Let us again open with a Word on words from a brilliant scholar.
"Words are means by which Human Beings communicate and we call it a language. In order to communicate, you have to have an understanding of the words you use and that is where the problem arises.
The meanings of most of the words we use were learned in context with other words, and we assume from this that we know the meaning of the word. When you do this, and your understanding of a word is the same as its real meaning, no problem arises. However, when what you assume the meaning of a word is does NOT agree with the true meaning of the word, then misunderstanding is the result.
It is most rewarding to understand the words; by understanding, the true meaning of the word is meant. The best sources for obtaining this information are dictionaries, encyclopedias and dictionaries in OTHER languages." [Karl von Eckartshausen, Principles of Higher Knowledge, 1788
Before we go to the latest survey of the politically shifting word definitions found in U.S. dictionaries, there is news on adult literacy in America that is very directly related to this subject, and at the most fundamental levels.
The most recent U.S. adult literacy studies, conducted nationwide in 2003, have revealed that only 31% of the 19,000 college graduates tested in the survey were able to read, comprehend and extrapolate information from a complex text or book. Participation was voluntary, and as clinical psychologists know well it suggests that the respondents who agreed to take the tests would have been those people most likely to be sure that they would pass with flying colors. The figures disclose a precipitous 10% decline in this group's overall literacy levels in just the past 10 years.
On another interesting note, these new findings were not released to the public until late last December. So far, the only source where the information has appeared in the mainstream U.S. press and media was the print edition of the Christmas Day, 2005, Washington Post, on page A12, rather well buried from view and given no other coverage until very recently. We owe a debt of gratitude to the person who scanned it from the print page into a computer and posted it this month at www.dumbingdown.com or we'd still not have had these crucial facts to guide our Seeing.
The tests used included reading and then accurately following directions to perform a task correctly, understanding what is sought and then correctly providing the information that is being requested on a form, working "word problems" in basic math, and accurately reading and following a standard prescription label's instructions. This is not the stuff of rocket science and quantum physics.
Worse still, only 41% of post graduate students, a term that includes masters and doctoral degree candidates and recipients who participated, could pass these basic tests. Again one must add the "volunteer factor" to this equation. The operant premise is that the situation for all college graduates and post graduates will be even worse than the results shown in the test groups.
That at least 69% of U.S. college graduates, and 59% of post graduates cannot read well enough to accurately follow the instructions on a prescription bottle's label or correctly fill out an employment application form, is a death sentence for the next generation's intellectual and cognitive development. A full 10% drop in the tested levels of functional literacy, afflicting the intellectual creme de la creme in the U.S., and transpiring in only 10 years time is catastrophic.
If this abysmal state of semi-literacy exists among college graduates and post graduates, then just how bad is it among average Americans? Those who've completed only the standard public school educational requirements would logically be expected to fare even worse, since, as a general rule, it is those who are in the top 50% or higher in high school academic achievements who go on to attend college. If 69% of the best cannot dependably read and write with sufficient comprehension to accurately complete simple tasks, what does this say of the rest?
Last week I received a new dictionary, the 2005 edition of the New International Webster's Concise Dictionary of the English Language. Shall we See now what has become of those shifting definitions we took note of in the first critique, back in January of 2005? A link to the previous article is available by clicking on the Signs of the Times daily news page's Site Map link, then, in the Quantum Future Group's page, in the left hand column, is a link for the first article, "Word Control, Thought Control, World Control."
The test words we closely examined back then and found to be undergoing decidedly political shifts were CULT, CONSERVATIVE, TERRORIST, and TERRORISM. The dictionaries consulted also showed a progessive impoverishment in the concepts and language used for the wordings of the definitions, over the 30 years they spanned, having been published in 1975, 1984 and 1994. Here that span is updated by another decade. This theft of words and concepts, systematically stolen from the American people over the past several decades, is in fact related to why so many just do not and cannot "get it."
The dictionaries consulted for this study are intended for quick reference use by the most educated of Americans. All four have a general literacy rating of 14 years plus. These are not dictionaries aimed at grammar and high school students or marketed to less educated readers on supermarket and Wal-Mart shelves, most of which have ratings of 9 to 12 years. All four of the dictionaries used for these articles were marketed to and sold through various university and college bookstores across the country in addition to other book retailers.
The dictionary examinations certainly indicate that the dismal state of semi-literacy among U.S. graduates has been achieved by the processes, and with the specific consequences and goals, that were well explained and illuminated by George Orwell, both in his prophetic book 1984 and in his lectures, essays and other Works. When the overwhelming proof of massive reductions to functional literacy and numeracy in the vast majority of Americans is considered in conjunction with observable changes in the definitions of politically loaded words provided by a series of dictionaries compiled and published in the U.S. over the course of the past 40 years, the Big Picture gets much clearer, and quite terrible to See.
One of the words we most carefully examined before was CULT. It is necessary to again stress the severity of the U.S public's verbal, thus conceptual and intellectual impoverishment. There is no failing to spot the fact of iti when one compares the definitions provided for the word CULT in the oldest dictionary, 1975, with those now found in the newest. It is a stunning change, beyond description except by making direct comparison. (Those who would like to review the intermediate definitions and the internet one will find them in the first article.)
This time it is imperative to emphasize the damages done by the alterations found in this particular word's new definitions. The direction of the shift clearly suits Pathocratic political purposes, and the changes are a matter of concern to all who Seek Truth.
Between 1975 and 2005, the alteration of the definitions given for the word CULT, and of the very words used to define it, is staggering. Note the stark differences in difficulty, quantity and richness of conceptual and informational content; note the reduced numbers of syllables. Major changes have now been achieved, and the word CULT does not mean what it did before, not in America at least, not any more.
The Random House College Dictionary, 1975:
cult: n. 1. A particular system of religious worship, esp. with reference to its rites and ceremonies. 2. An instance of great veneration of a person, ideal, or thing, esp. as manifested by a body of admirers; a cult of Napoleon. 3. The object of such devotion. 4. A group or sect bound together by devotion to or veneration of the same thing, person, ideal, etc. 5. Sociology. A group having a sacred ideology and a set of rites centering around their sacred symbols. 6. A religion that is considered to be false or unorthodox, or its members.
The New International Webster's Concise Dictionary of the English Language, 2005.
cult: n. 1. a system of religious observances. 2. extravagant devotion to a person, cause or thing. 3. the object of such devotion. 4. a group of persons having an excessive interest in something.
Regarding that last, italicized for emphasis, brand new and wide open "definition," note that it does not define any recognizable structural, social, or other characteristics whatsoever that are in fact associated with the real and historical definitions of a cult. Nor do any of these new "definitions" provide any context in which to consider the merits of a group as to whether it may, or may not, be a cult. These definitions have been stripped of nearly all meaningful and definitive content. Do not neglect to note the glaring absence of the last two definitions from 1975, numbers 5 and 6. That too is significant, because one of those two residuals, 5, held the last traces of the oldest meanings of the word CULT as it was known throughout most of Human history.
Except for the first of the new definitions, which does vaguely refer to a religious component to a cult, all of these new context and content purged "definitions" could potentially be used to describe any group of devotees to any specific ideas or pursuits, especially under definition number 4. From teenagers in a garage band living for their music, to a group of scientists dedicated to investigating a particularly intriguing theoretical question, to, indeed, esotericists and Truth Seekers, no closely knit group with a shared and avid "excessive interest in something" is excludable under the new definition. There is in fact no solid, factual definition at all, which means there are no limitations imposed upon the spurious and "off the cuff" interpretations that can be made of the word CULT.
Without the last definition provided in 1975 too, it is no longer necessary for the ideas or behaviours of a group to be in any way outside of mainstream society's points of view or practices, nor for it to be in any way associated with religion for the label of "cult" to be applied. It is probable that this is why that definition vanished. Both the religious context and that of being at odds with mainstream views and practices in society were weakened but still present back in 1994, but they are now gone. Considering the advances made by the Pathocracy in exactly these last 10 years, both in the U.S. and globally, it defies logic to think there is no connection.
The definitional changes in CULT present a significant danger. The new definitions can easily be extended to bring the label of "cult," and possibly the fate of Waco's Branch Davidians, down upon the heads any group of closely associated and like minded individuals who share an avid field of interest(s). Let's remember too that new definitions appear at the bottom, but in the political shiftings noted previously they move upward over time. If this holds true, then the "excessive interest in something" definition now introduced will, in the not so far future, likely become secondary, and possibly even primary. It would be a good bet, based on the previous shifts noted, that it is headed in that direction, likely on a "fast track" to the top.
The last new definition means that so long as there are accusers, such as were the Holy Inquisitors of the Roman Catholic Church for over 400 years, or as was the Cult Awareness Network at Waco, who are vested with sufficient credibility, power and tacit or even legal sanctions from government and/or other presiding enforcement authorities, then any persons engaging in group activities focused around a central set of ideas, in which all of the group's members have and share an avid and abiding, "excessive interest in something" are, by right of these very terms, a "cult."
What "something?" "Excessive" by whose judgment? The only limits are what the accusers choose to say and what they are allowed to get away with. There are no guidelines, no logical criteria, no restraints at all in the new definition. It is wide open to every possible abuse, and all upon the whims, say so and opinions of the accusers and/or society at large.
Seekers beware, for in every real way this does include us all. It means anyone who particpates in any group at all against whom the finger of official oppression may now choose to level the accusation of being a "cult" as redefined. No exaggeration was made in saying that the changes over the past 10 years are straight from George Orwell's visions of a totalitarian hell on Earth. This change in definitions can readily become the enablement of officially sanctioned attacks upon any interest groups who are disliked by their rulers. Naturally: That is the most probable purpose in making such changes.
The evidence of this would not be so solid, and one might dismiss it as just being evidence of a "bad" new dictionary, if not for the ability to track this change taking place in very specific increments in the three earlier volumes. The changes in both political direction and concept removal are consistent, not only in one edition of one dictionary bought anew as each updated volume was released, but through four different volumes, from four different publishers, spanning four different decades. The 1975 volume actually would have been researched and compiled between 1964 and 1974, the 1984 from 1974 to 1984, and so on. Thus each dictionary displays the official Knowing on Words from the entire previous decade.
Those dependent upon these new definitions for comprehension of the word CULT will at best have an extremely vague idea of what characteristics might be found in the behvaiour and structure of a real cult. The intellectually stumbling, semi-literate and ever more over-stressed average American is left without any descriptive guidance to give the slightest protection from those who are indeed members of real cults, especially not if they may be among officially encouraged and sanctioned, politically and ponerologically expedient religious groups.
Having little to no means to learn about or develop a firm grasp of the historical and factual attributes of real cults either, the public will be even more easily persuaded that any group the authorities might label as a "cult" really must then be one. In the final analysis, this is exactly how the Pathocracy got away with the Branch Davidian massacre. The public was already too confused and too intellectually incapacitated by that time to really "get it." Bear in mind that literacy levels fell by 10% these last 10 years, meaning that the problem of the U.S. public's loss of cognitive capacity would have already been at a 59% minimum at the time of the tragic events in Waco, Texas. That some significant changes in the definitions and thus the meanings of the word CULT had already been achieved by then is not unrelated.
The redefining of words is a two edged sword of Deceit and a weapon of enormous political, social, religious and worldly power, made entirely of Words. Word control IS thought control, in the Truest sense of that term, and here we can See an example of it's direct use in the pursuit of Pathocratic world control.
Next, from the oldest to the newest, we'll examine the definitions given for CONSERVATIVE. We spotted some troubling shifts and weightings of that set of definitions before. Now we can see how it has progressed.
The Random House College Dictionary, 1975:
conservative - adj. 1. Disposed to preserve existing conditions, institutions, etc., and to resist change. 2. Cautious, moderate: a
conservative estimate. 3. Traditional in style or manner; avoiding showiness: a suit of conservative cut. 4. (cap.) Of or pertaining to the Conservative party. 5. Of or pertaining to political
conservatism. 6. Having the power or tendency to conserve; preservative. 7. Of or pertaining to Conservative Judaism or Conservative Jews. - n. 8. A person who is conservative in principles, actions, habits, etc. 9. A member of a conservative political party. 10. A preservative.
The New International Webster's Concise Dictionary of the English Language, 2005:
conservative - adj. 1. Adhering to and tending to preserve the existing order of things; opposed to change. 2. Often cap. Of, pertaining to, or characterizing a political party or philosophy that favors the preservation of the status quo and is critical of proposals for change. 3. Conserving; preservative. 4. Moderate; cautious: a conservative estimate or statement. -- n 1. A conservative person. 2. Often cap. A member of a conservative political party.
There are some notable alterations here too, although not as obvious at first glance. What is most apparent is the shifting in the orders of the definitions, and, again, the severe reduction in overall informational and verbal content. What was the secondary definition in 1975 is now down to fourth place, and, since it is conceptually ad odds with the observable characteristics and behaviours of the radically totalitarian Pathocracy calling itself "conservative", it will likely be gone by the next round of verbal deconstructions, just as two of the most essential concepts and definitions for CULT were removed after dropping to last place gradually.
Although the tertiary definition is largely unchanged, except for its much poorer descriptive content, further indication that the political shift in this word's definitions is still under way is that all mention of religious conservatism, via the example of Conservative Judaism and Jews is gone. A most germaine concept has been deleted, considering how closely tied the U.S. Pathocracy is to a "conservative" form of Christian religion and to the type of Zionist Judaism that also masquerades as conservative.
Now for the word TERRORISM, and also TERRORIST, if present. Since these words are possibly the most dominant ones in the socio-political discourses we read and hear daily, and in the geo-politcal nightmares we are witnessing as the global Pathocracy pursues its final goals, one would think that these words would logically have become much better and more clearly defined and in the last 10 years. Seeing what has actually transpired is most illuminating.
The Random House College Dictionary, 1975:
terrorist: 1. A person who uses or favors terrorizing methods. 2. {formerly} a member of a political group in Russia aiming at the demoralization of the government by terror. 3. An agent or partisan of the revolutionary tribunal during the Reign of Terror in France.
As a point of fact, by definition number one, George W. Bush's policies and actions, domestically and abroad, do indeed define him as a terrorist. Apologies for not having made note of this in the first article.
The New International Webster's Concise Dictionary of the English Language, 2005:
No entry for terrorist. per se.
It does now seem rather conclusive that the elimination of the word TERRORIST was and is deliberate. One possible motive is to allow, just as has been done with CULT, for the broadest and most vague extensions of it being used to cover the greatest numbers of people. That it is simply gone from three out of four good American dictionaries, the three newest ones, covering the years from the midpoint of the Reagan administration and onward, turns the idea of coincidence, in view of all that has since transpired and is happening this very day, into an impossibility.
So what does our New International Webster's tell us about TERRORISM?
terrorism: n The act or practice of terrorizing, esp. by violence committed for political purposes, as by a government seeking to intimidate a populace or by revolutionaries seeking to overthrow a government, compel the release of prisoners, etc. -- terrorist, n; terroristic, adj.
The continuing shift is toward defining terrorism solely or primarily in terms of acts of violence. To do so is leaving wide the door to denying that psychologcial, emotional and economic brutalization, threats and intimidation of all kinds are also forms of terrorism. Of major importance is that the word threat is gone from the latest definition altogether, and the clearest implication of the new definition's wording is that intimidation is also conducted through violent acts.
The previous article's earlier intermediate source, the Webster's New World Dictionary had not yet, as of 1984, eliminated the specific mention of threats as acts of terrorism, retained the political basis of terrorism, and still included the concept of subjugation, showing for its entry:
terrorism. 1. The act of terrorizing; use of force or threats to demoralize, intimidate or subjugate, esp. such use as a political weapon or policy. 2. The demoralization or intimidation produced in this way.
By 1994, the Webster II New Riverside University Dictionary had only the briefest definition from which the word threat had been removed and the shift of emphasis to terrorism by violence only had taken place:
terrorism n. Systematic use of violence, terror and intimidation to achieve an end.
Let's go back now to the old Random House Collegiate Dictionary of 1975 and check what that one said about TERRORISM. Since it did actually also contain a definition of TERRORIST, maybe it gives a somewhat more complete view of the companion word too.
terrorism: n 1. the use of terrorizing methods. 2. the state of fear and submission so produced. 3. a terroristic way of governing or of resisting a government.
Neither of the older sets of definitions allow as well for bending meanings, but the "wiggle room" to distort and manipulate the word and its core concepts has been progressively increased by the two newer ones. Most telling here is the elimination of the definition that includes the induced state of fear, subjugation and submission in a populace. Thus there will be no access to the fact that the daily growing fear and submission present in many Americans is the direct result of their living in and under a growing and deliberate terrorization being done to them by their own government.
The necessary definitions to inform them of their own terrorization are long and truly gone, as is, for the majority of them, the very literacy and congnition required for them to understand the definitions. Again, this beggars the idea of coincidence in light of recent history and current events.
What we have here is factual evidence that a state of ideational, intellectual and verbal impoverishment has been deliberately inflicted upon a sizable majority of the U.S. populace, depriving them of operational literacy and inflicting upon them all of those injuries such loss includes in terms of active and significant congitive, interactive and interpretive deficits. These losses have been induced in them over the course of the past 40 to 60 years, and have now been demonstrated, in part, by a 40 years long body of evidence found in the presence of specific, directionally consistent, politically consistent, and conceptually consistent changes in the definitions provided by a series of college level dictionaries published in the U.S. during that time.
Here is a "smoking gun" of induced cognitive incapacitation, and a set of politicaly expedient changes in word definitions, being inflicted upon the populace of the most heavily armed and aggressive nation on Earth. Again, it beggars all suggestions of coincidence.
As an integral, coordinated part of this process, one of the most basic of all reference sources, the dictionary, has been made into a subtle and effective weapon of Pathocratic, Orwellian mind control. Dictionaries have always been the single most trusted quick, general reference sources for information about what any word means and for the most basic description and concept of what something is or does. Many an argument over what something is, or is not, has been ended by consulting the nearest dictionary, with whatever its definitions say being accepted as valid without question. Destroying the reliability and factual accuracy of the dictionaries we've all been conditioned to consult first and most for our basic grasp of words is an appallingly Evil and terribly cunning Deceit that is almost unimaginable in its scope.
Bear in mind too that our public libraries and schools "update" the dictionaries they provide for the use of their patrons and students regularly, and the old volumes are not kept. The fact once was the case, and is still believed to be so, that the new dictionary is of course a better source of more and improved information. A logical conclusion from the research done for these two articles is that the two youngest generations of now adult Americans, those currently under 40 years of age, have never had access to the old and true definitions at all. For them there weren't any such to be learned.
Not the least of the concerns raised by these dictionary investigations is that each new dictionary has had fewer words in it than the one before, and in the same oldest to newest, most to least progression as is shown for the verbal and conceptual changes. There are more than 25,000 words less in the newest volume than in the oldest. Exactly which 25,000 words do Americans no longer have any need to know? Who decided this and why? Had the word counts been randomly lower or higher from edition to edition basically averaging out over time, fine. But again a progressive loss of words, from four equivalent volumes, having four different publishers, and spanning four decades, simply defies chance as the explanation.
My sincerest advice to those who intend to continue to Learn and Grow in Knowing, and not only Americans but all who place the highest of personal values upon the quality of the information they permit to occupy their Minds, is that they begin haunting yard sales, estate sales, rummage sales, public auctions, public library book sales and used book stores in search of the oldest and most comprehensive dictionaries they can find. Buy them, cherish them, rebind them, mend their torn pages, use them often and share their contents with those you encounter who also Seek Knowledge. This now seems an imperative task for those younger English speaking Seekers, Americans especially, who are reading the Works of modern and historical esotericists, alchemists, mystics and gnostics.
It is almost certain that the definitions learned by those who are 40 and under, the younger the more so, the basic word meanings that they have been taught, have probably been altered and at the very least partially deprived of their original meanings or twisted deceitfully away from the objective or original definitions. What has been proved True for the few words examined here is undoubtedly also True for a vast array of other words, from the simplest to the most complex, whose deepest and fullest understandings is essential to a study of crucial esoteric and scientific subjects.
This is no doubt precisely why the Glossary available at the Signs web sites has been attacked, as have the other, related, information rich web sites working hard to maintain a high degree of accuracy in their content. Accuracy is now as Politically Incorrect as it can get. Being highly accurate is now far more unaccepatable than being liberal, and possibly far more dangerous. It is a downright radical and not at all tolerable behaviour in a Pathocratic world.
In Truth the ability to do such Truth Seeking as we do here is likely to have been a part of what the entire program of "dumbing down" was and is intended to prevent and defeat. It in fact likely that this is also in progress in other countries and societies. Truth Seekers living in the rest of the developed and western nations, regardless of their languages, might do well to begin checking their own oldest and newest dictionaries to See for themselves what is happening in their own "neighbourhoods." The available data strongly point to a conclusion that the Global Pathocracy, and its hidden Bosses, want to impose the same foul "dumbing down" upon all of Humanity.
In every nation where relatively high levels of literacy among the general populace have become prevalent, it is logical to assume that they will induce the loss of functional literacy by the vast majority through all possible avenues of attack. An ignorant populace is a far more easily manipulated, deceived and controlled populace. The systematic diminishment of Americans' verbal skills and thus of their Minds is a done deal here, but it may not yet be quite so done elsewhere. Let us all hope not, fervently.
In the U.S. we See the end stage of the process. The War on Human Minds was launched in the U.S. immediately after World War II ended. To expose the entire, ugly Reality, we need to take a look the history of U.S. public education, while bearing in mind that this destruction of public education is not limited only to schools in the U.S., not at all. There are discernible indicators of its utilization throughout western society. Those living outside the U.S. would be prudent to check what has happened with literacy levels among public school and university graduates in their own countries over the past 3 to 4 decades. Finding the answer to that question may also provide a clue as to how far into Pathocracy their own "neighbourhood" may have already descended.
It is necessary to now use a bit of anecdotal evidence, but please bear with it. It illustrates the Objective Reality more prescisely than is otherwise possible.
My parents married late in life, so I didn't arrive until they were in their 40s. My father was born in 1905 and my mother in 1910. An important point here is that they were solid working class poor, throughout their lives. Thus, what educational benefits they received were precisely the minumum available to all U.S. children at that time.
My father's education ended with his completion of the eighth grade, all the education that the public schools in his area provided for free, and all that was federally mandated back then. Yet he read for pleasure on subjects ranging from philosophy, political science and horitculture to theoretical physics, to engineering manuals, science fiction, and anything to do with electricity, electronics, aviation and, toward the end of his life, space exploration. He could and did "grok" Einstein, Tesla and anything else he chose to explore, from Kant, to Marx, to Plato, Voltaire, Heinlein and Clarke. He was not all that exceptional for his generation and society. Most of the men I have met from his generation were very much like him.
My mother made it through the tenth grade, in an area where high school was free. Her hereditary visual impairment became legal blindness that year, after a serious eye infection, and it ended her formal education in 1926. Retaining sight in only one eye and able to read only with a thick magnifying glass and in very bright light for the rest of her life, still she read, and read and read. Histories of ancient Greece and Rome, Egypt, England and anywhere else on Earth, and the works of the great poets from Homer and Virgil to Shakespeare and Whittier filled our house. Again, she was not all that exceptional for a woman of her generation. I have met many of them who had those tastes and read as avidly.
I ask readers to now consider what they may have been told about pre-World War II public education by their own parents, grandparents and others, for as far back as they can go with their older family members and others. Pay especially close attention to their demonstrated levels of literacy, their abilities to think, to reason and figure out new or unusual things independently, and to the continued processes of learning throughout their lifetimes that they might have displayed. Their reading for pleasure no matter what kind of reading, their participation in hobbies, their pursuing of technical skills such as playing a musical instrument, gardening, doing carpentry and so forth all count a great deal in that fundamental characteristic of an active Mind, lifelong learning.
The next points cannot be more important to understanding the full dynamics of the American public's dreadful inability to "get it."
The standarized U.S. Department of Education adult literacy tests are possibly the only aspect of education in this country that has not been changed in the past 60 years. Until after World War II, basic literacy and numeracy were considered a done deal by the fourth grade. My mother's younger sister was certainly living proof of that. She didn't finish all of the fourth grade, but she was as wide ranging and literate a reader as anyone I've ever met. Again, I have met others from her generation who also went no further than the fourth grade and were equally literate and numerate.
THIS IS WHAT HAS BEEN DESTROYED. This is the educational quality and the capacity of Mind that has been taken away from this nation's ordinary citizens, its poor, working class, and middle class people. This nation's educational history shows that a fourth grade, bare bones, U.S. public school education provided literacy and numeracy to every child who attended school long enough to obtain it, barring those few who had developmental or learning disabilities making reading beyond their grasp.
An eighth grade education completed in 1920 was demonstrably better than what has now been proved to be true for an early 21st century college or higher education.
Reason says that only deliberate and extremely careful design and implementation could and would account for such results.
Education in the first half of the 20th century was virtually unchanged from previous formal education throughout the known history of western civilization. In the schools of ancient Greece and Rome the teaching methods and student practices that would become the foundation of all subsequent, western, formal educational systems were first established. They proved themselves most effective for many centuries, and would be used until the mid 20th century almost unchanged.
The next real change in education came throughout America, Britain and most of Europe in the 17th through early 20th centuries, when basic education for all children, as nearly as possible, became ever more broadly implemented. For the first time in history, the masses, rather than the elite only, were provided with the skills of basic literacy and numeracy, mostly in response to the demands of the technolgical and societal changes brought about by the Industrial Revolution and also facilitated by ever more efficient and numerous printing presses.
Public education in the U.S. truly "got it together" shortly after the Civil War, with the result that adult literacy and numeracy among the general populace all went up, decade after decade, nationwide, among all graduates from the fourth grade to the Ph.D., with a stable, residual incidence of incomplete literacy and numeracy among graduates of just under 10%, for the next hundred years.
Beginning in 1946 and onward, public high school, university and college courses and requirements were changed significantly, ostensibly to meet the "less traditional" educational needs of the thousands of returning WW II veterans who began taking advantage of the new GI Bill's educational benefits. It was the beginning of the elimination of the most ancient components of a higher education, those studies essential to teaching and honing the ability to systematically and logically comprehend and utilize language and numbers, words and reason, to the highest degree.
The traditionally manadatory high school and college educational requirements in the "classics," Latin, Greek, foreign languages, ancient and modern history, political science, fine art, music, literature, basic chemistry and phsyics, advanced mathematics, an entire body of previously mandatory studies, fundamental General Knowledge courses that one and all had to pass if they wanted to graduate, were pared down, or waived, or dropped entirely in short order.
In U.S. colleges, the final remnants of required liberal arts, fine arts and basic maths and sciences, those ancient Gerenal Knowledge courses, have been almost completely removed in the past 2 decades, and again, especially in the past 10 years when the technical requirements of specific careeers or trades have taken over most college course work.
The first drastic, "inexplicable" drop in the overall U.S. adult literacy levels among high school graduates and above showed up in 1975's nationwide tests. The first catastrophic drop had arrived. It came after exactly the right span of years for the testing of that first generation of graduates to have been entirely educated by teachers who had received revised, post WW II college educations, and the first generation of students to "benefit" from several "reforms" in public school methods and courses, such as the introduction of the new "Dick and Jane" types of basic reading courses and the "new math" instruction innovations of the late 1950s and early to mid 1960s.
When reports on the findings of that decade's testing were released early in 1976, they raised a public furor. After that report the purveyors of "education reform" had carte blanche, and they went into high gear. For the past 30 years, U.S. public education has been thrown into an endlessly repeating loop of "reforms" and "improvements" which have successfully delivered a remarkably reduced, steadily dropping capacity for literacy, numeracy and Thought to U.S. public school and college graduates.
But, in the elite, private, residential primary and secondary schools for the scions of the wealthiest, guess which subjects are still mandatory? Yes indeed, those old liberal arts, fine arts and basic maths and sciences must still be completed if a student wants to graduate from one of the upper crust, private preparatory schools. Some of the most exclusive even retain the requirement for either Latin or Greek to be studied.
Simple logic does indeed tell us that, had all of the "reforms" done and the "innovations" introduced to public education since the end of WW II even been entirely random, half of them would have been beneficial to the learning processes of students, and the results would have been a balancing off of losses in some areas with an equal set of gains in others. None such has happened. The results have been a steady downhill slide in the abilities to read, write, speak, utilize basic math, learn and think among graduates of the "improved" educational system.
The unavoidable conclusion is that the last 10 years are the end and intended results of a deliberate, progressive, systematic destruction of the minds of a majority of Americans over the preceding 60 years. Between creeping Pathocracy, television's mind control bombardment, subliminals galore, and the deconstruction of both educational and informational content, the average American of today had little chance. Since WW II, each generation has become less literate than the previous one, thus less able to discern let alone correct what was wrong, less able to teach adequate skills to the next generation, and so on.
Welcome to the world of New Speak and New Think. WE ARE THERE.
The simple reality looming behind surveys over the last ten years consistently showing that some 70% of all Americans get their news information from television alone may well be that reading a newspaper and really understanding what it says is beyond them now and has been for a while. That 70% figure is suspiciously close to the 69% of college graduates who are not functionally literate, isn't it? If a Pathocratic government can effectively ensure that 70% or more of its populace is intellectually incapacitated, the other 30% will be hard put to overcome the surrounding ignorance and incomprehension of the majority well enough to engender significant levels of sustained opposition.
We must never forget that an ingnorant, gullible, easily manipulable and controllable populace is the goal of Pathocratic "educational" systems. The full presence and good use of Mind is what they cannot withstand and will do everything to stop.
When their lack of access to accurate information, even in dictionaries, is laid side by side with the deliberate destruction of their literacy, their numeracy and their cognitive capacities, the American public suddenly makes sense, totally heartbreaking, terrible sense. Orwell's dystopian realm is, unfortunately, present here and now, and, for those of us born and living in the U.S, it is the place we call Home.
Knowing how much has been stolen from the majority of Americans, let us, in their behalf, be sure to list the destruction of their precious, sacred Human Minds among the greatest and cruelest of the Pathocracy's countless crimes against Humanity when we Name the final tally of all those Crimes and demand a full reckoning.
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