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The left’s educational challenge
Somewhere along the way in my chosen career path of education, I learned of the old, but compelling cliché that if participants or students ‘aren’t learning’, it must not be considered the fault of the participants/students, but rather a challenge or failure in the approach of the educator. It is altogether too tempting to place blame on the ‘student’ in the context of learning. In fact, while working as a teaching assistant at an amazing culturally-focused, non-religious and autonomous First Nations school at one time, I listened with horror while one older, white teacher avowed that his ‘problematic students’ – first nations kids aged 8-11, simply ‘couldn’t learn’. While that avowal had clearly racist overtones, the tempting assumption that it is not, in fact the fault of the educator when students ‘aren’t learning’ or perhaps aren’t engaging in learning contexts belies the truth that all of education consists in the invitation to participants to become interested and engaged in the material on offer.
Rather than elaborate on this point in the context of formal education – which I could do, as I’ve worked in both schools and universities before as an educator, I’d like to suggest that left social and political movements face a serious educational challenge today.
I say this because I believe that building social and political movements that represent what I think of as the values of the left – ecological sustainability, human rights, the criticism of war, inequality and disproportionate power and influence for the wealthy and corporations in our political systems – is essentially an educational task. Those of us who take it upon ourselves in a variety of ways to speak for and represent these values face an educational challenge in reaching out to the broader public to entice them to become interested, to become aware, and to both care and have the confidence that they too can make a difference toward changing the world for the better.
There’s a necessary process of empathy built in to the task confronting the educator, along with the equally necessary care for the issues and people in an educational context. Through taking the position and the perspective of the broader public into account seriously, we can begin to think of our role in left social and political movements differently, if we accept the principle that we essentially act as public educators attempting to cultivate a more critical citizenry with respect to a whole host of topics. Accepting the nature of this role of the left in political and social life means also taking seriously the communicative power of the acts we undertake that are intended to represent left values.
This type of mindset puts a different spin, if you will, on thinking about how to invite the public to care for what the left speaks for in a variety of ways. As individuals or groups we can ask ourselves a whole host of questions regarding the intended perception and purpose of the type of acts we undertake to spread messages, and invite interest toward social change. What type of perception might we expect from engaging in a particular action or intervention? How are we attempting to engage the public on a certain issue or set of issues? What arenas of social and political life are we stepping into in the attempt to start and continue conversations on various topics?
I see this educational work as the hardest work facing the left today. While spectacles and stunts designed with the express purpose of garnering short-term media attention are a popular tactic for many on the left, they can’t promise the type of longer-term, movement-building rewards of left public education that carefully considers who it is trying to talk to, and why.
For this reason, among others, I remain mistrustful of the tilt toward the type of violent spectacle that many are attracted to who label themselves left, which inevitably involves confronting the police as the personification of the ‘state’, which is an object of hatred and revulsion (what I’ve termed ‘state-hating’). What, on the part of those who wish to undertake this type of confrontational spectacle, is this intended to achieve with respect to relating to the broader public? I tend to think that the desire for this type of spectacle ignores the educational dynamics at play. Not only have violent spectacle enthusiasts chosen to ignore the public’s reaction, but they more importantly enact a narcissistic individualism which pays attention only to the cathartic power of lashing out at the state, as a scapegoat for a sense of impotence and failure in building a culture and society that reflects left values more substantially.
In this sense, in retrospect, the educational challenge of inviting the public to think about the G20 in a different way – in a critical way – cannot be effectively met through spectacles involving getting close to police. Conceived as an invitation to the broader public to care, we can consider it a failure. How, then, can we think of different ways to meet the educational challenge of inviting the public to care more, and to act, with respect to questioning the shape of our economy, the way it’s measured, who it benefits disproportionately, its effects on the natural systems that support us, who wins, who loses?
There are many potential answers to this question and a myriad of potential approaches. Beside the necessary assumption that education must be nonviolent if it doesn’t simply wish to intimidate or inspire fear, I have faith in the many creative people, organizations, political parties and movements on the left in Canada, and globally, to meet the greatest challenges facing us today, all of which are fundamentally educational.
There is no doubt a narcissistic individualism running in many who want to smash a window at Starbucks near a G20 meeting. But total self-involvement is found in many different ways both inside and from without the Left subculture.
At virtually any activist meeting one cannot parse out an argument or position without being cut off from that the direction with ‘I am not comfortable with where you are going’ (without clarifying where that argument was going), or ‘you are being too direct; you need to be more contemporary by being more vague,’ or ‘you are too much like Chomsky - providing too much evidence.’
Without greater intellectual development (by that I mean stimulating clear debate, not more Derrida), we are stuck in this crisis of intelligence. At least here in Winnipeg, public meeting are few and far between. There are few reading groups and on the rare occasion they develop, it is for something thoroughly useless like a book by Nina Powers. We need a much more consistent effort, such as regular reading groups throughout the year, weekly public lectures or videos of lecturers from elsewhere. This does not happen in part due to the influence of the neo-pagan element in the Left which haunts various locales and literally attacks any intelligence of any kind.
We are nowhere without confronting the Paleo Post-Civilization crowd.
#1. Posted by Cornelius Froese in Winnipeg on August 18th 2010 at 6:30pm
First, I find it curious that you’re talking up education on the left and also talking up the NDP (or “left electoral movements”) in other posts on this blog in the past couple weeks. When was the last time the NDP seriously tried to engage in education or changing people’s minds, instead of drifting to the right to chase a stereotypical midde-class, middle income, white suburban soccer mom?
Part of the issue here is how we relate to the public through mass media. Obviously, trying to orient ourselves to be more palatable for corporate media consumption is a self-defeating strategy - if the corporate media likes us, chances are we’re doing something wrong.
I agree that short-term media attention isn’t what we should be focusing on, but I’ve seen more of that kind of ideology in the more liberal, passive, social democratic, what have you, section of the left than I have seen in the radical left, including the black bloc. How many times have we been to a protest where we go, stand around, listen to someone tell us what we already know, and make sure to “respect the police” and not engage in any confrontational or disruptive tactics whatsoever? Often, these are called in the hopes of getting “play” in the media in order to get politicians to listen and maybe even give us a “seat at the table”. Quite frankly, that is liberal bullshit and not how society works.
Also, I think you’re setting up a false binary between movement building and more confrontational tactics which is partially based on stereotypes of the bloc. Harsha Walie does a good job of dispelling those stereotypes here: (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oesjegD1-Vg)
Finally, you’re talk of “respect for the police” is insane. People have very different interactions with police, and often they don’t deserve respect. A middle class ehite suburbanite is going to have different experiences with the police than an inner-city young aboriginal male, than a sex worker, than a black blocer, than a peaceful protestor brutalized by police, than a community organizer pre-emptively arrested in advance of the G20. Why the insistence on respect for the police when at its core, they are there to protect the capitalist state and the institution of private property, and when they have been a racist organization from day 1?
#2. Posted by Brian Latour in Winnipeg on August 22nd 2010 at 12:13pm
Cornelius, I haven’t had the same experience with the Winnipeg left.
As for the reading group, I was in that reading group and while it wasn’t the best book out there, it did bring up a lot of contemporary issues which are of practical concern to the left - things like Bill 94, the appropriation of feminist language in support of reactionary politics and politicians and how to confront it, and various issues around feminist organizing.
I would suggest that if you want a different kind of debate on the left, start it instead of complaining about the rest of the left talking about the wrong things. It’s not like the people organizing that reading group needed to put a lot of organizational might behind the project - it was pretty much organized by three people, tops.
Finally, if primmies, anti-civers, and post-whatevers are a problem, shouldn’t the best response be to simply not waste time on them, let them do their little thing, and out-organize them so that they’re marginal and we’re not?
#3. Posted by Brian in Winnipeg on August 22nd 2010 at 12:23pm
Walia defends violence as a tactic - or attempts define violence as not, in fact violence where most of us see that it is (i.e., smashing stuff, hitting things, vandalism, etc.) - these types of acts are an excellent case in point concerning being out of touch, or perhaps wilfully ignorant, of how the broader public interprets actions that are meant, or intended, to represent left values… I fit ‘diversity of tactics’ in with this - and Walia has defended this dead concept many times. It acts as a tacit justification/legitimation tool for violent tactics, and was employed by the Toronto Community Mobilization Network - to the extent that TCMN spokespeople wouldn’t even criticize the Ottawa firebombing when asked by the media about it… I’m speaking of Lesley Wood here, a prof at York, who is on the public record in this regard - see my blog ‘the struggle for the social of Canadian social movements’, and ‘diversity of tactics’ posts I’ve done - for more information on my positions in this regard. I will continue to rail against the defense (tacit or explicit) of violent tactics because I firmly believe they are doing nothing to build a mass movement; rather, they intimidate the broader public and drive a wedge between them and the very left values most of us wish they cared for…
All of us - despite the fact that police services are not necessarily perfect in all jurisdictions (think of the problems in Saskatoon, for example, or other isolated spots), in a functioning state where the institutions are healthy and have oversight, all of us benefit from their protective services - they are a critical public service, what I think of as part of a healthy civil infrastructure. When police prevent someone from being harmed by enforcing the law, they are in fact possibly - and likely very tangibly - protecting countless others, including you or me. In this sense they act quite a bit like a working water or electricity infrastructure. As such, I do argue that a lack of respect for police services as s critical public service tends to indicate the tendency to state-hating, and there is a very real, vocal, and small segment of the left which is state-hating - I think Walia would loudly associate herself with this crowd, in fact…
I tie defenses of violent tactics and support for ‘diversity of tactics’ in with tendencies toward state-hating, which always gravitate toward objectifying the police as an object of hatred for the state… again, from an educational point of view I would suggest this does nothing to build a message and movement by attempting to take the broader public into account…
#4. Posted by Adam Davidson-Harden in Kingston on August 22nd 2010 at 2:19pm
Well unfortunately anti-civilizationists or those who follow John Zerzan have become quite dominant in parts of Left North America in certains sectors such as here in Winnipeg at the A-Zone. How can we ignore them if they stage events, come to meetings, etc and others refuse to confront what they stand for?
Following Seattle the mainstream media gave coverage to Zerzan instead of someone like Chomsky or Holly Sklar. Organizing takes resources and it you are unemployed, disabled, or low-income nearly an impossibility if you are isolated as well. This is not about complaining, it is about shedding light on those areas that others would prefer to leave dark. I am trying to start that debate right here and now because there are really are no other forums. If you go to rabble.ca, you can see that any thread of discussion ends at the point where you want to start the discussion about doing something. Recently Chomsky has written about the real threat of fascism in the current US; thus far it has only been featured, to my knowledge, only on Z-Net and The Progressive. I wish it could be featured here and on The Nation but more would have to push for that. I am sorry but the ability to change the direction of discussion have much to do with economics; class reproduces itself constantly and that includes the deep recesses of the Left or what remains of it.
#5. Posted by Cornelius Froese in Winnipeg on August 23rd 2010 at 6:42pm