| Everyday, millions of children march to | | | | this man, Calvin published a list of insults |
| school with drudgery and resistance. As | | | | of his former enemy."Be a rebel. Because |
| young children, they go in open-hearted and | | | | being a conformist means admitting that the |
| free -- at night, they imagine that their | | | | parts of you that matter are already dead.But |
| tiny hands can reach up and touch the birds. | | | | if that's the case, what does matter? The |
| The entire world is a new place and the | | | | emotions that run rampant through our head, |
| fascination of beauty never subsides. But as | | | | the thoughts that we tumble and toss over in |
| older adolescents leaving their high school, | | | | our minds constantly -- sexual fantasies to |
| they go close-minded and bondaged -- at | | | | memories of our friends and family, thoughts |
| night, they drink themselves into passing out | | | | and ideas about our future, wishes and |
| and talk about the most popular thing to | | | | desires for our current life with those who |
| come, under obligation. The boys worry about | | | | are close to us. The idea of a living |
| their sexual conquests. The girls worry | | | | freedom, knowing that what you wish to do |
| about their sexual appearance. Both worry | | | | believe with your mind is unrestricted and |
| about being social in a society that has made | | | | what you wish to do with your body, so long |
| a weakness of kindness and an insult of | | | | as you harm none, is unlimited. Life matters |
| emotion. Such a great change occurs between | | | | to us because we make it matter; if we never |
| those who enter school and those who leave | | | | told a lover we would miss them upon our |
| it.Just think of the sheer idiocy of | | | | departure for a long voyage, if we never told |
| compulsary education. We threaten these | | | | a family member that we dream of a time when |
| children with imprisonment if they do not | | | | oppression ended, if we never wrote a poem |
| appear in class. Once in class, they spend | | | | and hoped to give it to a friend whose face |
| their time either sleeping or completing | | | | we haven't seen in years -- if we never cared |
| tasks that are completely irrelevant to them. | | | | about life, then life wouldn't matter. What |
| By giving them no option in their schooling, | | | | matters is what we make matter. So in a few |
| what have we taught them? The first lesson | | | | years, all the kids who graduate from high |
| they learn is to detest learning, to hold | | | | school will know that their grades never |
| unbridled sympathy for education. Take any | | | | mattered, because even though so young, they |
| man, put him in chains, and force him to | | | | already know that it won't be the grades they |
| recite poetry, or force him to play an | | | | got that they think about upon their death |
| instrument, or force him to farm the land -- | | | | bed.Twenty years ago the textbooks used in |
| and once he becomes a free man, do you think | | | | history class just began to cover some of the |
| he will want to engage in that activity that | | | | issues of the four hundred years of |
| was forced upon him? The scars on a slaves | | | | oppression of the African race in this |
| hands from working the fields, the memories | | | | country.Children who are forced into a school |
| of abuse of a house servant; given the right | | | | and forced to complete erroneous assignments |
| to do as they wish in the world, is it likely | | | | learn only one thing: to hate education. I |
| to think that they will return to that work | | | | clearly demonstrated this truth earlier, but |
| which they were forced to do? And then | | | | there is more to be learned from it. Take a |
| consider schools. We force children to sit | | | | slave. It could be a slave from any society, |
| and overfeed them erroneous facts, faulty | | | | whether an African in colonial America or a |
| logic, damaged reasoning, concealed under the | | | | Plebeian in the Roman Empire. For the |
| guise of "schooling." Once the mental | | | | entirety of their life, they labor. Their |
| faculties of these children are damaged, | | | | sweat, their tears, their blood, the |
| their heart grows an animosity towards | | | | biproducts of their toil seep into the ground |
| learning, towards books, towards facts and | | | | and their garments. All they produce goes to |
| knowledge. It is the greatest folly to make | | | | the one who did not labor (and alas, our |
| children hate learning, and the greatest | | | | modern Capitalist system has managed to |
| danger to a real, living Democracy in any | | | | recreate these conditions). Inside every |
| nation.Because when the Red Sox win a | | | | slave, there will be a growing hatred of |
| baseball game, five universities in the state | | | | their activity as a servant, a farmer, a |
| of Massachussetts riot. But when the United | | | | manufacturer -- they will learn to hate what |
| States regime supports a South American | | | | has been forced upon them without their |
| dictator known for slaughtering his own | | | | consent. But inside some of them, there will |
| people, it's a whisper lost in the wind.Our | | | | be the kindling of hope for a dream. One |
| ignorance is their power.Real knowledge is | | | | day, they will hope to produce for |
| acquired by learning what interests you, | | | | themselves, knowing that what their hands |
| through reading, investigation, practice, or | | | | reap will be what fills their stomach, and |
| any other desirable method. To become | | | | not the stomach belonging to idle hands. So, |
| intelligent, you must engage in activity with | | | | too, it is with our compulsary education. |
| the idea that are you learning because you | | | | The more we are forced into schools and our |
| want to, because knowledge is a goal. The | | | | minds filled with useless facts, the stronger |
| path to conformity varies greatly from this. | | | | our thirst grows for real education, for real |
| First, you engage in nothing, but allow | | | | knowledge. Few are like this, but we exist. |
| cultural standards and social obligations to | | | | Others simply remain politically and |
| control you. Second, the idea of learning is | | | | emotionally sedated, as the focus of their |
| to memorize random, perhaps unrelated and | | | | mind is the next test or the next prom, and |
| blatant facts -- true or untrue -- so that | | | | not children enslaved in southeast asia or |
| they may be recited upon command. Third, the | | | | the meaning of life.To every student who must |
| goal is not knowledge, but a passing grade; | | | | endure the excuse of an education system that |
| they learn to for the sake of knowledge, but | | | | we have, I can only offer these words of |
| rather for the sake of social acceptance.Take | | | | hope... Educate yourself, not with school |
| two children. Give the first freedom and | | | | teachers, but with the books they wanted to |
| liberty, give him a wealth of books and | | | | ban. Teach yourself, learn, grow, and |
| movies, give him teachers to aid him upon his | | | | develop. Learn that the greatest asset |
| request and a place that encourages art, | | | | education can offer is that of |
| creativity, and independence. Then take away | | | | independence."If the teacher happens to be a |
| the freedom and liberty of the second, | | | | man of sense, it must be an unpleasant thing |
| require his presence in a classroom in front | | | | to him to be conscious, while he is lecturing |
| of a teacher, threaten him with a jail | | | | his students, that he is either speaking or |
| sentence if he does not go to his school. | | | | reading nonsense, or what is very little |
| Give each of them ten or fifteen years, and | | | | better than nonsense.[...]"The discipline of |
| check the development of each of them after | | | | colleges and universities is in general |
| this amount of time. The only forced to | | | | contrived, not for the benefit of the |
| endure slavery may be able to stand in a | | | | students, but for the interest, or more |
| lecture hall and he might be able to say to | | | | properly speaking, for the ease of the |
| you, "George Washington was born in 1732 and | | | | masters. Its object is, in all cases, to |
| died in 1799. In 1776, the Revolutionary War | | | | maintain the authority of the master, and |
| began where he acted as general. In 1783, it | | | | whether he neglects or performs his duty, to |
| ended. In 1789, he was elected president a | | | | oblige the students in all cases to behave to |
| first time, and in 1792, he was elected | | | | him, as if he performed it with the greatest |
| president a second time." You are given | | | | diligence and ability. It seems to presume |
| dates and events, surely, it is true history. | | | | perfect wisdom and virtue in the one order, |
| But take the child who was given freedom to | | | | and the greatest weakness and folly in the |
| do as he pleased, and he might be able to | | | | other."-- Adam Smith |
| stand in a lecture hall and tell you, "In the | | | | |
| sixteenth century, in Europe, a Spanish | | | | The Wealth of Nations, Book 5, Chapter I, |
| physician by the name of Michael Servetus was | | | | Part 3, Article II.Life matters to us because |
| convicted of heresy by the Roman Catholic | | | | we make it matter. Be a rebel. |
| Church. Fleeing from his oppressors, he made | | | | Life,Punkerslut (or Andy Carloff) has been |
| it to Geneva, where the vindictive John | | | | writing essays and poetry on social issues |
| Calvin had absolute authority. In earlier | | | | which have caught his attention for several |
| years, Servetus expressed his doubt on | | | | years. His website provides a complete list |
| Calvin's protestant religion. Once captured | | | | of all of these writings. His life experience |
| by the authorities, Servetus was burned to | | | | includes homelessness, squating in New |
| death at the orders of John Calvin in 1533. | | | | Orleans and LA, dropping out of high school, |
| They had him wear a hat of sulphur and used | | | | getting expelled from college for "subversive |
| slow-burning wood, that the crowd could | | | | activities," and a myriad of other |
| listen to screams for mercy for the duration | | | | revolutionary actions. |
| of a half hour. One year after the death of | | | | |