The Marxification of Education: Paulo Freire's Critical Marxism and the Theft of Education James Lindsay
I have spoken with teachers who express some radical ideas during conversations. When I would mention that the ideas they were expressing are Marxist they would get very defensive and deny that they were Marxist ideas. This happened so often that I thought maybe these individuals were all just Fabian Socialists who didn’t want to be exposed. But then in society, as a whole, it seems more and more people are begging for socialism, while at the same time polls show that people overwhelmingly do not want a government run economy. The same people begging for socialism seem to not understand what it is. How does this happen? It has been so frustrating that it has become overwhelming to discuss politics with people because they seem to be scatterbrained. More and more people are viewing reality through a lens of structural oppression, and when you ask for clarification, they seem unable to provide it. They can only parrot ideas and slander those who seek explanation for their views. It is quite literally destroying this country, spinning citizens against each other, and turning our attention away from meaningful debate to a focus on nonissues. I never understood where it was all coming from until reading this book.
I am familiar with Yury Bezmenov, the KGB defector who exposed the goals and strategies of the KGB to tear this country apart from the inside out. And I did think his foretelling that we will know when ideological subversion has taken effect, because we “will no longer agree on facts” came well into fruition. And I believed him when he said it takes about 20 years for this process to take affect, as “that is how long it takes to educate the next generation”. What I did not understand was that it would be our public education system which would be the source of this ideological subversion. That our government would incorporate Paulo Freire’s (a man I had never heard of) teaching methods to subvert ideology behind the backs of parents, under the pretense of education. That educators are the instruments of manipulation as they are taught brainwashing techniques derived from authoritarian regimes. It seems like a fictional story. Unfortunately, Lindsay has exposed this not as a dystopian thriller, but as the current reality of education in America. This book explains why children come home dumber: less able to think for themselves, full of talking points they can’t substantiate, less able to do math, less literate, and with less desire to learn. Academic competence seems to be replaced with very specific activist aspirations. Changing the world by way of revolution seems more important than the consequences.
If you want to understand how this is happening right in front of our faces, this is the book for you.
This is an episode of James Lindsay’s (the author’s) podcast and exposes how school curriculums obfuscate the radical ideas which are actually taught in classrooms. If you are a parent, and have a child in public school I would highly recommend you listen to this.
