Is Germany/America Incurable?
The title of this thread is inspired by the 1943 book by Richard M. Brickner M.D. "Is Germany Incurable?"
The book is a psychoanalysis of Fascist Germany. The US adopted the German model of bureaucracy that shifts power from the individual to the state and the corporation. In 1958 the National Defense Education Act replace the US liberal education with the German model of education for technology for military and industrial purpose. That is to say, we have the institutions of our world war enemy and every night in the news we hear about one horrible thing after another, and the reporters are asking what went wrong? Why are these terrible things happening? They are clueless about the fact that the US has imitated Germany in every significant way so now we are what we fought against, and Trump is our Hitler complete with thugs, not because Trump is who he is, but because a large percentage of the citizens what such a man to rule over all of us.
When I was a child, at the dinner table my parents talked about why the US is better than evil Europe. We did not have to carry and show ID. Our government did not tract us as it can do today through schools, medical care, and banking. Our citizens were not marginalized as they are marginalized today partly because of the destruction of privacy and our move towards a police state. Texas really shocked me by making a law that encourages people to report on their family or neighbors, or anyone they think might be suspect of helping in an abortion. These things were the horror of fascist Germany. We seem to be blind to this insidious perversion of our democracy and liberty.
Now we come to Richard M. Brickner M.D. description of Germany as paranoid. He defines this paranoia as excessive need to be superior and in control. And I want to mention here that with the change in education came a change in popular philosophers with Hegal and Nitsche replacing the Greek and Rome philosophers. Those philosophies may have remained harmless if it were not for the Prussian control of Germany and its superior bureaucracy and education for technology. What we call the German model of bureaucracy and the German model of education began as Prussian management of Germany.
White supremacist or Nazi? Hatred of Blacks and Jews, racism equal to the German past? American exceptionalism, or German superiority? Hail Hitler or Hail Trump? Reactionary politics and civil rebellion. culture wars, the threat of Evangelical control that is no better than being forced to live with Shia law, because both religious groups are driven to control. How different are we from fascist Germany?
The book is a psychoanalysis of Fascist Germany. The US adopted the German model of bureaucracy that shifts power from the individual to the state and the corporation. In 1958 the National Defense Education Act replace the US liberal education with the German model of education for technology for military and industrial purpose. That is to say, we have the institutions of our world war enemy and every night in the news we hear about one horrible thing after another, and the reporters are asking what went wrong? Why are these terrible things happening? They are clueless about the fact that the US has imitated Germany in every significant way so now we are what we fought against, and Trump is our Hitler complete with thugs, not because Trump is who he is, but because a large percentage of the citizens what such a man to rule over all of us.
When I was a child, at the dinner table my parents talked about why the US is better than evil Europe. We did not have to carry and show ID. Our government did not tract us as it can do today through schools, medical care, and banking. Our citizens were not marginalized as they are marginalized today partly because of the destruction of privacy and our move towards a police state. Texas really shocked me by making a law that encourages people to report on their family or neighbors, or anyone they think might be suspect of helping in an abortion. These things were the horror of fascist Germany. We seem to be blind to this insidious perversion of our democracy and liberty.
Now we come to Richard M. Brickner M.D. description of Germany as paranoid. He defines this paranoia as excessive need to be superior and in control. And I want to mention here that with the change in education came a change in popular philosophers with Hegal and Nitsche replacing the Greek and Rome philosophers. Those philosophies may have remained harmless if it were not for the Prussian control of Germany and its superior bureaucracy and education for technology. What we call the German model of bureaucracy and the German model of education began as Prussian management of Germany.
White supremacist or Nazi? Hatred of Blacks and Jews, racism equal to the German past? American exceptionalism, or German superiority? Hail Hitler or Hail Trump? Reactionary politics and civil rebellion. culture wars, the threat of Evangelical control that is no better than being forced to live with Shia law, because both religious groups are driven to control. How different are we from fascist Germany?
Comments (63)
I do think that there is a detrimental puritanical ideal of human society and behavior that permeates American society. I couldn't say if Germany suffers the same "super-ego" oppressive tendency.
However, I am reminded of an interesting element of American society provided by some writer I can't remember that observed the behavior of temperance rallies back in the early 20th century in my homeland of Appalachia. People would spend days railing against the evils of demon liquor and then afterwards would pick up moonshine from the local stil'.
So, the Puritanical streak in America was always something that made transgression more enjoyable.
I do think that the implicit fascist urge goes back to puritanism or the idea of purity. That there is some preordained pure position attainable by human beings. However, I also think that Americans at least - if not Germans - also tend to rebel against that. Which is why the shadow of fascism always hovers over America but never descends.
This is overstating the case. At least it seems that way from where I sit. Sure, there were at the time. and there still are Americans who sympathize with the idea of 'white racial superiority'. However, racist white Americans were/are prone to be anti anything non-white, whereas the Nazis targeted Jewish people.
The history behind how this all came to be is complex, for sure, but rest assured that there is always one deep seated mechanism at work:The systematic dehumanization of the 'enemy', whomever it may be. It's much easier to live with oneself when treating others cruelly or killing them outright, if those being treated as such have been previously devalued to the point of worthlessness in the mind(s) of the one(those) causing injury. That's the key core element common between Nazi Germany, the everyday affects/effects of the systemic racism inherent to The United States, and serial killers. We've not emulated Nazi Germany to the extent you suggest.
Babies and bathwater...
Americans were in awe of Germany's modes of manufacture and production, as well they ought have been. The Germans knew/know their shit when it came to such things. Given our post war economic boom was centered around manufacturing, it made good sense to emulate Germany in that regard, for they've always been very good at it. There were Nazi scientists brought on board in order to acquire their knowledge/expertise on rockets and nuclear dynamics as well.
All this being said, circling back to the OP...
American news outlets, today, are driven by profit. Profits come from advertising revenue. Advertisers want to reach as many potential customers as possible. Therefore, advertisers will pay the highest amount of revenue to the channels whose timeslots have the largest viewing population.
Shock sells.
In the seventies, the rock group KISS put on a constant theatrical production meant to shock conservative American values, particularly religious values and mores. The attention paid to them, much of which was by those avowed to somehow rid the country of their influence, made them global rockstars. The attention...
Shock sells.
Trump just said out loud what many Americans had been saying in private for a very long time. Sadly. Sadder still, is how utterly inept the opponents of such norms have been. Then there is the deep seated issue of who decides the narrative put into the public domain.
Point is that it's not so simple as to say that The United States is in trouble because we copied Germany.
That's indeed the red pill of the deepest red! Great thread. And we let our children still go to school? To turn them from colorful, playful little humans into brainwashed and programmed grey objectively thinking copies of the schemes the powers have in mind? Dear mother of gods...
The nazis were against every other color. Hitler didn't shake the hand of Jesse Owens, and in nazi Germany there weren't a lot of black people living. The ideology still has considerable influence. Weren't 10 black people shot this week in the US?
I do need to point out that the correct names are Hegel and Nietzsche... Those philosophers were never very popular in the US actually. Nietzsche bore a deep mistrust of nationalist Germans. Your vew is overly cultural deterministic. Every nation is prone to fascism. Italy was a fascist country despite its Roman heritage. The US was an inch away from electing a president with fascist sympathies before the war. There is no such thing as evil Europe and benign US. the question whether fascism takes root has to do with trust in institutions, resentment of the population towards foreigners , fear of the the loss of status and longing for times gone by during which everything was supposedly better... Whether one reads Hegel or Mill does not matter as both are not widely read anyways. Fascism creeps in through the mass media, through appeal to emotion rather then reason in times of economic crisis.
Quoting Athena
It is of course always good to remain watchful. Everywhere surveillance is being strengthened and that is a worrying development. So indeed be watchful of intrusions of privacy and of the massing of state power. No state is immune, I think that is a wise lesson. However, I do not share your cultural explanation.
Leprosy is a considered a disease but Buddhism is considered by some to be a cure. Both mess up our pain threshold.
:snicker:
Reminds me of a favorite line from Samuel Beckett, novelist, playwright and full-throated pessimist:
"You're on Earth. And there's no cure for that."
I agree that racism was always a problem in the US and I will go further to say especially in the South it was taught in public education. The North tried to end slavery through education but the South caught on and began publishing its own textbooks that supported slavery. However, In the West prejudice against Asians was more of a problem and Oregon had sundown laws that meant killing a person of color if s/he did not leave town by sundown. Christianity the sole provider of morality does not make democratic values clear, however, secular education did make democratic values clear, especially at times of war. Teach those values to Black folk and they start acting like they have universal human rights too. You will not find that in Germany before the end of WWII.
Personally, I think the reality of prejudice and racism is fascinating. How much of it is natural and how much of it is cultural? India has a very mixed population. Some native Americans were friendlier than other tribes. However, I don't want to stray too far from Hegal and Neitzche in this thread. Especially Hegel can lead to religious zealots and Nitsche can lead to supremacists. And obviously, if schools are not daily teaching virtues, the qualities of good citizenship, and democratic values, they are not learned. Making the problem of our slave history, and prejudice, forbidden school subjects will for sure promote the problems, and here is where Germany has far surpassed the US. Germany teaches their immoral actions against others in schools and publically makes everyone aware of the wrongs with signs and monuments. Shame on US for making change impossible. Like it is okay to make a person of color feel terrible but we must not say something that makes Whites feel uncomfortable? Perhaps a philosophy forum can deal with this better than our nation has?
Quoting The Guardian
Do you see mention of "White Supremacist"? That was taught in Germany and today it is being taught in the US. Democratic values are not being taught. Some places have made it against the law to speak the truth and this is very much an education problem in some states and a freedom of speech issue. At least we should be teaching democratic values, but in some places, it is believed we have democracy because of Christianity and no one knows what Greek and Roman classics have to do with understanding democracy. Here is an interesting chart when considering how Germany influenced the US, beyond replacing Greek philosophers with German ones.
• Chart: 15% of Americans Have German Ancestry | Statistahttps://www.statista.com › Topics › United States
I am so glad you are aware of "Americans were in awe of Germany's modes of manufacture and production". That became evident when we entered WWI. One of the speakers at the 1917 National Education Association praises Germany's technological and military accomplishments and explains why our education needs to emulate Germany's. I have said this is when our public schools added vocational training. We stopped short of the technological change made in 1958 because until the technology of WWII, we thought patriotism was the strongest part of our defense and teachers were defending our democracy in the classroom, making sure everyone knew why our democracy must be defended. There are serious social, economic, and political ramifications of the 1958 change that more completely adopted the German model.
"The history behind how this all came to be is complex, for sure, but rest assured that there is always one deep seated mechanism at work: The systematic dehumanization of the 'enemy', whomever it may be. " I have to run but first I have to point out the Republican party is strongly backed the Evangelical Christians and they have made "liberals" the enemy. Liberals don't know morals you know and are evil and will destroy America if they are not overwhelmed by Conservatives. Many strongly argue the US is not a democracy but a Republic, while Christians take credit for our democracy. :joke: It is a little whacko. A uniting truth is what the 1958 National Defense Act did to bring on all these problems. But on we can mobilize for war in 4 hours and do more damage in a day than many troops could have done in weeks when we entered WWII.
Good post. What you wrote makes a lot of sense and is well-put.
Well-thought-through and well-expressed.
We're in complete agreement here. American history textbooks are a joke. An injurious one at that.
I love your post. To get directly to the point, besides the Christian problem of Christians competing against other to produce the most saints and killing each other, what made Germany so powerful was the Prussian love of military might and its excellent bureaucratic organization. The Prussians applied their military bureaucracy to the whole of Germany when they took control. This is the most important piece of what I have to say.
You mentioned the Puritans but the Quakers were even more influential in creating the US democracy, and German Methodists thought they had the method for making humans better and they were not shy about forcing their method on others. Like the Evangelicals and Shia Muslims, these folks can be a problem to our democratic values, however, it is the Prussians we should study to understand why the Germans had superior military technology and were well equipped for war, and later became the nightmare of Fascism and the holocaust. It is a mix of things and what the media is not getting is what Prussian education and bureaucracy have to do with being what we defended out democracy against.
Quoting History Channel
Celts and Greeks got a long, but not so much Celts and Romans. Independence and liberty go with Celts not Romans. Rome came with Christianity that means conformity and living under a heirarchy of authoirty. It is all the historical stew we are talking about. I won't argue with what you said about people fighting for liberty.
Shit I am late, bye.
How different is present America from the segrationist America would be more interesting.
Totalitarian states actually give the perfect reason for people to adapt to it: it's simply survival. Yes, you can be a hero and fight the system, but you can easily pay the ultimate price, or your loved ones, without anyone even knowing about it.
Nazi Germany and post-war Germany are so different as the Third Reich collapsed so totally. In it's death throws it was genuinely destroying itself and the defeat was so bad that you really had a collective understanding that it didn't work and that it was utterly bad. This created the rare example of a country truly looking at it's past and condemning it. And that of course makes it so easy to hate.
In other countries, especially in Spain and Portugal, the fascist past is more problematic. It wasn't defeated in war. Spain just eased off the era of Franco and António de Oliveira Salazar's Portugal the Estado Novo, basically ended with the Carnation Revolution.
Quite different are the totalitarian systems which still have their supporters around who are respected "contrarians" and ideological minorities.
Not too different. The National Socialists, Italian Fascists, and New Deal liberals developed surprisingly similar systems to inspire and control their citizens. A good book on this subject is Three New Deals by Wolfgang Schivelbusch.
I love your term "cultural deterministic". That is perfect for what I have been trying to say for years but could not think of the right words. Of course, you do not agree with what I said because you do not have the same source of information, so I hope you don't mind me sharing my sources of information.
In the past, we all were more or less flying by the seats of our pants. We adopted the German (Prussian) model of government for a few reasons. 1. Merit hiring is supposed to correct the problems with Nepotism, hiring family or people who you know, for reasons other than their ability to do the job. But what the heck, we all were doing the best we could without technological education, which brings me to the next reason. Because each person did the job the best s/he could, when s/he died or retired, it would throw everything into chaos. The next person to do the job would not have the same talents and interests and would do the job totally differently. Everyone else in the office would have to adjust to the new person. We can see this when we change presidents. The following present completely wipes out what the previous president had done, and all the people around him are changed to fit his personality and desires. Trump was really frustrated because of the limits to his power, and few of us have the power we give presidents.
The Prussian military model means that even if all your generals are destroyed, the war will proceed as planned. Every detail of the operation is planned. Every job is planned in detail so everyone who does the job will do it the same as the person before. Kings die, but bureaucracies never die.
As Tocqueville said in his 1830 book about "Democracy in America".
Tranny and Despotism have always been with us. It was just waiting for the Prussian model of bureaucracy to fully manifest. That would not be all bad because there are good reasons for the change, but when we also replaced our past liberal education with the Prussian model, we also "molded him". That is, we are not preparing our young for citizenship in the democracy we had, but in 1958 we began molding our young for the same New World Order, we defeated in war. The 1958 National Defense Education Act had a 4-year limit but became permanent. Our young are no longer prepared for leadership but to be followers. We replaced education for independent thinking with "group think", and don't you think you should die your hair green and put a ring in your nose so everyone knows you are one of them and hip.
At the 1917 National Education Association Conference, Sara H, Fahey quoted, Tagore, to explain our enemy and why we have to defend our democracy in a war. He said, "Whatever their efficiency, such great organizations are so impersonal that they bear down on the individual lives of the people like a hydraulic press whose action is completely impersonal and therefore completely effective in crushing out individual liberty and power."
Of course, they did because they could not have the government programs without the bureaucratic organization. Germany had a better standard of living than Britain when we enter the first world war because Germany had social programs and the rest of us did not.
Knowing your population is essential to modern warfare, and what could be better than giving everyone a social security number? Numbers help keep track of things. But that is not what we thought of when we got a job and signed up for social security. Clearly, babies do not have social accounts but we are now numbering them when they are born.
I have not read your book but have a copy of "Big Government" praising the development of big government which was a republican and democrat joint effort, and I have books warning of the dangers of giving government these new powers, and also the danger of government contracts that do not end when the war ends.
Excellent, full of things to think about.
The racist thing is a distraction from the wanting a totalitarian system and I am so glad you brought in the rest of the world. Through the internet, I know a Portuguese man and the brutality of fascism is still with him. Why not go with what works? Except as you said. in Germany, it was clear it did not work. But exactly what piece of it did not work? Oh man, this communication seems impossible because nothing is simple! It is mind-boggling that people could want Putin in charge, but in the US many people want Trump in charge and I can't explain this. But somewhere in this soup of thoughts is a burning need to be superior and in control, and to have no qualms about exploiti8ng or crashing others.
Why is being a Nazi attractive to some? Is that different from wanting to be in the Ku Klus Klan? Those questions beg psychological answers, but also organizational and sociologic answers. Many people thought fascism was the answer to preventing economy collapses, and many see socialism as more just, and do we want to get into our human nature and what drives us to choose one movement over another?
What made our democracy worth fighting for? I am saying we are no longer the democracy we defended. I will also say the New Deal is fascist but is that organization beneficial?
Well, now that is something I want to discuss. Public education is like a genie in a lamp, The defined purpose is the wish and the students are the genie. We changed that wish in 1958 and now have cultural determinism and chaos! This does not feel like the past where we had individual liberty and power and the services and businesses asked "how can I help you", instead of "how should I direct your call". Some of us older folks are experiencing culture shock and if we are renting it is very clear we are no longer the authority in our own home, but we live under the authority of property managers who ignore the repairs that need to be made but evict people who don't follow the rules. The number of people who have lost their careers because they said the wrong thing, horrifies me. They may have been very offensive but what happened to freedom of speech? Many years ago my grandmother walked away from her teaching job because the principal interfered with the discipline of her classroom, and today teachers assume they work under authority. I feel like I am stumbling to explain why I think something has gone very wrong.
In the 70s we announced a national youth crisis and blamed the parents. While the teachers are sure the parents just don't care and the parents are blaming the teachers for what is going wrong. We are not looking at the federal government and the changed organization and changed the purpose of education, and why some think Trump is our Hitler while others are very willing to lick his boots.
I am not a big fan of Trump or Evangelicals, but perceiving them as Hitler and Nazis is outright delusional. America has lots and lots of problems, but most of them come from the left trying to keep people angry and fearful, be it climate, covid, blm, Trump, etc.
Trump organized at violent attack on the Capitol in an attempt to overthrow the government. Liberals did not cause that.
200 seriously injured police officers. Does that give you a thrill?!
Ignorance is not an argument.
What about everything besides the topic?!
I said nothing about Hitler.
Quoting Wikipedia
Why the denial of this instead of questioning the effect of adopting the German models of bureaucracy and education?
the following is the result of googling the popularity of Neitzche in the US.
Quoting Amazon
Quoting JENNIFER RATNER-ROSENHAGEN
I think it was evident to everybody when every large city or town was bombed and the country was occupied. The corrupt Nazi organization couldn't (and wouldn't) take care of the people once the fighting came inside Germany's borders. The absolute collapse could also be seen that there wasn't any resistance afterwards the surrender: no large scale Werewolf units continued the fight afterwards. You don't hear about nazi-insurgents fighting on and being captured in the 1950's or 1960's in either East or West Germany. The Third Reich just evaporated into thin air afterwards and became just an idea.
Quoting Athena
For many Russians, Putin seem to bring back stability to Russia and someone to contain the robber barons that had stolen the largest companies of Russia. Of course what Putin did was start his rule by killing innocent Russians by staging a terrorist attack in order to get the Chechen war going again (as the last had ended in humiliating defeat) and then put his friends and basically the St. Petersburg mafia in charge. And until now (at least), starting wars has made him extremely popular.
For many Americans, Trump seemed to be the perfect middle finger to the ruling elite, even if the guy was part of that elite, and simply went for his rhetoric and basically didn't care how inept the guy was as a leader.
Stability and security is what all authoritarians proclaim. And usually they portray every opponent of theirs as being against this and that those before them were evil and had no desire to serve the people, unlike them (the populism). The situation is so dire, that tough measures are needed. And many fall for that.
Quoting Athena
Actually, the Prussian Model is not that every detail is planned. Actually quite contrary: It's that lower leaders will take initiative as they understand what the intention of their commanders is and can use their own judgement to achieve those goals. Every detail, especially after the initial stage, isn't planned as no plan survives contact with the enemy. What is taught is a method of warfare and hence lower commanders, even soldiers, can use their own thinking and their own initiative.
In fact it's more of the Russian way of thinking where every detail of the operation is planned and total obedience is demanded from lower commanders. Hence you have had the situation (now in Ukraine) where high ranking Russian generals have had to command the troops from the front (as otherwise nobody wants to take responsibility) and hence they have been killed in large numbers. Even I myself was told in training that if you can take out the commander of a Russian force prior to it's attack, the unit will likely not continue it's operation.
But of course this is just a sidenote. When you have soldiers / bureaucrats who are not only following just orders, but using a method to operate even without given orders from above, then you have a situation where "kings die, but bureaucracies never die".
Weber was a sociologist and very influential. He was born in Prussia. I like many of his thoughts.
Now I am going to join a neighbor and work on my garden on this lovely sunny day. I hope you are also enjoying your day.
But yes, Weber is also one of my favorites and his views have been very influential. Indeed in his works on bureaucracy are important as it's been a framework on how bureaucracy has been studied. It's not only that Americans have adopted Weber, it's quite universal at least in the West. The faceless Weberian bureaucrat has been seen an antidote antidote patronage, nepotism and corruption. Of course as person living in the turn of the 19th and 20th Centuries he didn't live to see what modern bureaucracies developed into (someone as smart as Weber could have made interesting observations) and for him modern bureaucracy was part of the modern industrialized world. We have to understand that a professional, impartial and meritocratic government bureaucracy have been the exception throughout history. In Weber's time there was in Germany still the Kaiser and when you do have an autocrat, bureaucracy can be passed by going directly to the monarch. Hence sociologists that lived in the late 19th Century had still much things around from the past like the last remnants of feudalism in their day to day life.
Oh I think I love you! [quote][quote]:kiss: Now this discussion can flower. This is the first time in many years on many forums that someone has said something that can move the discussion forward. :grin:
Yes, the government programs we have today would not be possible without this bureaucratic order. I don't see the number for post? On the first page about halfway down I give quotes from Huxley, Tocoquiville, and Tagore Quoting Athena (click on Athena to see the thread) that draw our attention to the problems with this bureaucracy.
I believe everyone understands our change from the past as the consequence of technology, without considering bureaucratic technology. My argument is the change in bureautic technology is essential to programs such as Social Security, but it also has social, economic, and political ramifications. This would not be as true as it is, if we had maintained education for good citizenship and independent thinking and if we continued to transmit the culture we had.
With the change in bureaucratic order, came education for a high-tech society with unknown values. Now may I draw your attention to Eisenhower's farewell speech warning to not rely too much on the experts. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWiIYW_fBfY We replaced education for independent thinking with "group think" and the best way to become aware of this social change is to compare Star Trek, Kirk with Picard. Kirk is the John Wayne of outer space and Picard is the "Group Think" generation.
If you can get this and then think about Trump and Biden you can see the importance of social change.
However, The change is not all bad. Eisenhower praised the Germans for their contribution to democracy and that is to have your point of view of what is good, without realizing the problems. Sorry for being so wordy, but we have culture wars and we are ripping ourselves apart right now. An end to racism and greater equality for women are good things but they do not come without problems. Perhaps you can name a few?
In the 1970's we announced a national youth crisis and my son and daughter were caught up in it just as many in my generation were caught up in being hippies. This led to my grandchildren being made wards of the state and I learned more about tranny than I ever thought possible in the US. I hope we can get into this. I hope we begin screaming about Texas paying people to report anything related to abortion and what went wrong in Nazi Germany, where the witch hunts began, and what can we learn about this evil of reporting family and neighbors to "authority".
To make a choice people must be informed and they are not informed. People are totally clueless about the bureaucratic changes that have been made and what this has to do with our children having a very different education since the 1958 National Defense Education Act, ended the transmission of the culture we had. They are completely unaware that because of these changes we value each other differently and this is a huge change in how we experience ourselves.
Welcome to the Borg. Please verify who you are with official ID and tell us what is your IQ and what is your area of expertise.
In my humble opinion, the ills of the political system that are around are not unique to either the US or Germany.
:blush: Yep, you're on the mark. It's just it doesn't feel right to attribute anything to a particular group of people or to a country as a whole. When we do that, we do it for the sake of simplicity, but there's the real and deadly risk of oversimplification.
I was hoping to change my post before anyone responded to it. I should not have made a "you" statement.
@SSU is the only person I have come across in many years of trying to have this discussion who knows enough about bureaucratic choices and organization to have something interesting to say. I think most people find the subject of bureaucracy just too boring to bother learning anything about it and that leaves them powerless. Understanding very little they are easily manipulated.
Long before Hitler gained real power, he became a speaker for the National Socialist party. The party
surveyed people to find out what made them the angriest and then they rented places for speakers who would talk about what made the people angry and how they would change things so they would be happy voters instead of angry voters. Trump took that route to the presidency. He even came to my small city and used the fairgrounds and told us over and over again what I great community we have. There was no substance to what he said, only people-pleasing comments. He did that all across the country. Of course, he is not the only one to do that but these speeches and TV ads were not always the work of professionals who find out what we want to hear and how to package their message so we will vote for them. People who really do not have a lot of information vote for someone who makes them feel good. You talk about "it doesn't feel right", and I think you agree you ignore the information. THIS IS NOT HOW TO HAVE A DEMOCRACY! THIS IS NOT WHAT EMPOWERS THE PEOPLE.
Reactionary politics is all about feelings. Since we ended education for independent thinking and left moral training to the church, we have developed the reactionary politics that as @SSU pointed out resulted in a complete collapse. Quoting ssu But reactionary politics destroy everything because people are acting on their feelings, not their knowledge. They know they do not understand and do not have the power and they seek a leader who will take good care of them.
Education is vital to democracy and that is not education for technology.
The simplicity mon chéri, the simplicity! :up:
Quoting Athena
Hear! Hear!
Good points!
A major problem is the organization I am in is dependent on other organizations and those other organizations have no interest in what our program is doing other than the list of rules. Those who make the rules for how we serve elderly people have education in public service but not gerontology (the study of aging). That is, the rules are being made and enforced by people who do not know the population we serve. This is a huge problem because being over 70 is nothing like being 35. We are working with dependent and vulnerable people and the people making the rules have no understanding of what it is like to be one of them.
The organization could be doing a lot better if it were a religious organization with a focus on giving compassionate care, instead of a hierarchy of power and legalities and rules. And leave the volunteers free to do what needs to be done. Being American used to mean being our own authority and being trusted to do the right thing but today's bureaucracy has changed all that.
Nietzsche!!! :D
The post does not say much. Nietzsche might be popular in the US but only in some circles, literary criticism, as a progenitor post modernism maybe. Nietzsche is abused, used, held as a conservative and a revolutionary. But anyway, I think Nietzsche would be on your side in this debate. He abhorred mediocrity and 'herd spirit'. He admired the ancient thinkers just like you do. He abhorred democratization in the sense of populism because it made men ripe for tyrants. Nietzsche does not seem to be your target. I would recommend you to study him. Take your eyes from wikipedia and videos about the Prussian education system, and read Nietzsche. I thin you will find it wonderful.
I also do not think bureaucracy is a European disease. The US have their own fair share. Fordism, Taylorism... We are not living in the 19th century anymore, however if you want to understand it correctly, study the 19th century and study Germany, because it was the German golden age. If Germany is your enemy you have to get to know him and know the US as well. Nazism was only one side of the German coin...
I strongly recommend you be respectful and stop using your too soon drawn conclusions as the base of your arguments. God, you really pissed me off. You make another comment like your Wikipedia insult and that will be the last time I read your post.
My analysis is not that this is 'Prussian', or maybe it is Americanized Prussianism. Such emphasis on 'targets', 'rules' and feedback is often linked to New Public Management thinking. See this Wiki ;) link:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Public_Management
NPM Public services should be ran like a company and be as efficient as possible, To do that managers needed control over the company and organization and control over the individual within it. As a management philosophy it was pioneered in anglo saxon countries and is not part and parcel of any modern German model, though it is introduced there too. However, I wonder if the Germans can be blamed for that, in general it is considered an outgrowth of the Thatcher / Reagan years.
Here is an article about NPM in Australia, though I did not read it, it did seem to be a lot like you described. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1440783309346477?journalCode=josb
The Nazis in general were not evil people but people educated to be controlled and were controlled by the bureaucracy above them. Almost the same conditions as the US today because the US adopted the German model of bureaucracy and the i958 National Defense Education Act replaced domestic education the US had with Germany's model. The US has a different history with a constitution that assured human rights, but I don't think that history will continue to move the US in a different direction than Germany took. As many pointed out in this thread, some of the evils done were an imitation of what started in the US, such as putting native Americans on reservations, and eugenics.
We are no longer teaching national values when we enter wars and I am afraid the culture we had will be completely lost to the US when my generation dies.
This is so true. For a modern public sector to operate you do need that modern bureaucracy. When this bureaucracy is professional and doesn't fall into the pitfalls of corruption, favoritism or nepotism etc. things work well. This also has an impact on the populace: they trust and depend on the government in a totally different manner. Literally one's social safety net isn't anymore family (as it has been for thousands of years), but your public sector employee.
Quoting Athena
I think this is very much American thinking, where individual freedom is promoted. And as it's a huge country without real enemies lurking at the border (Canada and Mexicon don't impose a threat), American thinking has differed a bit from Europe. The collective isn't so important and seems to be something leftist. In a small country as mine where people understand that the existence of the people hasn't been and isn't self evident. Hence the collective thinking of "us" and it's link to the country and government is far closer than in the US. The government isn't a threat, it's something that people actually also voluntarily work for free. There's voluntary defense training, voluntary fire brigades, voluntary rescue and so on, which is controlled and lead by the government/public sector. It's far different from ordinary charity work in this case.
Quoting Athena
A very good point. Participation of educated, informed people is absolutely essential for any democracy or democratic process. Otherwise that "common sense" that people do have simply won't show itself in elections. At worst, politics can become so absurd and violent that "ordinary" people don't want to have anything to do with it.
In a way in our societies, the at least adequately functioning bureaucracy can carry any kind of elected leadership, however bad it is, to the finish line. Social security checks are sent, the health sector functions, the armed forces and the police operate, however clueless or bizarre people are elected to political leadership positions. The bureaucracy will implement the whims of the leadership as it has understood that it's not the role of the bureaucracy to challenge elected leaders. Authoritarianism can creep in easily to a democracy, as the bureaucracy will just mildly oppose it. Only if the laws are openly broken is there opposition to this from the government itself, otherwise the government bureaucracy will go where the leaders want them to go.
In fact this was crucial even to Hitler. When he came into power, the German military was small, limited in various ways by the peace agreement, yet a selected and an extremely professional volunteer force that had thought for a long time what had gone wrong in the Great War and what should be corrected. Hitler started the rearming and enlargement of the military and the generals obediently followed him. Straight until the end. Yet without that post-WWI German military, Hitler would have utterly failed in creating his Wehrmacht as the Nazis themselves didn't have the ability to create anything more than thugs that could harass political opponents and Jewish vendors. Hence the German military in WW2 gave a stellar operational performance (thanks to that Prussian military model and culture), but abysmally failed in it's strategic objectives. The simply fact is that conquering the World is an insane objective. Even trying to conquer the Soviet Union in 100 days is ludicrous. And it should be noted that other branches of the German bureaucracy, like the judicial sector, did follow Hitler obediently until the end. Hence Germany including it's bureaucracy had some soul searching to do after the war (at least in West Germany).
Directly contradicts...
Quoting Athena
The 'culture [you] had' was the one which decided to 'adopt the German model of bureaucracy and replace the domestic education the US had with Germany's model'.
If the 'culture you had' was so great as to lament its loss, then how come it made such a 'terrible' choice? It was clearly either stupid, or unethical, neither worthy of lamenting the loss of.
I do not now your age exactly, but culture is no monolithic entity. My mother is born directly after the second world war. She grew up in the 60s and lived in the 70s... there were so many cultural strands, the rise of the left, flower power, pacifism, conservatism, militant anti- communism... Which 'culture' would it be when your generation is gone? I think the culture you refer to has been taken down already by a double punch: flower power from the left and chicago school shareholder capitalism from the right...
[quote="Wikipedia;https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazism"]The full name of the party was Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (English: National Socialist German Workers' Party) and they officially used the acronym NSDAP. The term "Nazi" was in use before the rise of the NSDAP as a colloquial and derogatory word for a backwards farmer or peasant, characterising an awkward and clumsy person, a yokel. In this sense, the word Nazi was a hypocorism of the German male name Igna(t)z (itself a variation of the name Ignatius)—Igna(t)z being a common name at the time in Bavaria, the area from which the NSDAP emerged.[11][12][/quote
The link may say even more important things, but what jumps out at me is "Nazi" was a derogatory word meaning backward farmer or peasant. Trump appeals to these people. He was a Wrestlemania star
It is a total humiliation to have a president who behaves like this, and he still has a large following.
Hitler began in the countryside, not in the cities. We have a growing conflict between sophisticated, cosmopolitan people and those who are not, those who favor their religious beliefs and those who favor science. Some people are strongly opposed to opening our borders to immigrants, while some are in favor of immigrants and even see them as a wonderful addition to our diversity. Some want to hide the shame of slavery and discrimination and others want to resolve these problems. You mentioned being community-minded and I think country folk are community-minded, but we didn't live close together in little towns and live separate from our farms as Europeans did. We lived on our farms and separate from each other. We have been proudly independent. We had church charity and to this day many people in the US are opposed to government services. Especially Mormons are opposed to relying on the government. The whole Republican Party puts the concern for the budget before concern for saving lives. These are strong conflicting ideas of right and wrong and this kind of conflict can beg for a Trump or a Hitler to take control and end the conflict.
Then comes covid those who accepted isolation and wearing masks and those who did not. Many saw the scientific point of view as just government spinning out of control and wanting to control us, instead of science and wanting to get control of a virus. This is a life and death matter with serious economic ramifications and therefore it is not easily ignored. Add to this global warming and a war that demands our attention and it is like being in a pressure cooker.
What are the characteristics of good citizenship? What are the characteristics of good leadership? I was amused by this last election. For the first time, we had candidates promoting themselves as people of science, and my vote was based on my faith in science and fear of those who vote as their minister tells them to vote. When we fear our neighbor's decisions are harming us, it is hard to have a good sense of community. The different reactions to covid were life-changing. I have become intolerant of Christians and this really bothers me. Is Europe more secular than the US? I think this has very strong education and political ramifications. If we did not rely on the churches for moral education perhaps we would return to education for citizenship. I think this is essential.
I do see Marx and Prussian as complimentary. The military takes care of their own. There was a shift from the military being rather limited, and certainly, the officers were an exclusive group of people above the peasants, to a greater equality created by technology and wars that involve everyone as a military-industrial complex. Economic decisions are vital to the military-industrial complex. Communism is also about economics and the well-being of everyone. These concerns are not like apples and oranges but what kind of apple do you like best. German had workers' compensation, and a national pension plan, and a national health plan, and a healthier population than Britain had when war began. That gave Germany a very important military advantage. America followed that example, short of the national health care, but it did pay a lot of attention to physical education when war was on its mind before our focus on technology decreased the need for healthy young men to send into war.
"and for him (Weber) modern bureaucracy was part of the modern industrialized world." That modern industrialized world is a military-industrial complex.
The 1958 National Defense Education Act happened before the 60's and 70's. That act ended the transmission of the culture, that Eisenhower called our domestic education. Moral education was the left to the church as though that could do for us what education for citizenship was doing for us.
We began educating for a technological society with unknown values. That's what we have now. A technological society with unknown values and no one prepared to establish national, secular values.
Hopefully, this forum can begin resolving that problem.
Therefore, even though I really like your critique, it is always tricky to point out where it exactly began. Heidegger had these views in the 1930s... The uncorrupted society and nature has been a theme in 20th century Western consciousness. All too often it is forgotten that that society, in which we taught for citizenship was hardly inclusive. Only in todays mass society do we have really a mass citizenry. Hitherto citizenship was only for the happy few, the well to do and in the US the White Anglo Saxon and Protestant. The dark side of the coin of the old days is easily overlooked. What you call 'culture' another class of people might call oppression. Culture was only homogenous in tribal societies. A monolithic culture in a country that is a melting pot of peoples can only be sustained by domination of a certain class who determines what 'culture' is.
Nonetheless, I share much of your critique. I am also thinking of ways a new 'metaphysics of culture' that is, a binding force drawing people together, might emerge. I think it is indeed not around technology or technological education. I also o not think a return to the past is the answer.
What do you mean by "Directly contradicts"?
I would not say that civilians chose anything except to win the second world war and then to defend against the communist who came to power with violence. The Soviet Union held a philosophy of violently imposing communism on the world and the world knew they had the technology for atomic bombs. Sputnik proved they also had the missile technology needed to send atomic bombs anywhere in the world the communist wanted to drop one. The 1958 National Defense Education Act was the result of Sputnik. That act had a four-year limit but obviously, it became a permanent change in education.
None of this was an intentional change in culture and that is why I write. I can not think of one decision voters have made, except to elect leaders and some states agreed to give women equal rights and to end segregation. I don't think there was much thinking about either of those radical cultural changes but they were reactions to education for democracy, except in the Southern Bible Belt where religion results in conservative thinking. So one reason to change was to make our democracy more equal, but the South has opposed both equalities for women and people of color, conserving a culture with some democratic notions but mostly built on conservative religious reasoning much as Muslim radicalism prevents equality.
I mean voting for progressive changes in our democracy may not take into consideration negative consequences. A big negative consequence is an amoral society and increasing anarchy resulting from no longer preparing the young for citizenship and leaving moral training to the church. It was not an intent to destroy our culture but to make it better, more equal, and more democratic.
Many people have said what you said and assume returning to education for democracy and good moral judgment means returning to the past. I do not know why they make that assumption. It is a belief that is devoid of understanding democracy and Aristotle and Cicero. It is failure to understand Jefferson's meaning when he wrote of the pursuit of happiness, and understanding the pursuit of happiness is tied to not allowing everyone to vote. And lastly what part of being excluded because I am a woman do you think I have forgotten? Hell, my best friend told me I should stop reading because my husband didn't like me reading and when I returned to college, my father told my husband that he should be the one in college, not me because he is the man. My father guided his son into engineering. He would have nothing to do with me studying anything besides home economics. I remember well when our society was organized along the lines of Aristotle's belief that a man should have a wife, an ox, and a slave. The men in my life were like slave owners when everyone expected women to behave like slaves and obey the head of the male house.
Before 1917 the purpose of education was to teach good citizenship and Americanize immigrants as Jefferson understood the necessity of education in a democracy. We did not have vocational training until 1917 and that was because we had not developed technology and didn't need people prepared with vocational training until we entered WWI against Germany, a nation that, thanks to the Prussians, had long had education for technology for military and industrial purpose.
Many immigrants had no experience with democracy and education had to teach them about our very different institutions and the Protestant work ethic was a big concern. As religious as the Puritans were, they were intently focused on being industrious and accumulating wealth because of Calvinism and believing only a few people were chosen for heaven, and how well a person did here on earth was proof of them being favored by God of not. They set what was to be the American culture and Protestant work ethic. But this was religion, not technology and the obscene drive for wealth we have today. :worry: Am I making any sense? Yes, that was very White Anglo-Saxon Protestant exclusion. It was more religious than secular Greek/Roman democracy.
The US imitated both Athens and Roman and I have a problem with the Roman/religious influence. Cicero, a Roman statesman wrote a lot and his books were essential reading when we had classical education. No one saw democracy in the Bible until there was literacy in Greek and Roman classics. To this day, we are ignorant of democracy without that literacy.
BOTTOM LINE-
[b]Essential is both scientific thinking and good moral judgment that is based on knowing truth, universal/nature's laws, and good manners. This is not materialistic but intellectual and that is the pursuit of happiness. It is the path to raising our human potential and it is worth defending. The men who understood this ended our relationship with monarchy and the Biblical kingdom of kings, subjects, and slaves. Technology can greatly benefit us or put us back to being subjects.
I am saying education for technology is making us subjects rather than free citizens. Education for technology has always been the education of slaves. Liberal education is for free men.[/b]
I think this is a general way populism works. The populist favors "the ordinary people" and creates a dividing line between the people and the elite...or people they call as the elite. Now this elite can be the political, the financial, but also the educational elite. Hence if a leftist or conservative / nationalistic political movement can be very popular in academic circles, a populist movement isn't as it likely will depict the "academic world" as part of the problem.
That NSDAP gathered it's first support in beer halls in Munich shows the populist approach of this movement.
And in any way, populist movement intend to annoy "the elite" with their crude message as they do want to divide the people to us and them, not to gain overall popularity in all sections of the population.
Quoting Athena
Do note that this changed already during the Napoleonic wars. Napoleon and Revolutionary France gained such powerful military because implementing an universal draft and making military service compulsory. And also creating the "wartime economy", start of the military industrial complex. The other militaries of the time had been smaller professional armies. The defeat to Napoleon was the initial start for Prussia to reform it's military, starting with mimicking Revolutionary France with the levée en masse, the universal military conscription, and carrying out several reforms like creating the Auftragstaktik, which then became the "Prussian Model".
Quoting Athena
And it should be noted that for example the national pension plan was made by Bismarck, one of the most conservative figures in German history. The thinking was more to counter the demands (and the threat) from the socialists than to embrace government welfare thinking in my view.
Essentially I agree with you. I see a number of tenets in your post that would be important when we want to change things, please correct and me and fill in the list further:
1. The focus on technology should make way for ctizenship and reflection
2. The ideals should be democratic and inclusive
3. The teaching should be secular, though good manners and love for other should be instilled
4. intellectual progress should be emphasized over material progress
5. Virtue should be taught like in ancient Athens but without institutions like slavery.
This is what I got from your posts on the subject. I agree with this general inventory, but there are a number of questions and tensions that needs to be resolved.
1. Contrary to Europe the US could do without education for technology. People could live of the land as there was plenty. Europe was a continent densely populated with warring states vying for dominance. Now, also in the US let alone in Europe it is not possible to live of the land. Neither are people satisfied anymore working on conveyor belts in taylorist and Fordist fashion. Technology is needed to make modern urbanized society function and maintain the level of wealth people are accustomed to. So what would be the role of technological education in the reformed education system?
2. The cultural model is still very Western oriented and also rather idealized Western. It refers back to the Greek times like we imagine them to be. However we live in a pluriform society now. How do we incorporate African, Asian, Islamic and native American traditions in an education system that is inclusive an democratic.
3. What is the relationship between community an independency/ autonomy? The ethical outlook you describe to me makes me think of American values as independence and autonomy, providing aid to each other in the spirit of fellow travelers on a road to prosperity. That image is appealing but in our densely populated cities with high crime and poverty rates, a sense of community is necessary. How and to what extent do we incorporate that?
4. intellectual progress should be valued higher than material progress, but there are many people in dire material circumstances. The intellectual can only thrive when material needs are met. Moreover in our current day and age, material gains a seen as a measure for success. What measures for success might be adopted and will have an appeal to compete with material wealth?
5. What virtues should be taught. You refer to Aristotle, but Aristotle defended slavery and the subjugation of women. That has of course for a large extent to do with the age in which he lived. However, his philosophy tends to favor a certain style of dominance. He emphasized the active formative principle, over the passive material principle. Form determined matter. That division can still be seen today in how we deal with nature with nature for instance, leading perhaps to 'education for technology' . Moreover, earthliness and femininity were over the ages considered as connected, leading to the skewed vision of men being rational and in charge and women in the care of the household and fertility. We can therefore not simply copy Aristotle's virtues. What virtues do we teach?
Those are some consideration I have when reading your ideas. It is not meant as criticism of them, but to chart out some avenues to take them further and make them more concrete.
:grin: Can we have something like a supreme court that decides what knowledge and education is good for democracy and what is not? When Bill Clinton was our president in the US, I noticed schools were teaching good character. That is education for democracy. It is learning virtues and good character and today we use the term life skills.
Why do you know such things? I would not be repeatedly trying to discuss what this thread is all about if it were common knowledge. Is it common knowledge where you are? Do the schools teach that history? The US is sooo narcissistic that it can not see what is happening because they only know their own history, not what happened to Germany.
We almost have a disagreement on this point. It is not a disagreement on facts but on meaning. What you said is true but it misses the point of what I said. A military-industrial complex is about more than the military. This relationship between the military, industry, and government is what makes the Prussians stand out and is what makes the political organization, and decisions about such things as education, stand out as unique to Prussia and Germany until the world followed their example. A good economy is more important to the modern military than the number of young people who can be sent to the frontline because the fighting men have been replaced with weapons. We don't see this in Ukraine as we saw it in Iraq and Afghanistan. We dropped million-dollar bombs on Iraq, and what we do is tied to our technology. Next to wanting every man and woman fully employed to support the modern military, their children are educated for technology to serve military and industrial purposes which are organized by the government as they never were before adopting the German model of bureaucracy. I am saying every citizen today is serving the beast, not their families, and they don't know it.
[quote] German had workers' compensation, and a national pension plan, and a national health plan, and a healthier population than Britain had when war began. That gave Germany a very important military advantage.
— Athena
And it should be noted that for example the national pension plan was made by Bismarck, one of the most conservative figures in German history. The thinking was more to counter the demands (and the threat) from the socialists than to embrace government welfare thinking in my view._ssu /quote]
That was perfectly said. :grin: Yes, Bismarck was trying to appease the socialists, and appeasing the people works very well. Charles Sarolea was a Belgian philologist and author who tried to warn the world Germany was preparing for war the first world war. He was very concerned that Germans submitted to the domination of Prussian. I see it all today as the people of the US submit to the military-industrial complex and a man like Trump comes to power because that is what power-hungry people want. Christians strongly support him as their ministers tell them how to vote, and the words of Jesus seem to be forgotten. Especially in Texas where the law now pays people to report on anyone involved in an abortion. Jesus was very clear about the wrong of reporting people to authority, but we are overstimulated and grossly unaware. The power of the state is excessive.
1. The focus on technology should make way for citizenship and reflection.
It is a good thing this is a philosophy thread because people here may understand a different point of view. As I see the problem it is confusing technology with science.
Science comes out of philosophy. It is an art of asking questions and a method for finding the answers. Technology is just facts. You memorize the facts and follow the instructions and all is good. When Germany's war criminals were put on trail, their defense was they were just following orders. Tragically the world is not understanding that they were educated to follow orders and not to think. "Mine is to do or die, not to question why". Education for technology is not education for thinking. It is education for memorizing, being programmed and following orders, and relying on "experts". A result of this education is storming the Capitol Building when a president of the US told his followers to do so. Hilter would have to admire Trump's accomplishment. Trump was sure pleased with himself. People today are followers, not thinkers. They were not taught to think as our young were taught to think when we used the "Conceptual Method" of education.
A RETURN TO THE CONCEPTUAL METHOD OF EDUCATION. Teach children how to think and help them know themselves before taking the next step of becoming an adult.
I am glad you are aware of Athens' role in the manifestation of western culture however that awareness seems limited and useless when it comes to understanding democracy. Truth is universal. A 3 is a 3 for African, Asian, Islamic, and Native Americans. Humans are born dependent and this is true for African, Asian, Islamic and Native Americans. Scientific truths are universal. What separated western civilization from the east was thinking in terms of universals. It is this way because nature makes it so. This was a break from the rest of the world and a belief in gods. Egypt and Persia had amazing civilizations and a lot of technology, but technology is not science. You can do your thing as you believe a god wants you to do, but that is not going to work as well as knowing the relationship between cause and effect, science. Our focus needs to be on universal truths.
Science is proving a sense of community is essential to our health and happiness. And through science, we know, that large, dense cities are dehumanizing and civility breaks down. We need to use science for better social organization and I believe this will resolve many human problems. We have experience with communes and planned communities. However, China is ahead of us when it comes to connecting people. They are working on a building that can contain a small city and they are building a new silk road that could greatly diminish the power of the US. https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/chinas-massive-belt-and-road-initiative. For sure your question is one we should think about, and the answer will not be education for technology. It will be education for humanity. As in learning the humanities.
4. The best thing we can do is educate our children to consider the answer.
Not that long ago few people expected to have big incomes. We didn't buy a lot for our families and we relied on them almost completely for our joys in life. Many people have thought what matters most is meaningful work and women worked for very low pay caring for others because it gave them a sense of purpose. We were proud of our national and community parks that were open to everyone because they were free to all. We did not close the disadvantaged families out. What does a great nation do? What do people who love humanity do? What values do we want? We have gone long enough with education for a technological society with unknown values. It is time to question our values and why we took the father out of the home and now take the mothers out of the home too. Really is this what is best for humanity?
5. You are asking me a mear woman? :lol: If I had my way all decisions would be based on what is best for the children. I think the Cherokee had it right. Let the women rule, but leave some responsibilities to the men. But that is different from seeking truth and I think that is equally important.
On the wall before me is a list of 52 virtues. That is not all the virtues but the list is adequate. Children should learn all the virtues and how to use them in their lives. This must be a daily practice so that this virtuous thinking is a habit that automatically comes up when triggered. Confucius and Aristotle spoke of the importance of developing good habits, virtuous habits. We used to think virtues were synonymous with strength.
How about this, it is off subject but your questions stimulated the thought. What if we are in the resurrection? The resurrection is the work of geologists and archeologists and related sciences.
Possibly all souls are being reborn at this time. What if, it is our duty to learn all we can and to rethink everything we think we know? :wink:
Wow, I like that list, and today different thoughts come up. Especially this one leaps out at me. "intellectual progress should be emphasized over material progress." That is exactly my impression of what democracy is about, the development of intellectual progress. That was about the humanities which then manifest a culture for being the best human beings we can be. That is collectively not just individual superiority. Our old textbook stressed the importance of cooperation and sharing, but this also comes with not taking something for nothing. We developed a good human nature and then took it for granted.
I think we are now stressing competition, not just in school but throughout our country. Competition is supposed to reduce cost, but at what cost? Nurses began fleeing from our hospitals when the departments were pitted against each other, in a competition to do more with less. Nursing is about caring and in the past they worked cooperatively. With the change came hoarding supplies and no longer sharing or cooperating with other departments. Now even though we graduate many nurses, we don't have enough of them, and for the same reason, we graduated many teachers and don't have enough of them. When our medical people and educators are working for a monetary reward instead of intrinsic satisfaction it is destructive to work morale and the quality of caring. The problem of burnout is increased because the worker is being fed that intrinsic joy of work.
You ask, "What is the relationship between community and independency/ autonomy?" Family is about more than the individual and so is being a teacher and a nurse about more than the individual. Actually, any job can be about everyone and a good community because there can be intrinsic pleasure in doing just about anything. Or any job can lead to resentment and hating one's life. It is what we make it. To love being an American is to love what we stand for and feeling a part of something much bigger than ourselves. This is all about relationships. And when technology and profits were applied to our medical care, and education, they became dehumanizing. I don't mean individuals are less likable but that work situation is less likable. Enjoying our jobs depends on two things, having a positive attitude and a positive work environment.
The democratic model for industry is more like a family where everyone cares about each other and the shared goal of the business succeeding. In the US we have autocratic industry where often managment and labor are pitted against each other. That is very destructive to individuals, families and our whole nation.
The US has started marginalizing people as Europe did. We can't do anything without someone checking our ID and all our credit and criminal records. I remember when we had real protection of our privacy and only when we applied for high-security jobs were the records opened. I remember when we were judged on our character, not our wealth or specific work experience. Most jobs can be done by normally intelligent people, and as a nation can benefit from commerce and immigrants, so can most organizations benefit from new blood and different points of view. When the job is open only to the person who has been specialized and has had specific work experience, there will be stagnation and a lot of unemployed people.
Some colleges are realizing practices that keep people closed out, have a serious downside. And this is not just about the colleges or employers and individuals. It is about our culture and the health of our civilization. I am saying being technologically correct can be destructive and this increases all social problems. When using the democratic model, the doors are open and the training is ongoing and inclusive. By inclusive I mean, we can learn how the whole operation works and the individual has a chance to hold any position. People are not specialized, narrowly defined, and marginalized. Getting ahead in life is just a matter of developing our talents and interest and being likable people.
Blocking people from college educations and opportunities goes against democratic values, but our technological society began running on technology instead of human values. We are now smart but not wise. I would not be surprised if we continued to develop the problems Nazi Germany had. The mindset of technology and superiority and control, control, control has consumed us and is hurting us.