Pedagogy of the Oppressed (I)

There is so much to say about Paulo Freire masterwork Pedagogy of the Oppressed. It's direct, it's unrepentant in its criticisms, and it's eloquent in its message. It captures the essence of the oppressor-oppressed relationship, attempting to circumscribe such an abstract struggle onto paper -- and Freire manages to do so, quite well. The main dilemma when writing a book of this nature is that the woes of the oppressed must be properly synthesized into one concrete message in order to be discussed in any real detail. The biggest issue is that the struggle, in itself, is both metaphysical and material. It requires a look at the cognitive ramifications of being oppressed, as well as the causes of them; all in an effort to analyze the strife from a truly introspective perspective, one that virtually enters the minds of those under oppression. It is because Freire's magnum opus is able to successfully incorporate these concepts, it is able to transcend far beyond from being just a mere analytic Marxian study -- it becomes a riveting testament to those involved in the actual struggle, rather than being just a vague documentation of what their ills are. This makes it all the more powerful and enlightening. However, because it is so vast in its message, I'll contain my comparatively brief analysis to the first chapter only.

Paulo Freire, throughout the entire work, makes an effort to textually encapsulate the meaning of "humanization" and he revolves much of his analysis on "re-humanizing" the human spirit.

"But while both humanization and dehumanization are real alternatives, only the first is the people's vocation... It is thwarted by injustice, exploitation, oppressed, and the violence of the oppressors; it is affirmed by the yearning of the oppressed for freedom and justice, and by their struggle to recover their lost humanity" (26). 

However, he is careful in noting who must lead this liberation. 

"In order for this struggle to have meaning, the oppressed must not, in seeking to regain their humanity (which is a way to create it), become in turn oppressors of the oppressors, but rather restorers of the humanity of both. This, then, is the great humanistic and historical task of the oppressed: to liberate themselves and their oppressors, who oppress, exploit, and rape by virtue of their power, cannot find in this power the strength to liberate either the oppressed or themselves. Only power that springs from the weakness of the oppressed will be sufficiently strong to free both" (27).

With this, Freire makes a monumental point that has been historically validated time and time again. The greatest issue with any revolutionary struggle is dealing with the vacuum of power, which plagued the leftist vanguard experiments of the 20th century. The key point being: power cannot concentrate and cannot be exerted to form a new "ruling class" of privilege and wealth -- that would be the antithesis of any liberating movement, and would be a perversion of the humanization that was hoped to be achieved.

However, an issue arises (out of many) when attempting to foster such a radical change. The oppressed must realize the necessity to fight for it. The spark must be lit, but that must correspond with the oppressed realizing their downtrodden status. They must be lifted from their anesthetized state, by their own volition, and must be free of "their submersion in the reality of oppression" (27). Oftentimes, the downtrodden simply strive to become part of the higher class, in an effort to alleviate their poor condition, since they have been convinced it is the only way to move upward. They become fearful of greater repression to take action.

"... [the oppressed] have no consciousness of the themselves as persons, or as members of an oppressed class. It is not to become free that they want agrarian reform, but in order to acquire land and this become landowners -- or, more precisely, bosses over other workers. It is a rare peasant who, once "promoted" to overseer, does not become more of a tyrant towards his former comrades than the owner himself. This is because the context of the peasant's sitatuion, that is, opression, remains unchanged. In this example, the overseer, in order to make sure of his job, must be as tough as the owner -- and more so... during the initial stage of their struggle the oppressed find in the opressor their model of 'manhood'" (28). 

The oppressed must overcome this personal struggle before he strives for anything, that much is crucial. He must learn to accept freedom, and to cherish it, rather than take the position of his former boss or owner. He must not be fearful of real change. 

"This fear of freedom is also to be found in the oppressors, though, obviously, in a different form. The oppressed are afraid to embrace freedom; the oppressors are afraid of losing the 'freedom' to oppress" (28). 

"...the oppressed, having internatlized the image of the oppressor and adopted his guidelines, are fearful of freedom. Freedom would require them to eject this image and replace it when autonomy and responsibility... Freedom is not an ideal located outside of man; nor is it an idea which becomes myth. It is rather the indispensable condition for the quest for human completion" (29).

"...at a certain point in their existential experience the oppressed feel an irresistible attraction towards the oppressors and their way of life. Sharing this way of life becomes an overpowering aspiration. In their alienation, the oppressed want at any cost to resemble the oppressors, to imitate them, to follow them. This phenomenon is especially prevalent in the middle-class..." (44). 

Bearing this in mind, it becomes apparent that, first and foremost, reflection is essential to action. The goal is not to simply engage in dialogue with the masses, but to transform them in an effort to have them fight for their own liberation. It is this crucial step that will ultimately end their alienation. The difficulty, then, is how to go about doing so in a fashion that differentiates itself from the elusive efforts of the "humanitarian" oppressors.

"Pedagogy which begins with the egoistic interests of the oppressors (an egoism cloaked in the false generosity of paternalism) and makes of the oppressed the objects of its humanitarianism, itself maintains and embodies oppression. It is an instrument of dehumanization. That is why... the pedagogy of the oppressed cannot be developed or practiced by the oppressors. It would be a contradiction in terms if the oppressors not only defended but actually implemented a liberating education" (36). 

Simply put, by making the oppressed the objects of humanitarianism, you are in effect dehumanizing them -- you are leaving them in the same situation with produced them and fooling them with false gestures of generosity, which do little to fundamentally alleviate the ills they have grown accustomed to and inherited.

In order to fully articulate this message, you first have to clean up the semantics of certain terms to be able to even speak properly and understood in any reasonable context. The most important term that must be attended to is the definition of oppression. Oftentimes, the term is thrown around to describe the nature of egalitarianism; that equality is also oppression, since hierarchy is prevented through "force." Paulo Freire actually addresses this misguided criticism: 

"Resolution of the oppressor-oppressed contradiction indeed implies the disappearance of the oppressors as the dominant class. However, the restrains imposed by the former oppressed on their oppressors, so that the latter cannot reassume their former position, do not constitute oppression. An act is oppressive only when it prevents people from being more fully human. Accordingly, these necessary restraints do not in themselves signify that yesterday's oppressed have become today's oppressors. Acts which prevent the restoration of the oppressive regime cannot be compared with those which create and maintain it, cannot be compared with those by which a few men and women deny the majority their right to be human" (38).

Freire then goes on to describe the oppressors, and defining the class associated with that term. The quote itself is too long to post here (it surpasses a page of very concise text, and is elaborated on later in his the work), but there are a few stand-alone points that are worth reiterating. 

"For [the oppressors], to be is to have and to be the class of the 'have'" (40).  

"The oppressor consciousness tends to transform everything surrounding it into an object of its domination. The earth, property, production, the creations of people, people themselves, time -- everything is reduced to the status of objects at its disposal" (40). 

He then delves into the destructive self-depreciating impact this has on the oppressed:

"If [the oppressed] do not have more, it is because they are incompetent and lazy, and worst of all is their unjustifiable ingratitude towards the "generous gestures" of the dominant class. Precisely because they are 'ungrateful' and 'envious,' the oppressed are regarded as potential enemies who must be watched" (41). 

This is perhaps the root of Marxian alienation; it is this mentality that limits the human spirit and degrades the mind. The oppressed become convinced of their own unfitness. 

Paulo Freire ends this dense chapter on the proper method of liberating the oppressed. He differentiates two different transformations: those that are for the oppressed and those that are with them -- the latter being the valid one, which demands more than mere propaganda and simple populism. The struggle cannot be done for them, rather it must be done with them. It requires pedagogical action.

"They must realize that they are fighting not merely for freedom from hunger [or any other individually specific issue], but for the freedom to create and to construct, to wonder and to venture" (50).  

And perhaps most importantly: 

The oppressed have been destroyed precisely because their situation has reduced them to things. In order to regain their humanity they must cease to be things and fight as men and women. This is a radical requirement. The cannot enter the struggle as objects in order later to become human beings" (50).   

Therefore, with these requirements in mind, it becomes apparent that the struggle demands committed involvement and an elimination of the cultural hegemony that preceded it. This must be done through a radical pedagogy, one that is lead by the oppressed. That is the synopsis of the message in Pedagogy of the Oppressed -- that liberation, the humanization of human aspirations, can only come from the commoners themselves. 

Webster's Defense of Liberty

The War of 1812 was a brutal conflict between the infantile United States and the British Empire, and the culmination of years of unsettled dues from the Revolutionary War. The first real test of power since its independence, aside from the Barnaby Wars, the United States was faced with a dilemma; they lacked the proper ground troops to deal with such an impending crisis from the British Crown. Scrambling for solutions, then-president James Madison sought advice from his Secretary of State James Monroe who then pitched in his two cents -- instate a national draft of 40,000 men. It was this proposal that Senator Daniel Webster fiercely criticized on the House floor in his December address during the winter of 1815. His words are perhaps one of the most eloquent defenses I have read against conscription, against tyranny, and for liberty. Here's some food for thought:

"...Is this, Sir, consistent with the character of a free Government? Is this civil liberty? Is this the real character of our Constitution? No Sir, indeed it is not. The Constitution is libelled, foully libelled. The people of this country have not established for themselves such a fabric of despotism. They have not purchased at a vast expense of their own treasure and their own blood a Magna Carta to be slaves. Where is it written in the Constitution, in what article or section is it contained, that you may take children from their parents, & parents from their children, & compel them to fight the battles of any war, in which the folly or the wickedness of Government may engage it? Under what concealment has this power lain hidden, which now for the first time comes forth, with a tremendous & baleful aspect, to trample down & destroy the dearest rights of personal liberty? Who will show me any constitutional injunction, which makes it the duty of the American people to surrender everything valuable in life, & even life itself, not when the safety of their country & its liberties may demand the sacrifice, but whenever the purposes of an ambitious & mischievous Government may require it? Sir, I almost disdain to go to quotations & references to prove that such an abominable doctrine has no foundation in the Constitution of the country. It is enough to know that that instrument was intended as the basis of a free Government, & that the power contended for is incompatible with any notion of personal liberty. An attempt to maintain this doctrine upon the provisions of the Constitution is an exercise of perverse ingenuity to extract slavery from the substance of a free Government. It is an attempt to show, by proof & argument, that we ourselves are subjects of despotism, & that we have a right to chains & bondage, firmly secured to us & our children, by the provisions of our Government. It has been the labor of other men, at other times, to mitigate & reform the powers of Government by construction; to support the rights of personal security by every species of favorable & benign interpretation, & thus to infuse a free spirit into Governments, not friendly in their general structure & formation to public liberty."

He goes on to articulate the gruesome effects of the war on families and lives:

"...Sir, I invite the supporters of the measures before you to look to their actual operation. Let the men who have so often pledged their own fortunes & their own lives to the support of this war, look to the wanton sacrifice which they are about to make of their lives & fortunes. They may talk as they will about substitutes, & compensations, & exemptions. It must come to the draft at last. If the Government cannot hire men voluntarily to fight its battles, neither can individuals. If the war should continue, there will be no escape, & every man's fate, & every man's life will come to depend on the issue of the military draught. Who shall describe to you the horror which your orders of Conscription shall create in the once happy villages of this country? Who shall describe the distress & anguish which they will spread over those hills & valleys, where men have heretofore been accustomed to labor, & to rest in security & happiness. Anticipate the scene, Sir, when the class shall assemble to stand its draft, & to throw the dice for blood. What a group of wives & mothers, & sisters, of helpless age & helpless infancy, shall gather round the theatre of this horrible lottery, as if the stroke of death were to fall from heaven before their eyes, on a father, a brother, a son or an husband. And in a majority of cases, Sir, it will be the stroke of death. Under present prospects of the continuance of the war, not one half of them on whom your conscription shall fall will ever return to tell the tale of their sufferings. They will perish of disease & pestilence, or they will leave their bones to whiten in fields beyond the frontier. Does the lot fall on the father of a family? His children, already orphans, shall see his face no more. When they behold him for the last time, they shall see him lashed & fettered, & dragged away from his own threshold, like a felon & an outlaw. Does it fall on a son, the hope & the staff of aged parents. That hope shall fail them. On that staff they shall lean no longer. They shall not enjoy the happiness of dying before their children. They shall totter to their grave, bereft of their offspring, & unwept by any who inherit their blood. Does it fall on a husband? The eyes which watch his parting steps may swim in tears forever. She is a wife no longer. There is no relation so tender or so sacred, that, by these accursed measures, you do not propose to violate it. There is no happiness so perfect, that you do not propose to destroy it. Into the paradise of domestic life you enter, not indeed by temptations & sorceries, but by open force & violence."

Powerfully speaking, he once again affirms the principles of a free society:

"...In my opinion, Sir, the sentiments of the free population of this country are greatly mistaken here. The nation is not yet in a temper to submit to conscription. The people have too fresh & strong a feeling of the blessings of civil liberty to be willing thus to surrender it. You may talk to them as much as you please, of the victory & glory to be obtained in the Enemy's Provinces; they will hold those objects in light estimation, if the means be a forced military service. You may sing to them the song of Canada Conquests in all its variety, but they will not be charmed out of the remembrance of their substantial interests, & true happiness. Similar pretences, they know, are the graves in which the liberties of other nations have been buried, & they will take warning. Laws, Sir, of this nature can create nothing but opposition. If you scatter them abroad, like the fabled serpents' teeth, they will spring up into armed men. A military force cannot be raised, in this manner, but by the means of a military force. If the administration has found that it cannot form an army without conscription, it will find, if it ventures on these experiments, that it can not enforce conscription without an army. The Government was not constituted for such purposes. Framed in the spirit of liberty, & in the love of peace, it has no powers which render it able to enforce such laws. The attempt, if we rashly make it, will fail; & having already thrown away our peace, we may thereby throw away our Government."

Part of the Great Triumvirate of the Senate, Daniel Webster could not have used his talent of speaking more masterfully -- his speech is still very much relevant. Hopefully I am not being too chauvinistic, but let me say this; even in today's technocratic society, even in today's late industrial age, the principles Webster espouses is still very much alive, or at least something we should still hold dear. 

The Necessity of Anger

Perhaps in an effort to provoke, I'll just say it; anger is a necessity. 

It seems as though the modern individual has forgotten the value of well-placed anger, of well-intentioned rage, and has instead replaced it with this 'softened' variety of false struggle -- one that lacks the vigor to fundamentally change anything. This is a primary concern and a major impediment to mobilization. It is this dilemma that cripples the common man's mind, forcing him to adopt deceptive reformist positions and play the elusive game of politics. This seemingly divides many of us to the point of abandoning personal convictions, limiting us to an inhumane extent, and ultimately renders us useless rather than a catalyst for change. 

The supposed cause, from my understanding? Bourgeois liberalism and the decaying of the left. Seldom ever do you witness any real economic criticism from today's left, rather you see some trivial reformist position and a pandering to identity politics. That is really all it has come down to: petty unsubstantial reformism. And consequently, there has also been some 'softening' in the left's once-held convictions -- they've relinquished them and trampled on them. The modern left must be reinvented and revived if it wants to hope to even establish itself to the status it once held. Even worse so, they've also become inexcusably weak in their criticism (when they do criticize something substantive). When did we start espousing this implied platform that everyone is 'free from offense' and 'nobody can be offended?' The supposed 'socialist' parties of Europe are notorious for this in their willingness to relinquish basic Enlightenment principles (i.e free speech, secularism & other civil liberties) to comfort smaller groups, especially the religious. It is sad that these parties, carrying the title of 'socialists,' are our only alternative to the right. This kind of liberalism is truly dangerous, because it has shown that it is willing to forgo our own freedoms all in the name of "improving public relations." Christopher Hitchens tackles this in one of his TV interviews much more eloquently than I have, in response to the Muhammad Cartoon Controversy of 2005; you can see that here.

Ever since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the left has been in shambles. Rather then use their former criticisms, which are still valid, and reinvent themselves, many have adopted the positions of 'liberalism' and 'humanitarianism,' instead of tackling the issue of poverty itself. They've adopted the position of 'stop climate change' instead of questioning the destructive environmental effects the accumulation of capital brings. They've adopted the position against racism, which is very important, but they have been completely ignoring its linkage to class and socio-economic status. Why is it now that the primary concern of any 'leftist' is legalizing marijuana, or global warming, or some other reformist position that fails to tackle the crux of the issue? I just don't understand. 

Another point, that was actually first mentioned by philosopher Slavoj Zizek, is this; the demographic of leftist politics is changing. The Tea Party has begun to resemble something like the workers' rallies of the 1960s, with the same enthusiasm and conviction. This is disheartening as it is tragic. The right has managed to shift the layman's blame onto 'big government' rather than 'big business' and all the liberal left has done is make concessions, especially in the United States. The worst aspect, however, is that these people are voting against their interests. They have been convinced that such nicely-packaged 'change' will heighten their economic condition, when in retrospect this 'change' includes disproportional benefits to the wealthy. They are supporting the plutocracy, and status quo, and they've grown too numb to realize it. Their concerns are misguided, and their reasoning is skewed, and to mend their hearts and minds into the direction it once was is a task that the left has to wrangle with if it wants any real change; but seeing the slump they are in now, I fear the future is rather dim. Perhaps a threat to western privilege is what is necessary to wake the people from their apathy or misdirection, but until that opportune moment arises I remain an involved pessimist.

Now that I've laid down some of the criticisms, perhaps it is more obvious why there could be no better time to be angry. Be angry at politics, be angry at the inequitable system, and be angry at the dehumanizing culture, will you! Sensible rage is perhaps what we need to rekindle that emotional connection to struggle that has recently been absent. However, the most crucial step is translating all this agitation into real subversive action, and that is what the modern left must capitalize on -- as Stéphane Hessel writes in his small affront manifesto, this is indeed a "Time for Outrage!"