Not A Worthy Investment

Milton, the town I grew up in, had a strong working class culture.  Of course there were the bourgeois elements within my community; my family, in fact, was of a conservative middle class mindset.  But falling in line with principles which were purposed for eventual financial liberties seemed ominous to me.  And so I dispelled any motivation for academic achievement; I reeled at the thought of going to college. 

Among the friends I hung out with, two paths were respected as a means for young men to grow from adolescence into adulthood.  One was to play it safe—to find good physical work—to secure independence and maybe start a family.  And the other was to seek to be indoctrinated into the criminal justice system.  Both were to be a testament of your discipline; both were to embrace a common struggle.

The common struggle, within a democratic society, is to uphold working class values and liberty which a class economic structure inhibits. 

Schooling seems to me a means of having young impressionable people invest in their financial security.  Schooling indoctrinates voters, and taxpayers, into class warfare; very simply, if you take enough time to work towards financial security as a young person, you will not abandon class politics as an adult.  People who are invested in their financial security are much more likely to serve an economic structure which will secure them a return on the investment they made in getting an education.

I know, even in my youth, I saw schooling as means of coercion into a political structure I abhorred.  Because I resented the coercive nature of the mechanistic school experience, I sought to be as reckless as I could.  I would quit my first job at a pool hall and spend a whole summer stealing, and getting drunk.  I did get put in jail and this satiated my hunger for disorder—temporarily. 

After getting arrested for my first time, as an adolescent, I would find myself thoroughly implanted in the system.  And I would take until I was in my early thirties to maneuver the through the system to find independence.  Years spent in the system were hard; I questioned my sanity; and had to have assistance dealing with psychological trauma.  But taking an alternative route towards adulthood allowed me to undercut a system which poisons the souls of far too many people.

The whole system—from our schools—to our jails and psychiatric institutions—is a means of coercing people into a competition based economic structure.  In a democracy, the strategy for having people serve a political economy which they are against is to have them invest in having that economy serve them.  All of what we do from childhood, onward, is to perpetuate a lie to our friends, and, eventually, our future generations.