will benefit more people than if it was in the hands of X, Y, and Z who spend their money on expensive cars, big houses, social clubs, and other things that make them socially rich as independent individuals. Does it justify becoming rich? (… that is if you have the same idea that i do about money…as being a tool of power for the already powerful…something phsyical that enable the slavery of other men, without having a bad conscience…something like,… they might say that money is neutral…but i would disagree.)
Or should we all really struggle hard to regain the time of DEPENDENCE rather than the independence so many seem to strive for now (the american way). Dependence on man and nature…or independence with money.
Damn. *bangs head against wall* What a crazy world!
Also…would money even function if it were distributed more evenly? Or does it work as i imagine…only because it is something most people do not have and must work work work work work for to get even a little bit of it. Mexico has a minimum wage of $4.25 a DAY!…Most people live with this…many just scraping by…but American´s probably couldn´t live as they (we) do if their wages were much higher! Because we depend on their lack of money, to build up our own dollar (those mexicans in the US, and those in Mexico). If they too (and everyone) had an equally strong currency (meaning money was well distributed…)…money would, as i imagine, cease to be functional. Catch 22? More, to me it is just plain fucked up.
-Chris
Posted by drpoo as Peace Works!, Personal Endeveavors at 1:26 PM PST
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Ahhh, so i´m hanging out in Mexico, and i realize that, shit, after this term i only have one year left. And it left me thinking about a whole bunch of stuff.
Truthfully, i´ve been thinking about the fact that i have a senior project i need to do soon a lot. And well, i have a ton of ideas, but the tuff part is choosing which one and sticking with it. Please, READERS of this blog (mom, dad, … hehe… ryan.) Help me decide.
Okay. So here go a few. The latest first.
In short, draw up a business plan and understand all that it would take to start a small business here in Merida making selling dad´s already famous Jerky. *Tironito* Is my prelimanry name for it. *Small Jerk* o *Small Tug*. hehe. Lame! Why? well, because the damn stuff is perfect for Yucatan! I´m seriously saying that it would be a success, without a doubt. It would only be a matter of short time before everyone knew what it was and fell in love it. Put it this way, my host mother hear, who never eats red meat, could keep her hands out of the bag i gave the family! hehe. The fact that it is spicy, plus the fact that it´s meat (dried on top of that..meaning it won´t go bad in the heat for a long time) and the fact that everyone here loves to eat botanas (snacks) everywhere they go, give it´s high scores on the lovable factor. (i´m already having visions of the stuff being sold at all the local events, where there are always a ton of people selling little snack items out of the bag on their shoulder…and there are SO many events here you would not believe. Everyday there is something happening, it´s incredible. Then there is also the open air markets, and the parks, and the street venders…that are just always continuously walking around selling food products and other things…) Really, to say the least, Yucatecans are serious meat eaters! In fact, I hardly ever see green here. It´s a surprise when i do, my eyes are nearly blinded by the bright colors of letuce and fresh tomatoe.
The challenges i would be facing to implement this project are many. Well, that is if i wanted to do it legally and successfully (even then…it wouldn´t be exactly easy…but nor would it be extremely difficult since i´m focusing down to only one thing). Legally starting a small business in Mexico, Production, marketing, vending, etc. etc.
I know (well, i assume) i´m going to be starting my own business eventually and this is an excellent opportunity i believe. Especially because i have a lot of support here already, and i know the language, the area and the people rather well.
Let that one sink in for a few minutes. I know you might laugh…but with your support (i´m talking mostly moral here) it is definately possible. The most that would happen is i fail, have a good time doing it, and put it away in my bag of ´tried that already´s.
Now, the next idea is that i create … hmm…. should i give away my secrets online? Where someone like Microsoft…or hell, google for that matter…could take them before i get a chance to do it myself?? hmmm….i mean i´ll be releasing any software i do under GNU open source terms and anyone will be able to use them how they wish…but i´d like to get the chance to produce them and protect them with GNU liscence first. Let´s say i have an idea to put together a sophisticated online Peer Created Radio station. Think Wikipedia, but rather than text intries, it´s radio program entries. Where you as a user get to post your own home-brewed radio programs, and you as a user get to design your own custom streaming radio station using casts from your fellow users (perhaps some of those users could even be commercial). Yeah, big project, but i could break it down in some way so i could build the first basic prototype / beta system for my sr project and seek support from the open source development community to advance the software to production quality.
Now, another idea. I have many ideas for inventions…i could make a SR project out of one of them. The design, prototyping, production, marketing, and vending…etc. would all be a part of it. AKA. Plus i would look into patenting law..etc. I would start of with the most simple product idea that i have, then if i was successful in reaching my goals for the project, i could then move on to more advanced invention ideas that i have…
Finnally, i still have the idea to come down to Merida again and work on some sort of research project regarding Technology Development initiatives here. Which by the way, i´m working (volunteering) right now for a government organization that works in exactly this department…they are rolling out all sorts of cool stuff and i´m working with them to do it (well, it´s more like i´m observing at the moment, but we´ll see how things develop). And on top of that, i´m likely going to start working with the director of the Yucatan sector of the Nacional E-Mexico project, teaching some computer classes (or helping) and also going out to small villages around Merida organizing for more community computer centers to be setup in the local libraries. … so … if something develops while i´m here into what could be a good SR project, i´ll jump on it. Otherwise i might just end up coming down here to work in the future…perhaps…as a side job while i´m getting my Tironito (jerky) business up and running. :-)
Okay. There are others, but what do you guys think about those? I think these are pretty much the selection i´m going to choose from.
Though there is one more recent idea that i thought of…providing telephone services cheap through voIP Voice over IP (internet telephones…such as the one i´ve been using to call all you guys…) With this i could definately give customers a much better price rate than the people here that are using phone cards, cell phones or the Mexico Tel Mex telephony service. I´d likely be one of the first to the market here too…the people here are a little behind in the times still (though…i´m working on catching them up! hehe)
Also, Mom, Dad specifically, i have a question since i´m here….You guys know that i´m off sync for at COA for graduation. What do you think about me taking the spring term (the next term) off to resync myself with everyone else? I think it would make things easier for me, well at least less confusing in regards to deadlines and the like. I´m seriously thinking about it, staying in Bar Harbor probably, working working working, and planning for the Sr. Project, and the likes. Or perhaps for some of the spring term i would come and live in Merida again, to start researching for SR project.
Let me know what you´all´s think.
Peace…and happy new year!
-Chris
Posted by drpoo as Linux / Open Source, College Of The Atlantic, Live Mp3 Streams, Peace Works!, Personal Endeveavors at 2:57 PM PST
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“The oppressed, who have been shaped by the death-affirming climate of oppression, must find through their struggle the way to life-affirming humanization…” (68 Paulo Freire - Pedagogy of the Oppressed)
It’s strange, over the past couple weeks i’ve seen online cases of numerous people around the world being thrown in jail…fired from their jobs…or sued for speaking out against their oppressors online using Blogs such as the one i am using right now. Is freedome of speech just a facade…something the oppressors give to internalize the denial of oppression?
I was in class just the other day and we were talking about revolutions and popular struggles in Cuba (which although i learned nothing about it growing up…sly form of oppression…omission….I have come to realize Cuba is quite a fascinating place…and it’s very appropo for this thought too….US attempting to oppress Cuba…but fortunately for them, the US is not doing the best job at it). I asked outloud the following question. “How does one stand up against oppression when it is known their only fate is death (or other form of ’submission to silence’)?” Very few oppressors (if any) stand down without violence and denial of the oppression. It’s a hard question to answer….not having been having every exposed to being widely oppressed by such extreme and harsh forms of oppression as cololization for example or slavery or tyrant rule (oppression comes in many forms and degrees…people being thrown in jail for blogging dissent, parents oppressing children for what they deem as for ‘their own good’…schools too..wow yeah…..governments oppress citizens….and well…more clearly, people oppress people through various institutions and beaurocracies…economy….etc.)
And also, taking the example of the uprisings in Paris going on right now….why is that the oppressed are called rioters…why is the media claiming it is them that must be stopped….stop their violence….? Why is the EU giving money to the paris government to ‘put an end to the violence’…meaning the oppressed peoples uprising/resistence….but not telling the government to close up shop or fix the existing problems that have sparked the popular movement instead? Why are the oppressed blamed here, and not the oppressors?
“Any situation in which “A” objectively exploits “B” or hinders his and her pursuit of self-affirmation as a responsible person is one of oppression. Such a situation in itself constitutes violence, even when sweetened by false generosity, because it interferes with the individual’s ontological and historical vocation to be more fully human. With the establishment of a relationship of oppression, violence has already begun. Never in history has violence been initiated by the oppressed. How could they be the initiators, if they themselves are the result of violence? How could they be the sponsors of something whose objective inauguration called forth their existence as opporessed? There would be no oppressed had there been no prior situation of violence to establish their subjugation.
” Violence is initiated by those who oppress, who exploit, who fail to recognize others as persons–notably those who are oppressed, exploited, and unrecognized. It is not the unloved who initiate disaffection, but those who cannot love because they love only themselves. It is not the helpless, subject to terror, who initiate terror, but the violent, who with their power create the concrete situation which begets the “rejects of life.” It is not the tyrannized who initiate despotism, but the tyrants. It is not the despised who initate hatred, but those who despise. It is not those whose humanity is denied who negate humankind, but those who denied that humanity (thus negating their own as well). Force is used not by those who have become weak under the preponderance of the strong, but by the strong who have emasculated them.
” For the oppressors, however, it is always the oppressed (whom they obviously never call ‘the oppressed’ but–depending on whether they are fellow countrymen or not–’those people’ or ‘the blind and envious masses’ or ’savages’ or ‘natives’ or ’subversives’) who are disaffected, who are ‘violent,’ ‘barbaric,’ ‘wicked’ or ‘ferocious’ when they react to the violence of the oppressors. ” (49 Paulo Freire - Pedagogy of the Oppressed)
I have also been thinking about how difficult it is for me and the other privaleged people like me (oppressors…) to envision true equality…because it would mean ‘loss’ to us. If we are to bring others up, we must bring ourselves down….
“Conditioned by the experience of oppressing others, any situation other than their former seems to them like oppression. Formerly, they could eat, dress, weat shoes, be educated, travel, and hear Beethoven; while millions did not eat, had no clothes or shoes, neither studied nor traveled, much less listened to Beethoven. Any restriction on this way of life, in the name of the rights of the community, appears to the former oppressors as a profound violation of their individual rights–although they had no respect for the millions who suffered and died of hunger, pain, sorrow, and despair. For the oppressors, “human beings” refers only to themselves; other people are things.” For the oppressors, there exists only one right: their right to live in peace, over against the right, not always even recofnized, but simply conceded, of the oppressed to survival. And they make this concession only because the existence of the oppressed is necessary to their own existence.” (58 Paulo Freire - Pedagogy of the Oppressed)
“In their unrestrained eagerness to possess, the oppressors develop the conviction that it is possible for them to transform everything into objects of their purchasing power; hence their strictly materialistic concept of existence. Money is the measure of all things, and profit the primary goal. For the oppressors, what is worthwhile is to have more–always more–even at the cost of the oppressed having less or having nothing. For them, to be is to have and to be the class of the “haves”.” (58 Paulo Freire - Pedagogy of the Oppressed)
“The oppressors do not perceive their monopoly on having more as a privilege which dehumanizes others and themselves (I think I DO recognize this though…but how to get away from it is a fucking hell-of-challenge….). They can not see that, in the egoistic pursuit of having as a possessing class, they suffocate in their own possessions and no longer are; they merely have. For them, having more is an inalienable right, a right they acquired through their own “effort,” with their “courage to take risks.” If others do not have more, it is because they are incompetent and lazy, and worst of allis their unjustifiable ingratitude towards the “generous gestures” of the dominant class (otherwise known as False Generosity). Precisely because they are “ungrateful” and “envious,” the oppressed are regarded as potential enemies who must be watched” and constantly controled (think PARIS!). (59 Paulo Freire - Pedagogy of the Oppressed)
“…certain members of the oppressor class join the oppressed in their struggle for liberation, thus moving from one pole of the contradiction to the other. Theirs is a fundamental role, and has been throughout the history of this sturggle. It happens, however that as they cease to be exploiters or indefferent spectators or simply the heirs of exploitation and move to the side of the exploited, they almost always bring with them the marks of their origin: their prejudices and their defomations, which include a lack of confidence in the people’s ability to think, to want, and to know. …they believe they must be the executers of the transormation. They talk about the people, but they do not trust them; and trusting the people is the indispensable precondition for revolutionary change. A real humanist can be identified more by his trust in the people, which engages him in their struggle, than by a thousand actions in their favor without that trust.
“Those who authentically commit themselves to the people must re-examine themselves constantly…Conversion to the people requires a profound rebirth. Those who undergo it must take on a new form of exitence; they can no longer remain as they were….The convert who approaches the people but feels alarm at each step they take, each doubt they express, and each suggestion they offer, and attempts to impose his “status,” remains nostalgic towards his origins.” (61 Paulo Freire - Pedagogy of the Oppressed)
Hmmm……something to think about….and something to struggle for achieving!
-Chris
Posted by drpoo as Peace Works!, Personal Endeveavors at 11:58 PM PST
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