The "Misundereducation" of America
09 January 2007
by Timbre' Wolf, Contributing writer for AnaiRhoads.org
AnaiRhoads.org - Americans are intellectually unmotivated. This is *not* to say that they are stupid. And you may have noticed that I used the word "unmotivated" rather than "lazy."
A few years ago I was turned on to the idea that there is actually no such thing as "lazy." The prime example is a man who doesn't work. As a friend of mine pointed out: "Men work. That's what they do. They love to work, they have to work, they can't keep themselves from working. If a man can't work then it's because he has been really screwed up."
A friend of mine was a serious child student of the art in comic books. Even as a youngster he was a serious critic of film, music, and art. His mother, from the generation of the Great Depression, saw all of these endeavors as worthless. Her son, in her opinion, was "lazy." He was not lazy...he was simply unmotivated to pursue things which she found to be worthy.
Americans are raised, for the most part, going through the (largely ineffective) public education system. Then it's off to college. Various reports, over the years, have ranked US public education behind that of many other countries. Additionally, even our colleges - at the undergraduate level, fair poorly in most cases. Now, when you get to the graduate level things change dramatically. We rank very high in the latter. And the thing about graduate level work is that one's education is never really considered to be "finished." PhD's must continue to research, write, and teach.
But the average American considers their education to be complete after High School or after they receive a bachelors degree.
I hate to be the bearer of bad news but watching cable T.V.'s Discovery, History, or Home & Garden Channels just doesn't count. Neither does watching PBS or listening to NPR. Research is differentiated from watching T.V. or listening to the radio by shifting the intention and direction away from the "programmers" to the intent and self direction of the participant. The researcher is in control of which information is gathered. Those who watch T.V. are not.
This brings us to a curious body of data...but you won't see this ANYWHERE on T.V.:
George Bush sent Condoleezza Rice to Britain for the purpose of proposing the invasion of Iraq and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein. "Intelligence," which supported the invasion, was manufactured, modified, or amplified to make a "convincing" argument for invasion. Peculiarly, all of this happened BEFORE 9/11. Since then it has been determined that Iraq/Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction (WMD's).
Bush ignored the Army's chief of staff, Gen. Eric Shinseki, about the forces needed to reckon with the situation in Iraq. The General said that it would take 300,000 US soldiers to stabilize Iraq. Ronald Rumsfeld, the civilian (non-military), disagreed and sent 130,000. Now Bush wants to send 20,000 more American kids to Iraq. I hate to tell you this George...that's still only HALF of what the General said it would take.
Bush has bombed innocent civilians (including women and children) in Afghanistan and Pakistan (to say nothing of Iraq). Apparently Bush has a determined desire to continue his bombing madness in Iran.
Bush allowed prisoners to be tortured at Abu Ghraib and held indefinitely at Guantanamo Bay. The Supreme Court has declared Bush's actions at Gitmo UNCONSTITUTIONAL.
Bush's secret wiretapping has been declared UNCONSTITUTIONAL by Federal Judge Anita Diggs Taylor.
Bush's own legal council believes that he can be tried for war crimes including "grave breaches" of the Geneva Conventions. Noting that the law applies to " U.S. officials" and that punishments for violators "include the death penalty."
Bush has violated the rights of Americans, first with the Patriot Act, then with his illegal (and unrepentant) use of the National Security Agency (NSA) for phone taps, and now through the Military Commissions Act.
Bush has declared war on our National Forests and the environment in general. He refuses to abide by the Kyoto Protocol.
Bush has chosen to ignore chemical weapons ban protocol, has allowed the use of uranium on Iraq, and appears to be testing laser weaponry - which only burns the faces off of its targets.
And this list goes on and on and on and on.
Those of us who give a shit, and that would likely be every reader of this article, have looked up some, or all, of this information. We have a fairly clear picture of what is going on and what needs to be done.
HOWEVER, we are not communicating this information effectively to the masses. We complain about not having access to Main Stream Media outlets. But I must defer to the Tao on this one.
27
What is a good person but a bad person's teacher?
What is a bad person but raw materiel for his teacher?
If you fail to honor your teacher or fail to enjoy your student,
you will become deluded no matter how smart you are.
It is the secret of prime importance.
Dr.'s William Glasser and W. Edwards Deming say that bad managers, not lazy workers, are responsible for a corporation's failures, or (from Glasser) bad (misinformed) teachers, not lazy students, are responsible for the failures in our educational system.
And so here we are: teachers, researchers, managers, and otherwise "good people"...whose fault is it that the masses are not standing at the gates of Washington with pitchforks?
It is our fault.
Deming asks: By what method?
By what method will we communicate? Can we use humor? How about theatre or art? Movies, perhaps.
But we DO NOT have time to properly educate the masses with information - the same information which took us several years of hard fought research to garner.
We must become more adept at reaching the American people than the spin masters of the Fed/Corporate/Media complex. And any infighting, possibly caused by the infiltration of the ever clever enemy, must be stopped dead in it's tracks.
Wolfe can be reached at timbrewolf1@gmail.com.
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