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With that warning comes another--find a way for them to "grow up." For the past several Saturdays I wrote diaries aimed at "Womb to Tomb" Learning to represent the stages a baby goes through to become adult. The active word is "learn" and I must say others may not have seen what I was striving for. The underlying idea is stark: It takes careful tutelage to prevent top/down, authoritarian government.I carry an image of a roomful of little darlings in a cheerful classroom, lined up in precise rows. On their heads are funnels, inviting information for life's lessons. It's expected that they will later be able to regurgitate what they memorized. My other image is of me, clicking my heals as a child, with a comb as a mustache and my arm raised in an "Ach Tung" salute. We were adamantly anti-Nazi in our household.
What is happening in America today? We need not go into the absurdity of "teaching to the tests" to recognize a continuation of old Henry Ford conveyor belt methods to espouse the Department of Education's modes, which the Beltway finally succumbed to. My name for it is political propaganda--or perhaps more importantly consumer me-too-ism. (Think: go to the Mall, buy stock, etc. after 9/11.) However, one sees this harsh assessment, I believe most will agree that education in the United States is barely keeping up with the times in global affairs today.
In the Womb to Tomb series I now arrive to that scarcely understood stage, known as Adolescence.
In practical terms, psychologists have finally determined that the human brain is not fully developed until about the age of 24. Motor Vehicles Departments recognize such is needed for control of large trucks. Meanwhile, the body politic has assessed that civil rights demand an age of 18 for those who want to vote. I don't argue with the 6-year gap except to say it behooves us all to recognize what so-called progressive political idealists must consider.
It does not take a rocket scientist to vote after deliberation. What it does take is a citizen who has some sense of being on a journey of maturation. If youth fall for the notion that all that matters in a democracy is to shoot off a few comments concerning their taxes (most would truly come up short) and that we are all liberated if we vote for the person of choice--well, think again. After the inauguration of a president, results fall back into a timeworn tradition of continuing on a policy, trending since George Washington.
Adolescent Youth
Time smoothes out some of the bumps. If the years do not provide enough insight to realize that no one is "entitled" to less than a chance to make an honest living and enjoy some of the amenities of family and community life--well then, bumps are likely to put those unlucky persons somewhere between abject disgust and moral outrage. For those who find a better path it's the same for us all. Get up, dust ourselves off and question what went wrong. Those folks have learned that it's just as futile to blame their hard times on the government (or parents) as it is to study the Zodiac.
Adolescent America
Nations run into hard times too and it takes The People to step up to recognize that Rosy Scenario just faded. It behooves them to think victory gardens rather than winter cruises. "Recovery" is a soiled item sold by a few political charlatans when we know that for many of us "reconstruction" would be a better course. The cue is to find a process which takes into account current assets and liabilities coupled with circumstances which are obvious in the environs. A good first step is to analyze critically all the catch phrases aped by mainstream media. As a matter of fact, why bother with them, except to get a notion of how the gullible spend hours on the likes of Limbaugh when there are real problems to solve?
When enough citizens become imbued with a sense of reality, it just may happen that they will find others of like mind. The first thing you know, a movement (definitely not political parties or any of their offshoots) begins to make sense. Old labels become suspect. New ways of thinking make their way in candidates' proposals and, in time, the better ones will prevail. In the process, ballot totals surprise and a new policy becomes the goal of the times. The head spokesperson, a besieged president who may feel he's swimming upstream, will let the aspersions roll by as new policies become apparent. For those enamored with opinion polls, it's hard to forget the old ways. But, who's not to say that "growing up is hard to do."
I picked this topic and feel I have a right to at least one suggestion. Simple. Education. US education is overpriced and undervalued. In a cyber-age, we need to discuss what we all need to learn--more particularly schoolchildren who can sense social unease but don't know what to do except text-message a peer in class. The pertinent observation is that we have more young people attempting to grow up, who were left with few clues after a new decade of war and discord.
Please think of what this means in families, in communities, and in the nation and world. Posterity can survive with a lower net worth provided they are not destitute for knowledge about history and civic affairs.
