Submitted by John Bravo, Feb 22, 2007 10:26

Paolo Friere taught his students to read using newspapers, primary source documents, voter registration forms etc. Why would a right-wing commentator feel the need to take a shot at someone who was enabling peasants and laborers to participate in the political processes of their country? Freedom and democracy are our goals right?

Pedagogy of the Opressed is about giving people who have been marginalized and given the general message from society (and politicians) that they dont matter the tools to participate and change society to be more just and inclusive of other people's realities. Why would a right-wing commentator have a problem with that? Could such a change interfere with the money flow of people funding the Manhattan Institute? Which think tanks get money from Exxon-Mobil, Raytheon, etc.? Do you think they want a just world or do they want endless war? What causes crime and war? I guess I'm just being a crazy Marxist for asking these questions...

Is the purpose of education to indoctrinate students to be cogs in a society that degrades them? In a society where most of us are indentured servants trying to pay the debt of our college educations and credit card bills (the cost of keeping up), where we get fee'd and surcharged to no end while the CEO of Goldman Sachs gives himself an obscene bonus, I think Friere's ideas are totally relevant. Why do we send kids to school?

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