The Role of a Teacher (Elder)

In the time-honored Asian (and other indigenous) cultures, the title and honor of a "teacher," had a very special meaning, and not what it has become today -- to mean a person who is not a master and creator of that which he teaches, but merely "certified," because he has jumped through all the hoops of seeming to be one. But just because a trade association can determine who is certified to work in that field, doesn't necessarily mean they have those who actually created that knowledge, the masses now claim to own.

This is a very important distinction, because in the original meaning of teacher, that IS what it meant -- that the teacher learned it himself, as the originator of that knowledge -- and not merely accepting what was taught to all the other students, as the only truth they should then propagate. Such people would not know how to determine the truth of anything for themselves -- but are merely taught what the truth is, and that they should entertain no other.

And so "authority" and "authoritarianism" become very important in that institution -- rather than promoting the freedom of inquiry -- to entertain all the many ways of looking at a subject, and coming up with an idea that integrates all the old understandings, into a comprehensive, integrated better understanding that supplants the old, instead of merely teaching the old as the new -- to those who haven't heard it before, which are invariably the impressionable young, who understandably, haven't heard it all yet.

And that is why schools invariably target the young, rather than the old and wily -- who have heard it all, or at least heard a lot, to begin to suspect, that the "teacher" has no idea what they are talking about, and many of such students will actually likely know more (better).

But that is when education, or teaching, stands the test of scrutiny -- when ideas are presented to a group of peers, and not just the young and innocent (gullible) -- who don't know any better when they are being conned and coerced into believing what is not true. Obviously, many of the more able students are weeded out or persecuted in this way -- of not conforming to what the authorities demand they believe -- as the political/social correctness of the group in charge of determining that for everyone else.

Despite that indoctrination (socialization, education, institutionalization, etc.), there will always be a few who survive those pressures to conform -- and transcend the limits of the present knowledge, to discover the truth beyond the limits of that knowledge, or even its prohibitions, and the unthinkable, which often becomes the realities of the future.

Thus the role of the teacher, is to ensure that among his students, there is at least one, who go beyond the limits of the knowledge of the teacher, to discover what the teacher doesn't know or even thinks can be known -- as the great achievement and distinction, of a great teacher -- and not merely one who pumps out legions of mediocrities, who never dare to question beyond their "knowledge," as the limits of all that can be known.

Are Government Workers Underpaid?

$27,000 (benefits) is already the median income for all incomes in America -- which means, half the people make more, and half make less.

So for the government workers to make $100,000 on top of that, they all represent the top half of incomes -- and are the "greedy rich" they vilify. The AP ran a story not too long ago about a couple who were both employed as government workers, and reported that the man made $60,000 (I think as a teacher), while his wife worked as a nurse (for assuredly more but her income was not disclosed to better distort), and he was "outraged" that they were living a "lower middle class existence," to further give the impression that the "average" income was what the CEOs of the major corporations were making -- and the rank and file government workers should therefore be entitled to because they had "sacrificed" themselves to serve the people -- otherwise, they would assuredly be getting the top private sector compensations.

It all doesn't make sense in actuality, but that's what the union newsletters/newspapers would have us believe -- and no local reporter/editor would dare sign their name to it, but coming from the "Associated Press," it should be regarded as the vetted truth, that most government workers are highly skilled professionals with unique expertise that they created themselves -- rather than the rank and file that demands that level of compensation, even as rank and file bureaucrats.

That's the problem with unionizing the government workers: instead of working to provide that quality of life for everyone in America, they lobby and work solely to assure that life only for themselves -- at the expense of the rest of the taxpayers and citizenry -- even going so far as to claim that they are the " poor and underprivileged" (that they are selflessly and nobly serving).

And of course they can always find some starving/willing freelance writer to write that fiction as fact, under the imprimatur of the "Associated Press.

"Why Don't You Submit Your Writing to the Publications?"

Actually, I used to submit pieces to several publications, but when they realized I was so good and influential, they had to put a stop to that -- because only their writers and editors (themselves) could dictate the dialogue and shape what people thought.

That was the "old media" control and why people weren't allowed the freedom to see all the information, alternatives and options -- but only what the editors/copywriters would edit any piece to say -- what they wanted you to say, rather than what you actually wanted to say, in your own way, in your own words.

I told them that was not a wise thing to do -- because in the age of the Internet, they would lock out all the talent and brains on the other side -- just like every trade association (union) tries to define and protect their own turf, force everybody through their toll booths, and to play "their" game -- "their" way. So they could always claim you weren't writing in their proper "Associated Press" style so they could edit it to say something else entirely, or that nothing new and different could ever be said -- because you could only repeat what had been said before -- from what the AP certified writers only could say.

So rather than just have my words distorted, I just gave up submitting it to the publications -- and wrote exclusively for online forums and blogs, until all the traditional publications had to come around to allowing online discussions. Initially, they still censored (moderated) much of what I wrote, because it was too groundbreaking and radical -- this whole concept of saying what they had never allowed before. But then the participation began to outstrip their ability to "monitor" all the discussions -- and there wasn't enough manpower to maintain that control -- and so they had to presume that readers would notify them of abuses, if they got egregious enough.

But then the unions and other control freaks play their own games of "reporting abuses" just to see if they can regain control of the discussions, and suppress, repress, edit and censor those they don't want anybody else to see.

But people can make up their own minds now -- and decide for themselves what is valid and true, and not just what the publishers and editors tell us is "all the news fit to print," and like the union bosses keep insisting, "they'll do all the thinking and talking for everybody else" -- even on up through the university professors, who if they can't think, talk and represent themselves, what good are they?

So it is a credit to yourself that you can tell these differences -- and not as the old media editors insisted, "They'll never be able to tell the difference, much less appreciate it." I knew they were wrong.

(This reply was "moderated" out of existence at the Honolulu Star-Advertiser.)

I guess I should be flattered to be the most censored writer in America -- but also the most read.

The Selling of Hawaii

It's very typical these days, that all the news and information brought to us today, is provided by those who benefit from the distribution (marketing) of that "information," including and especially, the seemingly disinterested and objective "educators" and "experts" -- whose solution for everything, is that we need infinitely more of their "education" -- for their benefit(s) to continue to escalate.

That is the peculiarity of markets that exist to "create" a market, whether it is a real need or not. To some extent, that can be said of anything -- so one has to discriminate and decide, at what point does "need" become "greed" -- which is this insatiability beyond the actual needs for health and well-being, that distorts the sensitivities and sensibilities of everything else.

Certainly we've reached that tipping point, when houses that have outlived their usefulness and should be torn down, sell for half a million dollars or more -- and keep going up. At some point, some kind of fundamental tie with its actual usefulness and value, have to be restored to sanity, rationality and perspective -- so that people are not simply justified that everybody else have also lost their their sense of values.

Unfortunately, we might have long gone past that point -- in many arenas, because the marketing has long become its own reason for being -- as long as it sells.

There's No "Free Lunch" There

You just can't create more work so that you can create more jobs -- to do things that don't need to be done, while ignoring all the things that really do need to be done, and in fact, eliminated.

The purpose of education is not to create more high-paying jobs for teachers because the schools keep getting worse -- which in the backwards world of the education indoctrination, "justifies" the need for hiring even more "educators" to make the students even worse, and more confused than they came into the schools -- often causing children to drop out as soon as they've had enough, and vow never to learn anything again, after those disastrous experiences with "education" and "educators."

People everywhere, under every condition, are naturally disposed to learn (even all animals do) -- and it is the education, and notably bad education and education professionals, that make them resistive and rebellious. We should not be then guaranteeing such people lifetime jobs as "educators," but should be letting those who actually know something, and maybe even created the knowledge, to teach such classes, instead of the field being restricted only to "education" professionals, who have been educated to "look busy," and sound like they know what they are talking about.

Let us now move from the obvious to the more subtle -- of building a rail system where nobody presently lives, because the major justification for building a rail makes sense, is where there is the greatest density of population in the world -- like a Tokyo, New York, London, Paris, Beijing -- because that makes getting anywhere possible at all, and not simply because it is an "alternative," few can avail themselves of.

Meanwhile, the infrastructure of roads, water supply and sewer, are erupting daily -- with no money available to repair and reconstruct them because no federal funding is available because that's what any population is expected to pay for themselves -- and not expect citizens everywhere else to for them. And so, in order to get the "free money," we'll do what doesn't need to be done -- while the great urgencies of life, are ignored, because there is no "free lunch" there.

That's how the government of Hawaii has been so perverted to go for the money, instead of the good of the general well-being of the greater whole -- even if it means creating more problems and failures -- because that's where the money is. You have to do what is right and good, even if it isn't -- and that's what makes a government, and a society good.