We move so quickly through our lives, and the problem is that we don't notice this until we're well into our 60s. And then, we notice it because the expanding rate of population growth results in there being more people around you who have been around for less and less time. In other words, the benefit of the experience gained by living grows proportionately less respected as the rate of population growth expands.

The effect of this is made worse by the influence of commercial media. It is easier to exploit a market that is less knowledgeable and more easily conned, i.e., cupidic, so commercial media has become increasingly more focused on selling products and services that glorify youth. Since sex and romance are such ubiquitously limbic motivators, commercials for products that promise enhancements for people who prefer to be seen as sexy, young and successful, rather than knowledgeable dominate the airwaves. Since producers and sellers want to reach the market with these values, they hire people for whom the natural idiom is the most recently evolved—people with less experience show up in the workforce involved with the production of media, publications of news and information, and on the Internet.

In five years time, no matter what actually happened, the prevailing knowledge about what happened on September 11th will be as mythical and misunderstood as the murder of JFK and his brother are today. And no matter what you say about what you may have experienced on September 11, the population will have been indoctrinated through the public schools as well as the media circus with a history that bears so little resemblance to the facts that you will not recognize it as more than an Orwellian cartoon.

Much more can be said about this process of revising history, and about the specifics of how this relates to the ending of the "Cold War" and the resurgence of the defense industry, the demise of which should have been moot, and about what this means to us today and to the predictable future. Suffice it to say that "what you see is what you get."

Those who prevent information and inquiry have made few mistakes. Conspiracy is not a good word for this, because it misses the point—that the media system IS the message.

Today, we can read about the construction of the great pyramids and wonder how a civilization could promote such fantasies involving the enslavement of millions of souls. And if the world trade towers are not an analogy, the nuclear stockpile and the enormous annual expenditure for "defense" in America certainly is. Human nature has not changed so much in a mere 5000 years. Our technology has improved enormously but our society is motivated by myths no differently. The results that superstitions held as truth are producing in our civilization are vast indeed. But younger people have no frame of reference to see this. They are indoctrinated in schools and in the media in a view of the world that is frankly preposterous. As they age and if they come into contact with the world in a somewhat conscious state, anyone over 60 cannot help seeing the fabrications because they have been around long enough to see the truth and then they are amazed at the stories that are created about it. They may even see how stories are created to justify political actions. Many of them, and perhaps, most, are either resigned, or simply confused as they try to resolve the disparity between their values and myths their culture is viewing as facts. Some develop Alzheimer’s syndrome. And for the rest, the question is, what can be done about it? What can they do about it? There does not appear to be any escape. It is Orwell’s “1984�?. It is Kafka’s “Castle�?. It is Michael Fallon’s “Trumanville�?.

In the spirit of thinking globally and acting locally, breaking the link of indoctrination in public education is an honest beginning. We need to recognize that our children are being indoctrinated rather than learning to think and evaluate. We take such pride in our system of public schools and literacy. Recent studies of the results of education have compared the reading comprehension of children of dozens of nations. What was discovered is that American graduates of high school ranked among the lowest nations in the world. There are good teachers of subjects like geometry and algebra, etc., but when it comes to being able to understand whether something is Shinola or the other thing, our kids fail consistently, and the results after a few generations of this are apparent. Out nation is led by a very good imitation of the “What me worry?�? kid. And the Democratic political party’s greatest difficulty in local as well as state and national contests, seems to be finding someone who looks and sounds dumb enough to appeal to this electorate.

What it takes to produce progressive change are individual people, who are recognized and respected in their communities, standing up behind their own good names and telling the truth.

The tragedy in today's world is that rather than doing this, we have a generation that believes they can accomplish this while hiding behind Screen Names on the Internet. They miss the point. It is not just necessary to tell the truth, but to stand behind what you are saying. To put your name on your thoughts. There is no freedom without a free press and when you’re afraid to speak your mind because you may be ostracized, or be less popular, or denounced or investigated by the government, there is no freedom of speech and there is no democracy.

Michael Winn
http://delmarnews.blogspot.com