Vivat Libertas

Yep, I said it, and people aren't going to like it: learning makes you free. Now, there are a lot of objections to this, and I understand them. In our capitalist society education, like everything else, has a price. Particularly with higher education, it happens to be a very hefty price that will leave you thousands of pounds in debt. There's also the objection that formal education (for example, going to school) either does nothing or actively turns you into an obedient drone. Those three are generally the main overt objections - there is a nastier and more covert one, but I'll discuss it later. I'm going to let them pass. I'm going to accept them as true. Education up to 18, if not post-18, is mostly about "teaching" students to pass exams and be obedient, and even after having come out with a degree in something or other a lot of people are still  incredibly stupid and ignorant. Not to mention paying for that degree will enslave you to your debt. ...

Something I've noticed more and more, and something I really should have been seeing less and less of, is that even though we're supposed to have a democracy - you know, rule by the people and all that - most people are very passive. They put faith in their elected leaders and in the unelected corporations who, directly or indirectly, run much of the world, trusting that these smart people know what they're doing. Well, the financial crisis should have put paid to that notion, but some people just don't learn... ...I've noticed something else as well. Quite a lot of these people are hung up on the notion of personal responsibility, which once upon a time used to mean acting wisely and is now an excuse to blame the oppressed for their situation. Yet they're not willing to take responsibility for themselves or their society; they're not willing to stand up for themselves or for other people, because they think that it's not their place to do so. In a...

One of the worst traps to fall into is that of elitism: they  are stupid, they  are cruel, they  are unworthy, they  do not deserve freedom as much as we , the worthy ones, the Elect, do. Let them  rot in their own filth. I understand the appeal of elitism. I understand it all too well. I've told people who have pretty much openly told me that they want to remain stupid and ignorant that they can go die in a fire, that they can rot in their own filth for all I care, that they make me ashamed of humanity. I could have said and done much, much worse, but it was neither the time nor the place. For any person, there is a temptation to see it as me, my group, the good ones, the Elect, versus the evil, stupid, ignorant masses who are beyond saving. This is the point at which I sound naive, idiotic, childish, any number of things. Throw enough insults at me and some of them are bound to stick, I guess, but all the same...if you're only going to fight for a better s...

Free your mind and your ass will follow. That's something the very wonderful @nagoul1 has said before, and the more I roll the phrase over and over in my brain, the more I realise he's right. It's doubtful whether one can have a truly free and humane society when people are brainwashed and unable to think for themselves. It's almost certain that, when those same brainwashed people live in an unfree society, they will be unable to break free of it - at least, not without freeing their minds. A free or unfree mind is in many ways a dangerous thing to talk about, because there's always a risk of mistaking "disagrees with you" for "brainwashed" (no, they're not the same thing). The key to identifying an unfree mind isn't by whether they agree with you or not, it's by how dogmatic and illogical their beliefs are, and the dishonest lengths they will go to so that they don't have to give up those beliefs. A lot of people have unfre...

I pride myself on my leftism. I'm young, so I haven't been to many protests; I spent much of my life as a capitalist sheep, so I haven't spoken up much. I plan to change that. I want to march in the streets - fight, if that's what it takes. The people (or should I say sheeple?) around me seem rather disturbed by this course of action. Ostensibly they fear for my safety - really, I think they fear for my sanity and their social standing (for the record, I'm the sanest and happiest I have ever been, and I don't give a fuck about the society game). If standing up for basic human rights, if standing up for what I think is right - as should be possible, nay desirable and encouraged in a free and humane society - means that I risk anywhere between arrest and death (while people aren't dying in the UK yet, people in other countries are), I'll stick my neck out and risk arrest and death. Someone's got to do it, after all. Someone once remarked to me ...

Well, everyone seems to have differing definitions of freedom . The Tea Party think it's found in gun ownership and low taxes; the liberals think it's found in freedom of speech and communication; the cynics think it's found nowhere on earth, and the power-mad think it's found in the domination of others. Freedom isn't gun ownership. Freedom isn't being able to buy and sell things. Freedom isn't the right to enter into a contract where you slave yourself half to death. Freedom isn't low taxes. Freedom isn't having the biggest collection of nukes in the known universe. No, freedom is when you can say what you want, when you want, where you want. Freedom is where people will listen to you and actually pay some damn attention for once . Freedom is where you don't have to be scared of the authorities tracking you down for a loose tongue here or a hashtag there. Freedom is where no-one regulates your life but you. It's not an ...

I've just come back from the JACT Latin Summer School at Wells - 10 days of intensive Latin and letting my inner geek run free. To anyone as geeky as I am, I highly suggest you go: it's hard work, but fun, and you'll find people from all walks of life yet who still understand you. Of course, if you're not geeky, disregard the above...you don't know what you're missing, though. Seriously, you don't. I have piccies of the two badges I bought as well: That first one says "I am a Roman king and above grammar" - something which makes me laugh, both because of how one can ever presume to be above grammar and because I'm actually a stickler for it in real life. Meaning "I shall not altogether die", this is one of my favourite quotes. I didn't come here, though, to talk about the wonders of Latin camp...I came to post up something which I wrote while there: I haven't edited it, so it might be unpolished - I know that there's...

...or, how technology is not evil and I miss freedom. Or was that in the wrong order? This was first brought to my attention now, after many a warning from my mum, as I am largely clueless and need a lot  of prompting to get things done. She warned me not to bare myself to the internet, mixing this in with a tirade against all "new technology" - yes, even e-mail. This irked me enough to make me want to write something sensible and coherent - this is  sensible and coherent, isn't it? Ah, never mind. I'll deal with the "new technology" bit first, since that's substantially easier to tackle and besides, the second bit doesn't make much sense without it. The evil new technology which mother dearest pointed out as being a canker upon humanity was e-mail, Facebook and Twitter (posted in rough chronological order, or at least I can't be bothered to check which came first). This is my effort to point out that none  of them are, in fact, evil. First...