Knowledge as Power: The Governor of California as Teacher
by Oxminn (Richard Martin Oxman and — without his permission — some of Howard Zinn’s words)

“Thank you, Richard. Well done!” — Howard Zinn, in response to this article, Oct. 3, 2009

Knowledge is a form of power. True, force is the most direct form of power, and government has a monopoly on that, but in modern times, when social control rests on “the consent of the governed,” force is kept in abeyance for emergencies, and everyday control is exercised by a set of rules, a fabric of values passed on from one generation to another by society’s authority figures.

It does some good, school, for sure. But for all of its horrors, training in obedience* is arguably its very worst aspect.

*It would be impossible to conduct our abominations abroad — waging wars, for instance — without such training. If you don’t think we are responsible for such incessant, unnecessary abominations… I recommend that you contact me… or stop reading right now. For my entire thrust here, my life’s blood is based on the fact that our militaristic mentality/actions must end. For everyone’s good. Immediately. Oh, contact me, please. Parents would never give their offspring for the slaughter on an ongoing basis if they weren’t… hypnotized, the products, themselves, of Orwellian manipulation.

Force has been replaced by deception (a blunt way of saying “education”) as the chief method for keeping society as it is. As is meaning continuing its present momentum and profile.

In terms of environmental dangers, the threat of nuclear annihilation, disparity of wealth, exploitation, lack of competent medical care, atomization and much more, things have gotten infinitely worse, and are slated to continue… downhill. But you’d never know it visiting classrooms today. There’s no emergency mode in effect. In fact, there’s less opportunity than ever to address such urgent issues with the imposition of incessant testing, preparation for examinations.

And while disparity in wealth continues, those holding the greatest assets increase their pieces of the pie. Blindly reinforcing the status quo, as we all row down the river with them at them at the helm. And I do mean down.

Knowledge is important because although it cannot confront force directly, it can counteract the deception that makes the government’s force legitimate. And the knowledge industry, which reaches millions of young people in colleges and universities, is a vital and sensitive locus of power. That power can be used, as it was traditionally, to maintain the status quo, or… to change it.

THE NEXT GOVERNOR OF CALIFORNIA COULD — IF HE/SHE WERE NOT A POLITICIAN, IF HE/SHE WORKED (ON AN EQUAL BASIS) WITH ELEVEN OTHER CITIZENS as per http://oxtogrind.org/archive/364) COULD HELP TO EMPOWER THOSE STUDENTS, HELP THEM TO SELF-EDUCATE. For starters, the Guv wields enormous influence within the University of California system vis-a-vis The Regents. But it’s quite obvious that a Governor of California — especially one who is put into office by the means that we are proposing — could, on her/his own media outlet, destroy the deceptions I speak of above… ON A DAILY BASIS.

If that’s not REVOLUTION, I do not know what revolution is. If that did not deal a death blow to the powers that be, nothing ever would. For such “education” would not be limited to a given college campus, would not be held within the ken of California, would not be… controllable. The “word” would spread to labor and to every desecrated nook and cranny within our society.

Cynicism and resignation might actually be punctured. Deflated. Defeatism would be overcome. Just feel the energy in this article, if you will. And imagine that thrust and passion in the context of a gubernatorial stage… the “message” being delivered vigorously, creatively and repeatedly. As per http://oxtogrind.org/archive/311, the Guv can do a lot unilaterally.

There will be a day when physicists no longer work on thermonuclear horrors. When biologists no longer study how to spread disease. When chemists decline to work on nerve gas.

Let’s encourage economists to work out a plan for free food, instead of advising the Federal Reserve Board on interest rates. Let the political scientists work out insurgency tactics for the poor, rather than counter-insurgency tactics for the military. Let the historians instruct us or inspire us rather than amusing us, boring us, or deceiving us.

In Howard Zinn’s “The Uses of Scholarship” (in Seven Stories Press’ 2001 Howard Zinn On History, a very useful read from 1969), he says,

“I am not sure what a revolution in the academy will look like, any more than I know what a revolution in the society will look like. I doubt that it will take the form of some great cataclysmic event. More likely, it will be a process, with periods of tumult and of quiet, in which we will, here and there, by ones and twos and tens, create pockets of concern inside old institutions, transforming them from within. There is no great day of reckoning to work toward. Rather, we must begin now to liberate those patches of ground on which we stand — to ‘vote’ for a new world (as Thoreau suggested) with our whole selves all the time, rather than in moments carefully selected by others.”

Yes, but I submit that in terms of what’s happened in the last 40 years we are obliged to move… YESTERDAY. And that an unprecedented Governor of California in 2011 can help us to move expeditiously in the direction that Howard recommends.

Richard can be reached at tosca.2010[at]yahoo.com