Open Pollen Press Post 0.02
——————————————————————————-Jack Slaggert
Excerpt from; ¡Prologue! (Book Pending)
Once upon a Time, in mid 20th Century “Latin America,” there was a widespread movement to achieve literacy amongst the mass of humanity that existed as peasants. A model of widely accessible, self-directed, open education and inquiry was implemented. This was a world changing event. Historic in scope.
Underlying this movement’s praxis; consientizacao. In consientizacao literacy is understood as a tool to perceive one’s reality within a broad social, cultural, economic and political context, yielding the ability to take action to improve one’s situation. An Educational model that aimed to develop actionable contextual understanding.
Within the context of systemic poverty and exploitation, an opportunity to look up from one’s work, analyze one’s life situation, and take action. To make change. To be a creative agent within the world one inhabits and improve the quality of one’s life.
A literate peasant stands more erect; eyes not downcast. This was perceived as threat by some and much tragedy ensued as Banana Republics’ death squad gangs, in conjunction with the Dulles Brothers and Company, attempted to “disappear” and silence all suspected carriers of consientizacao; organized crime, operating from behind a wall of lucre, faux patriotism, fabricated law and neo-colonial/market ideology.
As consientizacao traveled North, across a matrix of frontiers, borders and badlands it was translated as “consciousness.” Hence, and therefor the expression “consciousness raising” that was heard at civil rights organizings, anti-war teach-ins, Black Panther mentorings, women’s gatherings and environmental meetings. Attempts to increase awareness of a context and to take action to improve an unjust situation.
Concurrently, another usage of “consciousness” prevalent in the English-speaking world was as what Aldous Huxley explored in “The Doors of Perception.” Add some Soulful Rock-n-Roll Love songs to the mix; base line, backbeat, 3,4 … North American Culture, the “American experience” irrevocably altered.
TV upgraded to color. The winds of change were blowing. Chuck Berry duck-walkin’ between the lines. The March to Montgomery. Allen Ginsberg chanting by the Bay and in the courts. Martin, Malcolm and Medgar. Baldwin, Carawac, Kesey. The Beatles. Birth control. Woodstock. Canton, Thomas Kuhn, Meldenbrant, Lasslo, Lynn Margulis, Shannon, Lovelock, Bill Mollison. Powell writes a memo. Chicago economics and police riots. Fred Hampton, Kissinger, Pinochet and Milton Friedman. George Wallace. Dick’s Southern strategy play. Hard hat riots. AIM occupies Alcatraz. Stonewall, Networking, swingers, equity flipping, herbal tea, embroidered bell-bottoms, Muhammad Ali. Some said the Pentagon was levitated, they said they saw it’s grim specter floating, a wrath untethered to the Land… Whatever.
The masters of war had to fallback, entrench and re-group. And re-group they did. What the Reverend Doctor King called out as “the giant triplets,” racism, militarism, and materialism glorified, marketed and denied. Fleeting smiles, dog whistles, and double-bind sticks, making it hard to Dream. Hard, but not impossible. Imagine… emergent backbeat resounding…cracking alienation’s spell…
We suffer from a well marketed and maintained manufactured perception of division and powerlessness; orchestrated disinformation, mis-definitions, interminable obtrusion, data mined enhanced scientific propaganda, advertising and news spinning, manipulative overt and subliminal sound bite branding, pecuniary duress occupying our time (like stressed rats in a behavioral modification maze, spin the treadmill for a piece of cheese paycheck), gerrymandered brains droning on and on, run-on crises and endless distractions, protests absorbed and neutralized, rents, war, habitat destruction and sea levels raised; compounding…
The historical vestiges of colonialism dividing and indenturing us all. On a corporate ride to nowhere. John Barleycorn’s mutant weed; poser cowboys round-upping the corn.
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*# Excerpt from; ¡Prologue! (Book Pending)
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