Reading and Learning Beyond the Soundbite; A Civic Imperative

"I have a foreboding of an America in my children’s or grandchildren’s time — when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and whats true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness. The dumbing down of America is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30-second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), the lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance." Carl Sagan, 1995, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark.

Carl Sagan, the astrophysicist, is given great credit for his foresight - he was a brilliant man; but I'd bet, even he read Alvin Toffler's The Third Wave and it's predecessor, Future Shock, both of which preceded his comments in the 1995 work referenced above, by 15 and 25 years respectively. I am hard pressed to believe Sagan didn't at least peruse them. The last part of his statement as highlighted, is so true and was covered by Toffler, whose Third Wave work summarized the impact of agricultural, industrial, and this third technological/information wave - the effects and potential influence each wave had (or is presently having) on human development - and the past - and evolving supra structures of our societies.

Unfortunately, Peter Griffith, Homer Simpson, South Park as examples, took sway in America where great swarths of the populace were concerned - and yes Carl, I read my horoscope every day. Beloved and celebrated as these fictitious characters are and have been; they were not what we needed - examples of the media, driving in tandem, many fractured, targeted and divisive narratives - the desensitization of our individual and national sensibilities these last thirty years.

The compression of knowledge toward prideful ignorance, has deteriorated, as Sagan notes in his quote, the public's capacity to hold our government leaders and captains of industry accountable - while aggressively constraining the people's rights and privileges in service to themselves. It has eradicated our ability to participate in our increasingly 'constitutionally dangerous,' duplicitous - and now kangaroo polity; and it has catapulted our nation toward its subpar standing in the world - with a wannabe dictator for a President, who possesses the sensitives of a slug wrapped in fish scales of the most pristine powder the elite can nasally and orally ingest - he is numb.

Military might and sustaining economic growth are not the only functions of governance and societies. Civilizations are formed to meet burgeoning human need and demonstrate cultural and technological accomplishment. Yet, in contrast to this, our national leaders are raping the nation's people; as they choose to serve the corporatocracy; eradicating the world's resources and our futures; marginalizing the ideals of the American Experiment; and egregiously neglecting our national infrastructure - in the name of greed and self aggrandizement - ad infinitum. This is in part, because the masses of people are largely, cross - culturally ignorant and ill prepared, to defend themselves; empirically. Therefore, they cannot participate and represent their interests, in the radical social changes taking place and rapidly, exponentially, gaining momentum.

The limited quips of our contemporary oratory, through social media; massive media propaganda, mind numbing entertainment emphasizing vanity and individualistic narcissistic tendencies has become problematic for democracy and puts the people at risk. Purposeful superficial designs and reduced outcomes of our elementary, secondary and higher education processes; the public's disdain for intellect; the utter cacophony of disinformation and consumerist media campaigns, saturating the airwaves, for generations now - are destroying this country. Any sense of a national collective consciousness, premised on sound thinking, discourse - and the people's 'communal' common sense, expressed in respectful dialogue and forums, seems to have all but perished through our nation's collective lack of knowledge and the impact of the ever pervasive media.

Contemporary propaganda is a massive, century old psychological experiment - accentuated now by cascading and increasingly invasive technology. The trajectories of learning and critical thinking are purposely being dampened in America and worldwide, into as Mr. Sagan asserts, sound bites. While a few words, well thought out, offer opportunity for thought crystallization and "ah hah" moments, sound bites of targeted, surreptitious summaries of mis/dis and other information, are purposefully designed to promote false narratives, engender a tangential range of emotional responses from the public, and to promote mutually exclusive thinking within targeted groups.

Copious reading by the populace would counter this intention on the part of our 'invisible' handlers - to use Bernay's logic. Reading more; not novels, comic books or for purposeful entertainment; but for the value of studious application, for learning the state of our human condition, self and communal improvement; and for gainful development. Critical analysis and formulation of evidence based thinking - must be re-celebrated.

For my part, reading things like ancient and contemporary history (specifically pre as well as post Greco Roman); the sciences (just pick a few); Afrikan, Eastern and Western philosophy; the psychological disciplines; the phuckin' Constitution and Bill of Rights for God's sake America; diverse religions (at least the sacred works of Hindu, Islamic, Christianity, Judaism traditions, the Khemetic template,The Book of the Dead), and metaphysically, Monadic Esotericism. Those are my choices, my epistemological trajectory of accomplished and desired learning, if you will - yours and others, will of course, be different.

The point is, if we are going to turn the tide away from a potential mass dystopia descending upon America (it may already be too late) people will need diverse life long learning dives into gaining information and knowledge, of how we got here, to manifest what to do about it. Reading across disciplines, helps man or woman, connect the dots of human experience and progress, in the context of humanitarian purpose, source and the depth of individual potential. It strengthens the ability to critically dialogue with others; it forces the synthesis of ideas; and it creates foundational cognitive pathways for the genesis of new thought paradigms.

More people need to read MORE! The black man (cause I Am one) must make an effort to understand the Khemetic, Sumerian and potentially, the contributions of Atlantean mythos - the ancient, antecedent origins of world history that some/many contemporary historians would rather suppress in opposition to the Westernized interpretation of human development as an epistemological standard. As every other nation of peoples, whose lineage has not been lost or corrupted - values and understands their contributions to the collective body of knowledge and human progress; so must the Afrikan, the world's black people, understand why blackness was deemed as needing to be circumscribed, coded and suppressed - academically and psychologically inverted in terms of epistemological influence - as if pyramids are not supported at their base.

Accomplishing these studies; therein - we would find ourselves and our Diaspora potentially unified and strengthened - a fertile basis, for a 'virtual sovereignty' of our people's worldwide - a gamechanger - in my mind. This thinking is reinforced, as Afrika has not yet managed a continent wide response to the impact of past and present neo-colonizing. More input is needed from those in the Diaspora. Too many African Americans have long abdicated any interest or responsibility in building pathways back to our motherland; but the time is upon us - and even that is changing.

Regarding the generalized American consciousness,the bell's and whistles, we chase in life, in all our righteous thinking and indignation, are rags upon the feet of knowledge - and knowledge precludes wisdom; in my opinion. I've known this as a man of means and as a poor one - intuitively and empirically. In all thy getting - get thee wisdom; that is the principle thing. Wisdom is not based on just one type of information, discipline or belief - it is well rounded; critical, intuitive, discerning, compassionate - and above all illuminating. The thing is, knowledge begins with dismissing indoctrination and suspending beliefs in the face of; and the pursuit of evidence - empirical evidence. Only then, have the precepts been resolved, that begin the path to conveying the experience of knowledge with wisdom. Most are not prepared to do this... but reading more, helps it unfold.

In this context, none of the hysteria, being so massively fermented in the American public 's minds and collective subconscious, is surprising. How can America compete in increasingly knowledge based economies of the world without its people's having sufficient knowledge based skills and critical thinking practices - toward efficacious cognition and problem solving? We may have the largest economy on the planet, but many of our people, are functionally illiterate, after being financially fleeced and educated in institutions devoid of any intellectual rigor - and those not educated at all; while simultaneously being saturated with cascading waves of nonsensical minutiae, 24 hours a day in perpetuity. This is compounded by the cascading proliferation of fake news.

Our impeached Commander in Chief is the best, most important example of this. Trump is a decrepit example of vanity, shortsightedness, lacking compassion and maintaining a fervent unbound hubris, that sacrifices our Country through contrite, yet rancid dismissiveness of all things known and unknown - in the interest of a few. This should be proof enough, that the bane of pubic ignorance and its costs [the electing of this man], are far too high a price in this equation... unless of course; chaos and democratic destabilization is the objective. Much of the current crisis in democracy could have been avoided with an informed public, possessing foundational skills, in discourse and building consensus. Civics are undoable however, if the masses are under performing in terms of knowledge and civility, but on steroids as emoting, becomes the preferred method of getting a point across.

So this piece is encouraging people to read assertively and teach your children to teach their children to do the same - teach them to love reading as a pathway to heights beyond the physical form and as a conduit to the examination of the truth. I've always known it to free my mind; regardless of hilltop or valley, to inform and assist perspective and to find authority, in my own personal constitution. In contrast to the prison that is willful ignorance, this seems a worthy personal development goal. As a civic goal, applicable to deteriorating discourse as a nation, reading must be a fundamental tool, in this subversive age, to protect the public's national security, literally; and figuratively in the autonomy of our thinking. It is a civic imperative. Read. Know. Resist.