Enculturation

Enculturation

The other day I was talking

to a young woman, bright eyed

and intelligent as she explained to me that

when she sold something

on Craigslist, she made sure

to arrange to meet potential

buyers in a public place in order

to guard against serial killers.

She didn't realize, of course,

that the country

is as safe from violent crime

as it was forty years ago

when people didn't lock their

doors at night and that her chances

of being shot by a cop were

much, much higher than being killed

by a serial killer.

Not long afterwords, I was having

a conversation about climate change

with a man in his fifties, intelligent,

full of experience and informed, as he mouthed

the corporate media's misinformation explaining

to me that even though climate change

might be real, it couldn't possibly

have been brought about by the

actions of Man not realizing that the link

between global carbon-dioxide levels

and the behavior of mankind since

the beginning of the industrial

revolution are a certain as the fact

that the ice-caps are melting.

A few days later, I was talking to another

man in his forties, liberal, and well informed

who mouthed the media's liturgy in some detail

about how America has to guard

against more terrorists attacks

not thinking about the fact that

American soil hasn't seen a terrorist

attack in almost thirteen years.

As you leave the fog

that is the mass-media enculturation

of American society,

You begin to see how pervasive

and often misleading the institutions

of our culture have become.

The more you become aware of

the actual state of the world, three things

become resoundingly apparent---

First, virtually all of our mass-media

marches in lockstep with the desires

and goals of American

corporations, military and government.

They want you scared, obedient, and feeling

as though you're dependent on them.

Second, our culture has trained millions

upon millions of people to be afraid

of everything from the cause

of their own daily aches and pains,

to the beliefs and goals of people

in other countries, to the motivations

and personalities of their own

next door neighbors.

And finally, you become

more and more conscious

of how unimpaired by fear your

journey through life can be.

After awhile, you discover you don't even

need to be afraid of the institutions,

that are trying to control us,

because when you lie as much as

they do to as many people as they do,

you become increasingly incapable

of recognizing what's real

and acting in your own best interests

until the day the truth walks up to you

and smacks you upside the head,

which explains our ruling classes

inept responses so far

to global warming, doesn't it...

Dewey Dirks