Education in "Utopia"

Education Education Education

"In his great work Equality [1931], R. H. Tawney pointed out that the English educational system "will never be one worthy of a civilised society until the children of all classes in the nation attend the same schools . . . The idea that differences of educational opportunities among children should depend upon differences of wealth represents a barbarity.""

England is perhaps unique in Europe in the sense that it is still fully in the grips of the utter barbarity described above.

It's not that private schools should be abolished (though that might help things). It is that they should not be necessary!

The idea that an education system in England that is different to the current one represents a "utopia" is false.
"Utopia" means "nowhere."
And a different educational system to the English one exists "everywhere in Europe except England".
This is hardly "nowhere"!

"Education! Education! Education!" says TB.

There will never be a solution to the problems of English education until New Labour fully addresses the crux of the problem as expressed by Tawney above.

I remember feeling annoyed at the age of 9 when I realised that the school I was going to was far better than the schools of other children in terms of the quality of the education and the facilities; and that my parents were nearly bankrupting themselves to send me there. It made me feel angry at the injustice even at that age. Also there was the pressure for exam results. The place was just an exam factory where your parents bought you a ticket to keep you in the middle classes.

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"England is the most class-ridden country under the sun. It is a land of snobbery and privilege, ruled largely by the old and silly."

George Orwell.

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I don't think semi-privatised academies are the answer either.

http://www.antiacademies.org.uk/

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It is contended that there is no reason why education should not be provided as a supposed charitable good.
Why not let health or transport be run by charities as well?
Ridiculous isn't it?
Health and transport could be run by charities.
But what kind of society would tolerate that the best transport and the best health was provided by so-called private "charities"?
Education is just as important as health and transport provision.
The bottom line remains that (very) rich people should never have a (much) better education than (very) poor people.

In England, uniquely and barbarously, this is very much the case.

It is utterly disgusting and intolerable.
And it quite simply would not be tolerated were England in any way a civilised entity.

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It also must be pointed out that many so-called "public" schools in England were founded in the late medieval period with the explicit intention of educating the poor or the general populace....

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All education should be secular and non-denominational.

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"Utopia" etymologically either means "good place" or "no place"/"nowhere".
"A good place" is not necessarily something that should not be strived for in my view.
Or at least "a better place".
Calling it "nowhere" is also conducive to being realistic. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't try and improve things.

"Disillusionment" with Politics.

Stop Press! Rant

The current supposed disillusionment and disengagement with politics is in reality the direct and desired result of capitalism.

Saw Stephen Fry on telly last night and I can be silent no longer. He seemed to say "Our government is corrupt because we are. Our government is vermin because we are."
Bollocks.

New Labour is not the party of the people. New Labour/ The US Democrat Party of England is the party of business.

On shows like "This Week" and "The Daily Politics" politics is presented as entertainment. Issues are presented along with pop music and graphics which trivialise the issues and distance them from the viewer. Above all nothing is serious in this view. And even if it were serious there is nothing you or I or anyone can do about it. According to the "This Week" view, politics is out of the reach of ordinary people and has it's own coterie of political celebrities who we must worship. It was always thus, and always will be.

Politics is not serious. It's just the way it is. The only parties worth hearing from are the main parties. And who are the main parties? The ones we say are the main parties. Is it government by, for and of the media??

Politics is just parliament, politicians, celebrities and the media.
It is not allowed to be anything else.

(I exaggerate of course. It is supposed to be for effect :)

"A vibrant political culture needs community groups, libraries, public schools, neighbourhood organizations, cooperatives, public meeting places, voluntary associations, and trade unions to provide ways for citizens to meet, communicate, and interact with their fellow citizens. Neoliberal democracy with its notion of the market uber alles, takes dead aim at this sector. Instead of citizens, it produces consumers. Instead of communities, it produces shopping malls. The net result is an atomized society of disengaged individuals who feel demoralized and socially powerless."

Robert W.McChesney.

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Loyal to Lovely

Friday, May 19, 2006

Loyal to Lovely

Another (in my view:) interesting blog from the sunny cyber land of Lovely.
I am a citizen of Lovely. Why don't you join up too at:
www.citizensrequired.com/


From the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:-

"Article 15.(1) Everyone has the right to a nationality.(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights Adopted and proclaimed by UN General Assembly resolution 217 A (III) of 10 December 1948 "

Are the UN denying King Danny and Lovelians their human rights?

The country of Lovely has no more nor no less right to exist than any other country or state.

Countries or, more accurately perhaps, states, are completely arbitrary and, ultimately, an absurdity.

(Maybe states are to a point a necessary evil and a necessary absurdity. I am not so sure.)

Countries and nationalism are in a sense an absurdity. We're all humans.

"My country is the world; my religion is to do good."
Tom Paine.

Long live King Danny!

"A STATE [is] An arbitrarily-defined part of the earth's surface, occasionally having a human population with a common culture and language, which is more or less cut off from all other parts of the world and forms the geographical base for centralised and hierarchical control of its human population by powerful elites. The division of the world into states is a condition so much taken for granted that we almost never stop to think why we have states at all, why we need them, and what the world might be like without them..."

John Button, Dictionary of Green Ideas, 1988.

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The lovely cyberland of Lovely is also where I picked up my internet name, CitizenSofa.

Lovely - King Danny's country - is in fact a flat. So my thought process was that some of the furniture might be citizens of Lovely.
Then one of my proposals for the name of the country was "Union of Sofa Socialist Republics" which, even though I say it myself, is quite funny.
Armchair Anarchists and Sofa Socialists abound on these kind of sites after all.
So that's how I came up with my name.
I was briefly Citizen Bidet on the message boards because I believe in bidets as opposed to the disgusting English invention of toilet paper.... Don't get me started.
Then I changed to Citizen Sofa.
I don't really like it anymore but I am sort of stuck with it.
I am not sure if I want to be a "citizen" of anywhere. I am an anarchist.
I suppose I could still change it. Might well do.

A Myth About the Middle East

Thursday, May 25, 2006

A Myth About the Middle East

"...Arab society and much of the Muslim world are not dictatorial or intellectually paralysed because of religion, but the other way around - it is the existence, for other reasons, of such states and societies that itself produces a paralysed religion."

(Myth 86, p.165, "100 Myths about the Middle East",  2005, by Fred Halliday.)

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Destruction and deprivation lead to a more primitive religion; development of all kinds can lead to reform and cultural development.
This general principle obviously does not just apply to the Middle East and Islam.

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In the Middle East and Afghanistan American policy was a major cause of the rise of Islamic fundamentalism.

Discussion of "The Sane Society" by Eric Fromm.

Interesting Book - "The Sane Society" (1955) by Eric Fromm.

I read "The Sane Society" by the psychologist Eric Fromm a few weeks back.

Even though it was written in 1955, I think it is still relevant today, maybe even more so. 

That was near the beginning of the sort of period we're in and he diagnosed some of the problems at the outset.

It was a great relief to find someone saying what is obvious. Our society is basically unhealthy, insane. :)

He spends the first two thirds of the book saying why this is so and slagging off capitalist society of the last couple of centuries and then in the last third he tries to come up with an answer to the vitally important question: "It's all very well you slagging everything off but what would you do and how would you do it?"

He sketches out some answers and they are quite convincing. I don't think they are utopian. I think they're only natural.

One thing that he stresses and that J.K. Galbraith and E.F. Schumacher (for example) stress is that the conventional economic way of looking at the world is relatively new and complete bollocks.

I also read "The Economics of Innocent Fraud" by J.K. Galbraith, one of the greatest economists who ever lived and he seemed to be saying that his whole subject was bullshit:) .

I wish the style of this little book was less ironic and elusive. I wish he'd been more concrete in it. 

I can't help thinking he was reluctant to spell it all out.

The conventional view of work, employment and unemployment is questioned by Galbraith in this book, his last and in his view his best.

Eric Fromm also believed that a component of a sane society was a basic guaranteed income for all, as explained in the book. So I am not the only one. E.F. Schumacher also makes the point that work must come to be regarded as work and not just as paid work. I will put up a quote about this.

Andre' Gorz, another Green philosopher, also believed in some kind of basic income.

I think Eric Fromm is a sensible psychologist, and an excellent thinker.

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Another thing to ask, which is relevant to the question of cultural lag, is :

Why should people be encouraged more to read "The Communist Manifesto" of 1848 - also why should more people have heard of it? - than "The Sane Society" of 1955??

In the year 2048 - if we are still here - will people find "The Communist Manifesto" more relevant than "The Sane Society"?

And will it still be the case that far more people will have heard of "The Communist Manifesto" than "The Sane Society"??

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BASIC INCOME 
EARTH NETWORK:

http://www.basicincome.org/bien/

"The Everything Industry" - a poem

The Everything Industry - a poem

The Everything Industry
Why today is everything an industry?
Is it just a new hyper-logical use of language?
Or conspiracy of ideology?
Or neither?
Just the result of the profit motive ruling
For the last few decades?
Industrial relations
Crushed by the wheels of industry
Industry Shmindustry
Everything's an industry
There is no room for anything that
Doesn't make money now.
It's here or brought near
the time when everything
Has a price.
And nothing is a service
No one serves
Industry is a technical term for economists and geographers
Not a way of life
We used to Say the X trade
the trade
now it's more
There is something wrong about these words
There is something wrong here
I can't put my finger on it
But I know there is something wrong
It has jarred in my ears
For at least a few years
Which sound strange to you now?
The media industry
The health industry
The mental health industry
The football industry
The mental health industry
The holocaust industry
The parking industry
The food industry
The pornography industry
The travel industry
The train industry
The postal industry
The teaching industry
The knowledge industry
The religious industry
The church industry
The defence industry
The war industry
The funeral industry
The baptism industry
The academic industry
The university industry
The monsastery industry
The biology industry
The music industry
The film industry
The money industry
The leisure industry
The idleness industry
The health industry
The industry industry
The politics industry
The art industry
The poetry industry
The gaming industry
The gambling industry
The sex industry
The charity industry
The hope industry
The faith industry
The space industry
The service industry
The devotion industry
The justice industry
The truth industry
The birth industry
The death industry
The love industry
The life industry

A note on the use of the term "holocaust"

I was listening to George Galloway's radio show at the weekend.
It's very often the only thing worth tuning in to.
I like him and many of his views.

He made a point that pertains directly to the contents of this think tank.
He said that there was only one holocaust: The Holocaust. With a capital "T" and a capital "H".

It is undoubtedly true that the Holocaust is an incidence of genocide that is very probably unique in various ways.

However, if a holocaust means or can mean a genocide or a great slaughter, then to say that the Holocaust is the only holocaust is to limit language unreasonably, as well as being factually incorrect.

Also the sanctify the Holocaust linguistically in this way, even though the Holocaust is probably unique in various ways, is to seem to create a hierarchy of genocides, something that would reasonably be seen as repugnant.

There have been many genocides and massacres in history - who is to say that only one should be referred to as a "holocaust"?

The word obviously has the effect of dramatizing and enhancing the negative aspects of a genocide. "Genocide" is more factual; "holocaust" is more emotive. "Holocaust" maybe implies more malicious intent and makes it sound more extreme.

The point about my spoof posters included in this think tank which included the phrases "Iraqi Holocaust", "Irish Holocaust" and "Iberian Holocaust" - terms which I do not personally think are inappropriate - is that they are based on the idea of an exhibition. They are to be seen in comparison with the posters advertising the Holocaust Exhibition in London.

I personally think many other expressions such as African American Holocaust and Armenian Holocaust are perfectly justified.

If there is a permanent and prominent Holocaust exhibition at the Imperial-ist War Museum in London, then this is giving public, prominent and permanent recognition of this genocide.

Recognition of some other genocides is far from being achieved in some cases and this is the point I was trying to make with my posters.

In my opinion the above makes sense in the context of the name of Holocaust Memorial Day, which I think is correctly named.
To remember the Holocaust and all holocausts.

http://www.hmd.org.uk/

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http://www.aegistrust.org/

Hiroshima - The Worst Terrorist Attack in Human History

Hiroshima, whether justified or not - and it is possible that it was justified - was the worst, most destructive single (state) (terrorist) attack in human history. Let us hope this remains the case.

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Just to balance things out I will put this....

After the first bomb was dropped surrender was fully expected within moments. There was blood in the fireball. A town was rubbed out like a full stop with an eraser. And yet no surrender came. Three days later this was repeated. And still no surrender came.

A testament to the malevolent power of over-fanatical belief. "Tantum nationalismus potuit suadare malorum."...

There is still anger today in the UK about the way that Japan conducted the war.

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Monday, September 04, 2006


Something amiss

Martin Amis on Mohammed Atta in the Observer.Well. er. i will shut up. for now.

OK So Mohammed Atta may have been a reptilian religious psychopath.

As well as a human being of course.
And there might be not much more to it. I don't know.

Amis may not have been saying "those people are just like that" but I don't know if he avoided giving that impression.

But, most importantly, why doesn't someone write an essay examining the person and mind of an American "soldier" bulldozing sand over suffocating Iraqi conscripts?

Anyway I'm pretty fed up with everyone saying that 9/11 was some kind of uniquely evil event that changed the world.

It certainly didn't change the determination of the USA to invade in Iraq. The US was going to invade Iraq anyway.

I think the 15th/16th January 1991 was just as evil, disturbing and distressing as 9/11. But no one else seems to.

The 16th January 1991 as just as evil as "9/11". 


"16/01" was worse and more evil event than "9/11" in my view.

It needs to be said that Amis' essay on nuclear weapons, "Thinkability", is really good. It is a very complete and precise exposition of why they need to be opposed. Wonderfully written too.

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Iberian Holocaust

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Inspired by
"Horrors of the Inquisition" by Joseph McCabe, an excellent book.
inter alia....

The Rage Against The Machine allusion is rather appropriate too:

Their famous song "Killing In The Name Of" says correctly:

"SOME OF THOSE THAT WERE FORCES
ARE THE SAME THAT BROUGHT CROSSES!"

"Killing in the name of!"

In the case of the Europe-wide and centuries-long Papal Inquisitions, it was literally "killing in the name of Jesus".

According to the excellent book by Cecil Roth, "The Spanish Inquisition", any suspicion of Jewish descent was enough to warrant someone's burning.

Also the torture involved was totally pointless and ineffective. Many torture transcripts show victims didn't know what was going on, didn't know what they were being asked and simply wanted to know what to say.

There are many parallels between the Iberian Holocaust and the Holocaust itself. Some of these are pointed out in this same book, written near the time of the Holocaust.

People are still living today with some of the problems caused by the Iberian Holocaust.

Eternal shame for the Roman Catholic faith in whose name it was perpetrated.

It should not be forgotten that what was done to the Jews of Spain after 1492 was also done to the Muslims of Spain.

Also it should not be forgotten that the Inquisition of the Roman Catholic Church murdered many Protestants.

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Good site about
Muslim Spain and European Culture is (now) to be found here (I hope):

http://www.sunnah.org/history/moors.htm


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http://www.geocities.com/iberianinquisition/

(Link is dead. Geocities seem to be part of the "halcyon days" of the internet - some wonderful sites no longer up. C'est la vie.......

It was a site which amongst other things, comemorated those murdered in the Iberian Holocaust. )

The words "British" and "schizophrenia".

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"...British seems to me to be a rather meaningless term..."

Kate Fox, social anthropologist, in "Watching the English", 2004.

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"Add to this the fact that they are given a label like schizophrenia - which has no scientific meaning,..."

Richard Bentall, Professor of Experimental Clinical Psychology, Manchester University.
in "The Indepenedent" Tuesday 6th March 2007.

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