Volume 9, Issue 6, page 7
EDUCATION ACCUSED OF
SACRIFICING "THE MAN" TO
EFFICIENT "WORK PAWNS"
By PAOLO GRIECO
WE ARE suddenly being plagued with much
controversy about education thruout the
whole country. Yet out of the battle of
words, very little change has been forthcoming outside of a shifting from overliberal "progressive" education to a
quasi-traditional "solid subject" discipline --
and from "fringe" courses back to fundamentals. Indeed, our schools have dared indulge
in some of the most bizarre courses of little
worth and no mind development content.
A renaissance in education has most certainly been wanting for a good many years. But
getting back to the three R's, the 'solid subjects', and the good old fundamentals does not
guarantee the most desirable results in education. Tho they may better prepare students for
greater intellectual development and practices,
they do not surely "build the man". One great
thinker put it thusly:
We are all blind until we see
That, in the Human Plan,
Nothing is worth the making
If at does not make the man.
There is no question of the quality and
ability of our university instructors, their
laboratories and the professional technicians
developed. This country without a doubt ranks
high in academic fruitage. In consequence, we
have built great scientific knowledge, technique, and know-how, great industries, vast and
complex and profound institutions of every
size and description. We are producing the
greatest variety, quality, and abundance of
consumer goods on earth. Yet with all these
great achievements, can we say that we are
also making the man?
With all the "greats", let us now view the
other side of the coin. We have the biggest
and most heavily-populated prisons, hospitals,
mental institutions, and foundling homes. We
also have the greatest consumption of narcotics,
sedatives, tranquilizers, tobaccos, alcohol,
candy, pop, and an endless array of murderously
devitalized, demineralized, shamefully adulterated, and sadly unbalanced foods. Is this
not a devastating indictment of our moral
fibre, rationale, and discretion? If a man is
as he thinketh, what then is the image he has
of himself to produce such a dreadful status?
With horror, we read of the ignorance,
superstition, and violence of man described on
the pages of history. Do not these facts appear mild compared to our own immediate history? A world has been built indeed, but in the
making, we simply forgot about the making of
man. We see generation upon generation blindly
heaping ignominy upon ignominy with not a trace
of a promise for a change to betterment.
For what do we educate? Is it to create an
overwhelming mass of exploitable labor force --
work -pawns? Or shall we educate to develop
creative, thinking, perpetually-unique human
individuals with a highly-expanded consciousness, recognizing individual sovereignty and
responsibility capable of securely meeting the
swiftly-moving, changing, challenges of earth
life? Can we educate men to be creatively discriminating, discerning, evaluating, reflective,
and analytical with the inherent intuitive,
intellectual, and rational powers of a sound
healthy body, an elastic, expansive, and eclectic mind sharply focused to simplicity and
honesty? Will man not then have a truly noble
heart, acutely aware of his highest humanitarian association as man to man, man to nature, and to Life itself?
The image precedes the fulfillment. What is
the image man has of himself? Is it one of
physical, material, scientific strength, power,
sufficiency, and superlativeness? Or is it one
of inherent, emergent, spiritual, moral, ethical, honor, honesty, decency, and integrity?
Can we build a really worthwhile social structure based on human beings who are sharply
organized, stringently specialized, and limitingly indoctrinated as clever mechanistic manipulators and idolatrous materialists? No --
never! The former leads to common human welfare and decency. The latter can only result
in deprivation, suffocation, degradation, complete social imbalance, and ultimate rebellion ,
revolution, destruction, and potential annihilation of civilization wrought over the eons
of time.
LAY TROUBLES OUT LIKE CARDS -- AND LOOK THEM OVER
By "LOUIS"
EW OF US would find it difficult to take a
deck of cards, lay them out on the table,
and in so doing, look at them, recognizing
their suits. This is a rather simple operation, and this technique can be used to
help us work out some of the problems that
confront us in everyday life.
Where we foul up a situation is not seeing
it in its totality. If we lay our troubles on a
mental table and look at then , one by one and
then at the total, we gain a new insight into
just what we face. We go from the negative to
the positive. We say to ourselves: This is the
situation; now what am I going to do about it?
Thus we start to play a game. Maybe it calls
for reorganization, or even a new deal -- but we
are approaching it from its whole pattern
rather than from a few isolated incidents. It
is not always easy to face the various issues
that surround us, but in facing a situation,
we become the master over it. We can manipulate to our advantage. What seemed as an obsta
cle now is but a part of many obstacles, and
we can remove each segment as we choose.
It is a good technique to at times actually
map out the situation from its every aspect.
You will find after you finish, the answer to
solving the problem or group of problems comes
along as a natural result of this positive action.
The main difficulty with many persons is
overemphasizing one facet of life's pattern,
and in so doing, getting involved in an involvement. When we detach ourselves and look
as a stranger on the sum total, the answer
comes as the result of the one action. Actually, this is the duality in action. We state
the problem in its entirety, and the counteraction comes in the form of the answer, or action necessary for promoting growth.
So, next time you have a problem, lay it on
the table -- - and watch the answer emerge. This
follows the law of the duality: Positive
springs from the negative.
OCTOBER, 1962 The ABERREE 7
