I can’t deal with it right now, it has to with the things like the left’s wild swings between radicalism and an uncritical embrace of the electoral process since the 1960s, as well as the draining of any class content from any anti-establishment politics and the fossilization of the trade union movement, but if I get the chance I will post on it on my blog someday
–Richard Estes\’s last blog post: The Legacy of Marla Ruzicka

That’s not all of it. But it should be acknowledged.
–Richard Estes\’s last blog post: The Legacy of Marla Ruzicka

Also, let’s try and keep the character assassination to a minimum. This comment section is too tense as it is!

Meanwhile, have you seen these?

http://www.amazon.com/Read-Karl-Marx-Ernst-Fischer/dp/0853459746

http://www.amazon.com/Marxs-Das-Kapital-Biography-Changed/dp/0802143946/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1281559805&sr=1-3

Both are excellent, and their authors write way more clearly than David Harvey does.

1) Whatever I inherited, brain-mind-psychology-wise, from my parents as a genetic gift.

2) My education K-6 at a private school that encouraged individual student development and fostered an environment where intellectual curiosity and learning were valued, rather than mocked-scorned-disdained.

From 7-12 I went to public schools where I saw the pride-in-ignorance attitude well on display. I think that attitude came both from the public school environment itself, and the families from which those proudly ignorant kids came. Which is the primary cause, the family or the public school to which the family sends its kids? Dunno, good question. One thing I know is that the kids I went to K-6 with, they came from families who wanted their kids to LEARN and I don’t recall a single classmate who sought or treasured that proudly ignorant status. And I don’t think my lack of recollection is due to a bad memory; I think that’s how it really was.

I’m afraid public schools have grown much, much worse. My present job is serving as a counselor of sorts to kids in middle and high school, and the crap that passes for “education” in the public schools in my town… ridiculous. It’s more like a breeding ground for apathetic ignorance.

The process of changing social attitudes in this field we’re discussing, it’s not a quick-turnaround project. It’s a generational project, one that would require teaching in a totally different manner. I think Socratic learning is the best, at least for those whose intellectual capacities will tolerate it. If it were up to me to create an educational system for Americans, I would make Socratic learning the centerpiece of such teaching. By its very nature, Socratic Method encourages independent, self-reliant analysis of the subject matter, it encourages self-confidence, it encourages curiosity, it encourages one to have the type of mind that is skeptical, holistic, and eager to learn.

The main problem I see with that approach is that most public school teachers I know don’t want to work that hard.