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Notes on the current state of being (ongoing thread, comments okay)

Started by Doktor Howl, April 10, 2012, 01:54:42 PM

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Doktor Howl

4/10/12

Education, they tell us, is a sacred thing that should be denied to no child.  This is hardly a surprising attitude, when you consider that modern education is a vector by which they deliver the malady of subordination.

Make no mistake, the governments and corporations know they need some technical geeks, just to keep the lights on, etc.  The problem, however, is that educated people are hard to control unless you put the bridle on them first.  A highly educated man with a third of a million in debt coming out of the gate is much easier to deal with than one who comes out free and clear.

That much ought to be obvious...But let's look at children for a moment.  Children are subjected to, at their schools, 3 kinds of operant conditioning:

1.  Fear/obey authority:  THESE are the rules, and YOU will follow them.  K-12.  Leads to a lifetime of servile habits.

2.  Fall into the pecking order.  This used to be done by means of encouraging bullying.  It has, however, been found that simply ostracization functions BETTER when bullying has been removed from the table, as bullying creates multiple groups, which distracts from

3.  Encourage conformity.  Not in some eglatarian "we are all equal" sense, but to make people predictable.

When the above methods prove unworkable on a child, and that seems to be about 10-15% of the student body, why then we come to the problem of drugs in our schools.  For example, America consumes 90% of the world's Ritalin, and almost all of it is administered to male children between 6 and 12.  Keeps the little bastards quiet, and monkeys with their cognition.

How can a 6 year old have a diagnosable mental condition?  How can so many of them have these conditions?

Since they obviously can't, then the obvious question is "Why are they being drugged?"  The answer, of course, should be equally obvious.

And thus they manufacture the consent of the governed.

Okay for now.
Molon Lube

Doktor Howl

The only takeaways from the modern school system, other than the minimum math & science skills they pretty much have to teach you to allow you to minimally function is that You don't belong.
Molon Lube

Doktor Howl

Trayvon Martin's death...It should have been investigated locally.  It wasn't.  The state should have stepped in.  It didn't.  The Feds should have stepped in, on civil rights grounds.  It has failed to do so.

The reason for this, of course, is to further drive home the message that you are helpless.  You exist at the whim of entrenched "good citizens", who have the backing of the entire government, at all levels.
Molon Lube

Doktor Howl

Of course, the principle danger of looking around is that you tend to become jaded.  This is because there seems to be no handle by which to gain enough control of your daily life to change any of the horrible shit they shower us with, every day.

The best part is that you know that's not correct, but they've convinced you that it is.
Molon Lube

Doktor Howl

Consider:  They control all forms of media save one (the internet), hence SOPA, etc.

If they control the media, then what do you get by watching or reading the media?  Why, you contract at least a few of their memes, of course.  The meme that Mexican illegal immigrants are responsible for the rise in measles, polio, eye disease, TB, etc, is a good example.  It also turns out (thanks for the link, Nigel), to be completely untrue.

Another obvious example was the lead up to the second round of Iraq.  The media treated the war as a foregone conclusion; that the decisions had already been made, so why not just sit back and watch the CNN war porn?

Bradley Manning is another example.  The lesson is, we're going to torture this American because he followed his own moral sense.  And you can do nothing to stop it.

If they keep telling lies, and you keep listening, you'll start believing them.  And believe you me, all the stories that the major media spews in your face are ones that are in fact carefully vetted as issues that are almost impossible to influence.

Which, obviously, distracts you from the issues you CAN influence, but even if you saw them, you're so beat up, it's kind of like "why bother"?
Molon Lube

Doktor Howl

Think about this, for just a moment:  If the US government is no longer bound by the US constitution in any meaningful way, why are you?
Molon Lube

Nephew Twiddleton

Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 10, 2012, 02:57:03 PM
Think about this, for just a moment:  If the US government is no longer bound by the US constitution in any meaningful way, why are you?

What parts of the US Constitution would I have been bound to? The only bits I know of deal with how the government works, and how it is limited from interfering with a citizen's life.
Strange and Terrible Organ Laminator of Yesterday's Heavy Scene
Sentence or sentence fragment pending

Soy El Vaquero Peludo de Oro

TIM AM I, PRIMARY OF THE EXTRA-ATMOSPHERIC SIMIANS

Doktor Howl

Quote from: Nephew Twiddleton on April 10, 2012, 03:01:57 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 10, 2012, 02:57:03 PM
Think about this, for just a moment:  If the US government is no longer bound by the US constitution in any meaningful way, why are you?

What parts of the US Constitution would I have been bound to? The only bits I know of deal with how the government works, and how it is limited from interfering with a citizen's life.

You are required to:

1.  Answer the draft.
2.  Sit on a jury.
3.  Pay taxes.

You are also, by implication - and this is the important part - obey federal laws as passed by congress, in precisely the same manner the government "must" obey the constitution.  It's right there in black & white, in article VI.
Molon Lube

Nephew Twiddleton

Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 10, 2012, 03:03:56 PM
Quote from: Nephew Twiddleton on April 10, 2012, 03:01:57 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 10, 2012, 02:57:03 PM
Think about this, for just a moment:  If the US government is no longer bound by the US constitution in any meaningful way, why are you?

What parts of the US Constitution would I have been bound to? The only bits I know of deal with how the government works, and how it is limited from interfering with a citizen's life.

You are required to:

1.  Answer the draft.
2.  Sit on a jury.
3.  Pay taxes.

You are also, by implication - and this is the important part - obey federal laws as passed by congress, in precisely the same manner the government "must" obey the constitution.  It's right there in black & white, in article VI.

Cool- thanks for that.
Strange and Terrible Organ Laminator of Yesterday's Heavy Scene
Sentence or sentence fragment pending

Soy El Vaquero Peludo de Oro

TIM AM I, PRIMARY OF THE EXTRA-ATMOSPHERIC SIMIANS

The Johnny

Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 10, 2012, 01:54:42 PM

And thus they manufacture the consent of the governed.


Ive been doing some field-work on a middle school that involves interviewing teachers... and each and every one of them talks about how education must be "integral"; not just about teaching knowledge on specific subjects, but about VALUES.

They dont have values because they horse around flag ceremony and have no respect for the patriotic symbols; they dont have values because their family is dysfunctional; they dont have values because they cherish the internet more than our words of wisdom.

School is a tool and an enforcer of the disciplinary society because it tries to impose its worldview and ideology of "what-is-right" on students.

Different contexts, different applications; same objective.
<<My image in some places, is of a monster of some kind who wants to pull a string and manipulate people. Nothing could be further from the truth. People are manipulated; I just want them to be manipulated more effectively.>>

-B.F. Skinner

Doktor Howl

Quote from: Nephew Twiddleton on April 10, 2012, 03:07:41 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 10, 2012, 03:03:56 PM
Quote from: Nephew Twiddleton on April 10, 2012, 03:01:57 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 10, 2012, 02:57:03 PM
Think about this, for just a moment:  If the US government is no longer bound by the US constitution in any meaningful way, why are you?

What parts of the US Constitution would I have been bound to? The only bits I know of deal with how the government works, and how it is limited from interfering with a citizen's life.

You are required to:

1.  Answer the draft.
2.  Sit on a jury.
3.  Pay taxes.

You are also, by implication - and this is the important part - obey federal laws as passed by congress, in precisely the same manner the government "must" obey the constitution.  It's right there in black & white, in article VI.

Cool- thanks for that.

Here you go:

QuoteArticle VI
All Debts contracted and Engagements entered into, before the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be as valid against the United States under this Constitution, as under the Confederation.

This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwith-standing.

The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.
Molon Lube

Doktor Howl

Quote from: Joh'Nyx on April 10, 2012, 03:11:11 PM

Different contexts, different applications; same objective.

Precisely.

And just whose values are they inculcating?
Molon Lube

AFK

Quote from: Joh'Nyx on April 10, 2012, 03:11:11 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 10, 2012, 01:54:42 PM

And thus they manufacture the consent of the governed.


Ive been doing some field-work on a middle school that involves interviewing teachers... and each and every one of them talks about how education must be "integral"; not just about teaching knowledge on specific subjects, but about VALUES.

They dont have values because they horse around flag ceremony and have no respect for the patriotic symbols; they dont have values because their family is dysfunctional; they dont have values because they cherish the internet more than our words of wisdom.

School is a tool and an enforcer of the disciplinary society because it tries to impose its worldview and ideology of "what-is-right" on students.

Different contexts, different applications; same objective.

While that may be true to some degree, the problem is that society has grown to have that expectation of the education system.  Our society has grown to expect schools to not only teach math and science and english, but to also be a third parent.  It's the school's job to teach kids about safe sex, about drugs, about how to be a good citizen....

And while I think those are all good, what has happened is that parents have, perhaps unconsciously, shifted that part of parenting to schools.  And then when the schools fail (because they are not designed to be parents), people get upset. 

Schools need to be more empowered to do what they are supposed to do which is impart knowledge upon our children and get them ready for their next phase of learning whether it is college or taking up a trade.  Parents need to be more empowered to be the parents. 
Cynicism is a blank check for failure.

LMNO

Re: education.

I see where you're going, and for a large part, I agree....  But how does that explain me/us/y'all?  I've felt and experienced the appeal to authority, the bullying, the conformity, the social heirarchy.  But it didn't take.  It did suck, though.  But I kept learning things.  I liked learning things.  I also managed to avoid the drugs.  And once I got out into 10th grade, "it got better".  My desire to non-conform was accepted, if only reluctantly at first.  But it was a freedom, in some sense.  And so here I am.

Now, I know this is potentially a biased outlook: "I'm not, so no one is."  But I know that for the majority of kids, the way you present it is the way it works.  But there's a way to escape.  Maybe we should look into that, figure out how to do it.

Also
Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 10, 2012, 02:24:48 PM
Of course, the principle danger of looking around is that you tend to become jaded.  This is because there seems to be no handle by which to gain enough control of your daily life to change any of the horrible shit they shower us with, every day.

The best part is that you know that's not correct, but they've convinced you that it is.

This is TROOF.  It's hard for me to think outside the system when I've got both feet in the system.

The Johnny

Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 10, 2012, 03:13:32 PM
Quote from: Joh'Nyx on April 10, 2012, 03:11:11 PM

Different contexts, different applications; same objective.

Precisely.

And just whose values are they inculcating?

From what i can see, its the modern State's rationalization (im not sure if it translates this way) process, which aims at the re-integration of whomever is a deviant (excluded or radicals); but the thing is, they want the re-integration to be under their terms of the established order which ultimately favours the ruling classes. Its essentialy on the conservative side of things. It's nostalgic, self-centered and preachy.
<<My image in some places, is of a monster of some kind who wants to pull a string and manipulate people. Nothing could be further from the truth. People are manipulated; I just want them to be manipulated more effectively.>>

-B.F. Skinner