Beyond the Politics of the Big Lie: The Education Deficit and the New Authoritarianism
http://www.sott.net/articles/show/246983-Beyond-the-Politics-of-the-Big-Lie-The-Education-Deficit-and-the-New-Authoritarianism
Tue, 19 Jun 2012 16:01 CDT
Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity. -Martin Luther King Jr.
The American public is suffering from an education deficit. By this I mean it exhibits a growing inability to think critically, question authority, be reflective, weigh evidence, discriminate between reasoned arguments and opinions, listen across differences and engage the mutually informing relationship between private problems and broader public issues. This growing political and cultural illiteracy is not merely a problem of the individual, one that points to simple ignorance. It is a collective and social problem that goes to the heart of the increasing attack on democratic public spheres and supportive public institutions that promote analytical capacities, thoughtful exchange and a willingness to view knowledge as a resource for informed modes of individual and social agency. One of the major consequences of the current education deficit and the pervasive culture of illiteracy that sustains it is what I call the ideology of the big lie - which propagates the myth that the free-market system is the only mechanism to ensure human freedom and safeguard democracy.
(Article does continue. Zim.)
Mad Poet Strikes Again.
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