Politically the world seems to be moving very much to the right, and with it there is an attack on thinking, especially critical thinking where an issue is questioned, analysed, interpreted and evaluated to make a judgement about the issue.
Critical thinking is a dangerous activity, and should be banned. It has been a problem for a long time. In ancient Greece, Socrates was forced to drink a beaker of hemlock to silence him, to stop him from teaching young people of Athens to think since the thinking led to questioning of how the city elders were behaving. Socrates knew how little he knew as opposed to the power elite of Athens who knew everything. They saw that Socrates encouraging young people to think was a threat to their authority, so Socrates had to go.
Don’t question the superiority of the race which dominated the world for over 5 centuries, the White European colonisers. The intolerance that we see expressed in so many ways as political and racist bigotry also has its origins in colonialism. In his introduction to Empire: How Britain made the modern world, Niall Ferguson quotes an excerpt from the 2001 Durban Declaration of the World Conference against Racism:
… Colonialism has led to racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, and… Africans and people of African descent and indigenous peoples were victims of colonialism and continue to be victims of its consequences.
The danger of critical thinking is that it allows the examination of the origins of bigotry, of discrimination, of seeing ‘difference’ in its many forms, in colour, in creed, in self identification, in politics, and in responses to the humanitarian crisis refugees and statelessness presents.
Thinking, especially critical thinking threatens authoritarian leaders and so they target protesters and universities which encourage critical thinking to quell dissent.
We have seen, since the beginning of the conflict in Gaza, protests about the brutality of the Israeli response to the vicious, murderous terrorist attack on a music festival on October 7 last year, an attack which saw 1200 people killed and 250 taken as hostages, probably as bargaining chips to negotiate a more sustainable life for the 2.3 million people crammed into the Gaza strip, dependent on Israel for the provision of basic life essentials such as food, water sewerage, power. Not one of the protesters supported Hamas and their terrorist act, but were appealing that the wholesale destruction of Gaza be stopped. But the protests were seen as supporting Hamas, supporting terrorism, antisemitic, anti Israel’s right to defend itself. The universities were criticised for allowing the protests on university campuses.
And under no circumstances mention that the Israeli military used the ‘Hannibal Directive’ against the terrorists, resulting the IDF killing many of its own citizens and soldiers as they drove the Hamas attackers back to Gaza.
The protesters separate the October attack from the destruction of Gaza and the apparent genocide of the Palestinians living in Gaza. To be pro Palestinian is not to be anti-Israel, it is not antisemitic. Critical thinking makes that distinction, but it is politically uncomfortable for the Israeli government of Benjamin Netanyahu and in the various governments which support him, including Australia. October 7, it is better to believe, came out of the blue, it has nothing to do with the treatment of the Palestinians of Gaza and their treatment over the years since the Nakba of 1948.
There are many other examples on autocratic leaders quelling dissent, attacking universities for questioning various policies and discriminatory practice. The New York Times in February reported that universities in India were anti-India according to the Prime Minister who promotes a Nationalistic form of Hindu, as he discriminates against the Sikh and Muslim communities in India.
In Pakistan, peaceful student protests objected to the imprisonment of former PM Imran Khan and the ban on the press even so much as mentioning him, have threatened nation wide protests if Khan is not freed by August 30. Khan is in prison on charges of an illegal marriage and regarding state secrets which saw him imprisoned in February on what are considered trumped up charges. The response to the threat of protests has been for the government to introduce bills restricting the right to protest.
Similarly in Bangladesh, student protests questioning a government decision to allocate certain government jobs to a favoured elite were met with a violent crackdown but continued protest and support for the students from the military saw the autocratic Prime Minister, Sheik Hasina flee the country, at this stage a victory for the students and a victory for the right to protest and to question government decisions.
In each case. in each country the news is censored, the true situation is withheld from the citizens. I know a Russian family who arrived here about four years ago, they cannot understand the ‘lies’ told in Australian news broadcasts, and how they differ from the Russian news they get through the internet regarding the Ukraine conflict.
Difference is not to be tolerated. This is most apparent in issues such as immigration where despite there being around 117.3 million forcibly displaced people in the world at the end of 2023, according to the UNHCR report, not including those wishing to flee Gaza as that enclave continues to be razed to the ground. It seems no country wants them.
It is far easier to dismiss the very idea that there can be four times the population of this country seeking somewhere to live since for any number of reasons they cannot live in their homelands.
Turning to the dumbing down of political rhetoric here in Australia, we had the negative campaign against the Voice referendum, ‘If you don’t know, vote no’, the rejection by the opposition to explore the violence of colonialism by promoting ‘Truth Telling’. To listen to indigenous people on land use, to criminalise young offenders by making the age of criminal accountability 10 years, before children are mature enough to make such distinctions, to treat young people charged with ‘adult crimes’ as adults, to mete out ‘adult time’ on conviction.
On immigration, the simplistic ‘Turn Back The Boats’ slogan and ensuring that no asylum seeker arriving as ‘boat people’ are denied entry to Australia, but are sent to off shore detention facilities, denied the respect enshrined in the UN Declaration of Human Rights, effectively criminalised and imprisoned without trial. To effectively claim any Palestinian seeking to come here from the hell hole of Gaza is a Hamas supporter, hence a terrorist and denied a visa despite passing through at least three security checks.
Don’t think too deeply on the ‘crime waves’ committed by young people. Don’t think too deeply about what causes children to be ‘criminal’, don’t look too deeply at the socio-economic situation of their families, or that they may even have been state wards, taken away from troubled households but offering little or no support to those house holds.
Don’t think for a moment that the lives of two teenagers in custody in Western Australia could have been saved though a better system than one which criminalises poverty and dysfunctional family life. Solve the problems by being ‘tough on crime’. Lock them up and throw away the key!
Don’t think that people seeking refugee status are really desperate, they could be criminals, murderers, rapists, terrorists. Don’t think for a moment that 117.3 million people are forced to flee from their homelands because of wars, religious conflict, famine, discrimination or any other life threatening situation. If they cannot afford a plane ticket and visa to arrive here legally, as tourists and overstay their tourist visa, they are not welcome.
I recently posed a question during a discussion, to consider where the animosity between religions comes from, both in terms of religious texts and holy books, the practice of these faiths including the divisions within those faiths (sects or denominations), the story of colonialism including the cultural and economic influences as a result of colonialism. Also to consider the situations for those nations after the colonial powers left.
One response was that I align with terrorists.
Don’t think too deeply, don’t engage in critical thinking.
Ever.
You may be considered to be aligned with criminals or terrorists.
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Bert, we “comets” are not able to do much more than fly, zip, glow, attract, interest, arouse, symbolise. We cannot imagine a collision, a “reckoning”, with a body of size and strength, a black hole, galaxy, huge star…, so, we must shine vigorously, announce ourselves, declare, stand, deliver, attest. Otherwise we must go. Socrates went, as did Jesus and Gautama, and Moses and Muhammed. Death and exile, rejection, condemnation await all who are “different”, less amenable, problems. “They” will always win against the emerging ones who think and act differently. “They” will drive us out, down, under. Let us live and die with dignity, integrity, honesty and our awareness, for good souls are so precious.
Phil, I refuse to let the bastards win.
We need to work for a more humane world.
Let the bastards lose, with pain in the defeated ego and ambition. I expect to die difficult.
Bert, great work.
Great article Bert,
As a semi-retired teacher, I can concur that the mindset of many young people has changed in the last 40 years or so.
Even in my areas of Maths and Physics, the desire for exploration has decreased, and I get comments like –
“what are we studying this shit for, the Bible says ….. and my parents say ….., and I don’t know why I’m here”
While I understand their frustrations about not “getting it” in my subjects, there is certainly something deeper going on. Unfortunately, amongst the young men in my classes, the rise of misogynistic, hyper-masculine and ultra right wing groups in social media, is not helping at all.
It’s not so obvious to me amongst the young women, but I admit that I may not be understanding what they are saying or where they are coming from.
Little kids get their favourite words, including Why?.
The best response is, What do you think?
Throw it back at them.
Perhaps treating those young pretend alpha males as little kids, turn their comments back on them is a way of dealing.
Just glad I left the classroom when I did.
Thank you Bert for a splendid essay; it pretty much covers the field.
I admire your breadth of vision and understanding.
To uncletimrob, my own experience is similar in that I have been aware for some time of a marked increase in general belligerence. A old mate refers to this phenomenon as “undifferentiated truculence”.
Good and important. Victoria and I think NSW had critical thinking as 1/4 of the compulsory English Expression, along with some environmental science etc.
Apparently disappeared in the ’80s and one recalls that not very liberal Liberal of the early 20thC, Kevin Andrews, questioning why students need to learn skills of ‘analysis’.
Whiff of Koch outlets and fossil fuels with RW MSM to produce low info and less educated citizens precluding education, empowerment and strong civil society.
Yes Bert, well put.
And as commented, it all falls on the kids. But for old teachers, what are the chances?
After just responding to James Moore’s Cemetery America all I feel up to doing is repeating here my last few paras:
“And so, the whole world with populations turned to decline, seeks to protect itself somehow as it watches America, apparently unable to rescue itself, collapse as have the wielders of colonialism, feudalism and barbarism before. Except, this time it’s at light-speed, and America has about 30% of the world’s economy, almost half the world’s arms, and could in a fit destroy the world.
It lost any moral high-ground it may have espoused, and with it, any ability to transact fairly or by any means other than its habit of coercion.
So, all in about 50 years or so, the world of democracy and collective good faith has been supplanted by a reactive contagion of self-interested escape, the varnished absolute, and trade by treachery with the aura of a death cult.”
Clakka, the shift of economic power follows the trends set through history, vacillating east and west. China will become the leading economy in a few years, ten, maybe a little more.
Interestingly Kissinger and Nixon brought American investors with them in the 1970’s when visiting Mao, included were coca cola, now the number one drink seller in China. Also other investors, looking to use cheap labour and almost free land to build factories…. IBM started manufacturing there, leading the way in developing China’s hi-tech industries.
China is now developing production facilities in Africa, making clothing, using cheap African labour…. they learned well.
Sometimes I get the feeling what they really mean is, “It’s critical that people stop thinking.” Which would make it so much easier for them to run everything without being questioned.
Fair enough for Bett to join that subset of society who intrepidly continue to enumerate all the many things that are wrong in this world – and, Bett, you’ve left out the whole panoply of environmental issues, and the deepening cost-of-living crisis.
But what’s the good of whinging, if we can’t actually propose any workable answers?
And this is where things do get difficult: in order to open for ourselves at least a sporting chance to get on top of our issues would require a complete re-orientation of practically all principles that inform our current (bourgeois) way of life, and including all its constituent political, economic and commercial, legal, social, educational, etc. structures and dynamics. In short, we need a revolution.
For most people this is obviously inconceivable: they just cannot comprehend the scale of change required! But another problem is that all too many people’s livelihoods are directly dependent on things continuing as they are, with even cosmetic changes potentially posing existential challenges. Just a few days ago, none other than Bett himself admitted to having been reminded by a friend that the ability of his superfund to continue to provide his pension benefits materially depends on capitalism continuing to operate as usual.
Therefore, here is the most immediately urgent challenge: how many we, both individually as well as collectively, go about securing the financial and commercial freedom and agency that would enable us meaningfully to address the many problems enumerated (once again) by Bert?