The police state of the future

While Canada is generally following US in increasing surveillance it is interesting to note these 2 stories: Can. Supreme Court striking down emergency phone tapping w/o warrant http://goo.gl/64Qwm and contrast Jessie Brown found compared to US of our telcos and passing cellphone tracking data to the police: http://wp.me/p2kSKg-13Ds.

Hope this trend continues here despite Harper but it will take political mobilizing.

Ian, think you meant InculCate?

Ah, the unsustainability of authoritarianism. Much like capitalism, it eventually eats its own.

Ah, the unsustainability of authoritarianism. Much like capitalism, it eventually eats its own.

I don’t see anything unsustainable about it. Biometric scanning and databases are cheap and probably effective. A very small price to pay to maintain the status quo, and innocuous enough for most of the population to see it as a good thing.

Authoritarianism seems to be what we’re bred for; it seems to be the fall-back position for the uneducated, shallow thinkers, so prevalent in America today.

Sorry, I’m going to have to push back on this rather lazy statement. There are no “uneducated, shallow thinkers.” There are plenty of the mis-educated, and this results in what appears to be shallow thinking – to those of us who have managed to shake loose the paradigms that we all are under tremendous social pressure to accept.

There is a great deal of very deliberate education buttressing our world-view. And these educational experiments are historically new enough that the jury is clearly out on just how we will collectively – yes, collectively – respond to it now that the curtains are being pulled aside.

This subject has come up before here, and we are not being “cultured” under anything remotely resembling our natural conditions (what we’re “bred for.”) We are struggling with challenges, that appear to be inevitable under the historically-new distortion of mass-civilization. These challenges are problematic precisely because they are unsustainable – they chafe and they vex.

We could very well perish in the face of these challenges (or face the perpetual roiling of the boot-trying-to-stamp-on-face-forever), but it is also possible that we will push through this and find something that resembles a proper equilibrium.

I know that “equilibrium” is also something that has been roundly mocked here as well, and I will concede that it could be just a unicorn dream – but there is no way I am going to accept that what is happening now is either natural, or something that will continue in perpetuity due our flawed nature… to turn it around, I reject that somehow this is the equilibrium.

Accepting how much people are forgetting, right in my face, my lifetime, is something I still barely come to terms with. During my childhood Jim Crow statutes were in force. I came of working age when we still had a thriving economy, plenty of jobs, no such things as homelessness or shock jocks. I refuse to forget things like that.

Thing is, doesn’t seem to matter what strikes me as important. The community around me is elsewhere, an elsewhere that could care less about the histories I value too much to relinquish.

I have trouble figuring out how to talk to people every day because the difference between our views of the world are that far apart by now.

Celsius – If you’re defining education in that more narrow sense, then yes, we have a semantic difference (except that I might challenge how useful much of “classical” education is in the flowering of the natural human being – but that’s a separate quibble, and I don’t come ’round here looking to argue.)

And of course you are right about there being no “equilibrium” – or balance – in sight. How could there be, without proper education? (Without getting into the weeds here, as an aside may I mention that my perspective on “proper education” is animated by Krishnamurti’s views.)

I do, however, take issue with the de-fanging of the natural/unnatural distinction. By your usage, the concentrations of toxins through resource misuse is also “natural” behavior. I prefer to retain the distinction and hope for a more holistic relationship with the world – and each other – and call that “natural.” More specifically: The pseudo-reality we inhabit – a construction of the mind – is a meta-verse that I deem “unnatural.” Unlike the singularity dreamers, I find that what Plato might call the unbridled mind and what K. would say is the noisome one, a pox on the “natural” life.

Peace & love.

(Sorry about the “lazy thinking” invective – that was rude – and indeed lazy – thinking on my part.)

@MontanaMaven:

Loved Gatto’s book. The fact that he uses his data as an apologia for the rather cold individualism of libertarianism colors his thesis somewhat, but his exposition on the evolution of modern Industrial Age education is invaluable. Highly recommended.

I think that damaged people lean towards authoritarianism – and we become damaged at a very early, formative, age with the regrettable hierarchical family-unit model that is so very modern civilization. Child-rearing is a very different proposition in what is our traditional, tribal, organization – the one that existed for the vast majority of our incarnation on this planet, the one that created and raised us.

Then we had to go and get all clever with agriculture and other manipulations of the Mother. I think (hope) we’ll survive this, and too bad I won’t get to see what comes out the other side, but I rest easy thinking that others will…

Yes, my biggest problem with Gatto is that he believes that all collective action is tainted, unreformable. Whereas I see the necessity for having a healthy collective (and I can identify specific reasons as to exactly why we don’t at the moment, rather than just to demonize collectivism en toto.)

Essentially, he’s an apologist for home-schoolers at the end of the day, and in modern culture that has more to do with jingoism and theocratic ignorance than it does with criticism of the public education agenda. (And, as Gatto well points out, there is much to criticize about public education.)

(His Darwin references have to do with the unfortunate behavioral sciences that he presumable laid the groundwork for, Skinner & Pavlov and that crazy “Prussian” (Austrian) Freud & his Swiss doppelganger Jung… 🙂 – plus I’m sure it plays well with the theocratic anti-science crowd as well. He did run as a conservative libertarian for some office or two in New York…)

are “tells” – gratuitously anti-science because of

Education is irrelevant. In the face of danger the lizard brain takes over. Obama is doing precisely what Bush did, he is making sure that the lizard brain stays in control. He is a bit more subtle in his fear mongering but no less dedicated in his mission to keep the voters terrified of forces that are determined to kill Americans and from which he and he alone can defend them. Whenever any other topic is raised he will steer it back to “keeping aAmerica safe,” and voters of all persuasion will slurp the message up.

groo – Well, he’s much more precise, even somewhat pedagogical, in his writing (not to say that he’s boring at all.) MontanaMaven, above, has the link to his fine book. His discussion of the Prussian system will have you cringing nicely. 😉

I agree that he has the sincerity of a true believer – I didn’t mean to imply otherwise with my criticism of his politics.

I also agree that his input is invaluable – so much of his information is like an oasis in the desert.

I thought I had seen most of his videos back when I was reading him, but I just sauntered over to YouTube and see that there are many more than I remember. Do you have a link to the one you enjoyed?

Cheers.

Great conversation. Yes, I’ve read Gatto as well, and share the sentiments. Surely there must be a third way or a forth way or fifth way. Individualism doesn’t have to have to preclude community and community doesn’t have to preclude individualism. That’s dualistic thinking…or thinking inside the box. How do we collectively (gasp) break out of the box. I agree, the Authoritarians on both ends of the spectrum want that box to remain in tact. It’s what perpetuates their power and status. Without that box, they’re pariahs floating in the wind like milkweed thistle.

I read an article once upon a time that described how some Western NGO traveled to some distant remote land, I can’t remember where, and attempted to teach the local tribe there how to farm more effectively and efficiently. Once they helped the tribe implement the changes, yields increased dramatically, but the tribe became depressed and despondent. When the NGO members investigated, it was determined that they had so altered the fabric of the tribe’s life by changing their daily activities, the tribe no longer had a purpose for life. Prior to the NGO arriving their daily work, whilst inefficient, always yielded them enough to survive and the they had a blast doing it their way. They sang and danced a socially cavorted the entire time. The sad part is, it took forever for the NGO to figure out the reason for the tribe’s depression. The NGO had ruined it for the tribe. They shut the party of life down and separated the tribe out into isolated duties that no longer allowed them to enjoy each other and their “work.” That about says it all, don’t you think. I can so empathize with that tribe. It’s what is sorely missing in my life, and it’s why I know I can never go back to the corporate world without it finally killing me for good.

P.S. Oh, and we all know that when Bush was in power we were allowed to use the “p” term. But now that Obama is, the pwogs won’t hear of it.

Thanks for the link, groo.

What sounds about right to me, is, that the PTB, and here he is nearly a conspiracy-theorist- is that the educational system is designed to produce obediant servants.

Yes, and this is where we come ’round full circle. It’s all about respecting the legitimacy of “authority.”

And there is no such thing as authority (outside of the very narrow definition of one person knowing more about a particular thing than another – in an honest world with transparency and no need to grip power, this is a temporary condition.)

On the Prussian bit – realistically, the birth of capitalism and the Industrial Age was thirsty for some means of fundamentally transforming agrarian society… if it didn’t pop up there (and originally it was created for the narrow purpose of transforming the behavior of their military), it would’ve popped up somewhere. And the proselytizers who took it across Europe and into the U.S. are just as culpable – if you’re into the blame game. Which I’m not, really. If life’s taught me anything, it’s that we’re all mutually responsible for the whole damned mess…

Thanks again for the video link…

You’re right, Lisa – I know because I downloaded that movie back then because of your recommendation (powerful movie.)

But there’s nothing wrong with repeating things a few times until they become truly internalized (as W. said, you gotta “catapult the propaganda”, heh heh.)

I echo Morocco Bama in the answer being in some sort of synthesis of community and individualism. Martin Luther King Jr said that communism forgot the individual and capitalism forgot the social. He was looking for a synthesis of the two. Gatto has come closest to anything I’ve read lately in trying to come up with practical solutions while blowing up a lot of conventional wisdom with history. His emphasis on freedom, a real freedom from restraints and from being shoved in a box is appreciated. He talks about learning civility and manners so he is aware that the individual lives in a social communal situation.

Blowing up the way we educate seems as good a place to start as anything. It fascinated me that the Occupy movement had a whole lot of education going on and it was free. MIT professors, strip tease dancers, chefs all came to the parks and taught with a whole lot of practical application for the tribes. That’s when I, a product of liberal arts education, starting question the idea of “school” and started thinking about Plato’s forums. So it’s nice to discover Gatto’s chapter on early forms of education. It also is interesting that a lot of my neighbors including my husband were educated in one room school houses. We have a woman from Pasadena that moved her so she could have her daughter attend a one room school. We have three of them in a 20 mile radius along with the sad typical bunker type elementary school in town. A friend had a son labeled “special” at the town school by an unqualified special ed teacher. He’s thriving at the one room school.

I am in the movie/television business. A product like a movie is made in about 12 weeks and then some time in post production. The people that work on a movie from the costumers to the set decorators to the electricians (gaffers) to the builders (grips) to the story tellers (actors, writers, directors) to the editors and composers mostly learn on the job. They apprentice. Kind of like medieval guilds. (Speaking of medieval, those folks had a whole lot of leisure time what with all those festivals. )

As Graeber points out in “Revolutions in Reverse”, we have got to get our priorities straight. We should emphasize the production and nurturing of humans and their environment. Making stuff for the humans should be secondary. Now it is reversed. So why indeed learn to read books and study history in order to fold and sell sweaters? Making sweaters for humans is good though. Telling stories to humans is good. But why do we put a banker on a pedestal when it is really the plumber who is much more important. Priorities. And thinking small, not big.

I’m not sure if this short clip of Gatto on Training Fleas has been linked to yet, but if it hasn’t, here it is. I know Montana Maven will appreciate it. I sure do. My response to it is yes, yes….and yes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJhSAv-NrDo

A final note;

Gatto does not present himself as a leftist, and never directly refers to enlightenment principles.

Doing so, he accomplishes a rare feat: not to open up an ideological battle-ground, but pointing to a mode of education, which even rightwingers would be hard pressed to reject.

There maybe substantial differences, eg wrt the role of authority, but he does not make that a central issue. He does this indirectly.
In this respect, he seems to be more clever than eg Lakoff, who openly declares war aginst the Right and their distortions of the meanings of words, which is correct in a sense, but a loosing strategy.

This all is a far cry from Habermas’ theory of communicative action, where societal actors engage in a dialogue, to determine what the ‘truth’ is.
habermas assumes, that all participants in the discussion are genuinely interested in determining this ‘truth’, as a compromise of autonomous individuals, engaged in a substantial debate.
But this, as we know, is not the case.
It is cheaters against the decent lot.

The perverse tautology in all this is that all the cheaters assume that everybody else is cheating.
This is per definition so:
If you cheat, YOU HAVE TO ASSUME that you are not the only one.

On the other hand, if you rely on trust, you tend to create an enclave of trust, defending against deception.

Those defenders are the gatekeepers.

@MontanaMaven:

Is Gatto then more clever than Lakoff or is he one of those people we call “good” because he is engaging in communication to get to the truth? Both I’m thinking.

Agreed, especially the latter.

I’m watching his “Ultimate History Lessons” interview (thanks for the “Fleas” teaser link, MB) – just completed the first hour (of five). I found his characterization of his classroom style towards the end rather touching and inspired. I’m getting to like him even more.

Montana Maven, Petro,

You know that I’m an outsider, not really knowing all the intricacies of american debate.

Anyway.
As far as is understand, Lakoff makes the debate a mental issue. A meme-fight.
Lakoff seems to be convinced, that the fight is all abot words.
Program the memes in the right way, and you win the fight.

I think Lakoff is a bit off the mark here.
(the philosopher in me recognizes the same proplem in Wittgenstein I versus WII

Plus, Lisa, I find out from the manicurist that her family is hooked on programs like “Restaurant Stakeout” and “Undercover Boss”. I said, “Don’t you think it’s creepy and really anti-American aka FREEDOM! FREEDOM! to have surveillance and hidden cameras everywhere?” Not only the restaurant staff is being spied on but many of the patrons. And this is what is called “entertainment”. Talk about “Hunger Games”.

addendum:
category (c) is not simple psychopaths, but is shaped by beliefs, which have a long history, and are the hidden codes of power.

Full-blown psychopaths, capable of shaping society are quite rare.
Not even Hitler, Mao, Pol Pot , Milosevic or GWBush really apply for this single explanation.

Mostly they HIDE behind an ideology, and you do not see their true essence, which is a subtle effort, constructed by a century-long code of power, ranging from ‘god’ to ‘property-rights’ to the ‘nature of man’ or ‘national identity’.

Sun Tzu and Machiavell.
Both, I would say, were Humanists, because they revealed this hidden code of delusion, intertwisted as personal aspiration and projected ‘need’ of society.

Interestingly enough, cat (c) uses this as a valuably strategy, not as a deconstruction of a defective method, what the authors actually meant.

Not really surprising, because cat (c) has a mental defect here.

MB, anytime the TSA gets a rash of bad publicity for one of their frequent episodes of bullying, harassment, theft, or sexual assault, they bring out the puppies. Bloghdad Bob over at Propaganda Village (the TSA blog) writes a puppy post. And the media dutifully follow.

Really, why bother even having reporters anymore? So much easier just to reprint the press releases verbatim.

Oh, that’s right. They already do.

Thank you Ian for articulating something I’ve thought my entire adult life, but have lacked the words to convey, no excuse me, the strength to pose such an argument, but hearing it now its easier to admit agreement, I tangent now, but with purpose,I think the United States of America is ripe for a rallying cry to prosecute the banksters, we just need eggs heads who can explain the shindle in plain english on a large enough forum.