This post was mentioned on Twitter by Rubin Sfadj: Know Your Propaganda http://ff.im/-cHH0L...

Having been schooled in Canada, my experience contained absolutely no negative statement or innuendo about any major religion. I recall finding it funny at the time that we would learn so much about Greek and Roman mythology, as well as native American heritage, while leaving out any mention of Christianity, Islam or Hinduism, especially as they relate to politics.

Being better off from believing them comes from the fact that we stay in sync with those around us. By confronting our self-deceptions we become out of sync with those around us and become vulnerable to social censure. The person who finally breaks down his self-deceptions will very likely become bitter about the fact that he was taught false things, confused about who to trust, lose the sense of sureness and rightness of his own judgment, and all this is only the beginning! As he interacts with others, unless he is very careful to conceal his new perspective (a path which has its own dangers – ie. “living a lie”), he will also likely be jarring to those who are still deceived, create conflict and have negative judgments cast upon him. The pains of these social pressures can be overwhelming, and this in turn could cause him to become even more embittered, getting into a negative feedback loop from which escape is difficult. This is the why it is dangerous and harmful to confront the deep lies at our cores.

Now I’m very curious: does anyone here think there aren’t [any beliefs that are both true and extremely disreputable nowadays]?

Which beliefs qualify as “extremely disreputable” is a somewhat subjective judgment, but the relative disreputability of different beliefs would be relatively easy to agree upon at least in broad terms. Thus, a more precise alternative to the above question would be: what are the most disreputable beliefs that you think are true or at least could be true with a significant probability? Now that would be an awkward question for many people! On the other hand, imagine the peace of mind of someone who can answer this question honestly in a way that wouldn’t raise any eyebrows in polite company.

I presume as Robin has used this very precise word in the title of this post and the one previous that it was not without a fair amount of thought. He is an intelligent man and hopefully expects us to read at least that much into his words. Else we must dismiss with a great deal of this.

The use of the term ‘propaganda’ is itself a normative assessment of the educational system. I’m all for exploring the subtle and likely unconscious modes of acculturation in elementary education. But that’s not what is intended with this exercise. This exercise seeks to see how a pupil is subjugated by state run education.

Exploring ‘propaganda’ presupposes a conscious effort of disseminating some set of values. Not necessarily secretive or nefarious, but by definition and common use of the word with intent. I’m suggesting that the system is far too chaotic for intent and that no mechanism has been presented that might overcome that.

The lessons of any one teacher reflect such a great diversity of influences, and the differences between any two teachers likely being infinite, to call their common product ‘propaganda’ is reductionist.

What’s more, the use of the word ‘propaganda’ speaks of it’s own bias: as an irrational description of the state (irrational because it does not seek truth in complex causes) it reveals the speaker’s opposition to government (good or bad).

An objective study on the history of public schooling in the US shows a very clear and obvious effort to shape the minds of school children so that they would be good citizens.

This doesn’t mean that there have ever been “secretive” teams of nefarious writers composing a standardized message of “propaganda” and I don’t believe Robin is trying to imply that this is the case.

Read up on John Dewey, his views on public education and how very influential he was. Then look at the current state of our public school system and you’ll see that Mr. Dewey (among others) has been wildly successful.

There is no reasonable causal link between the source of the purported ‘propaganda’ and the ultimate means of conveyance: the texts and the teachers.