September 17, 2013

The Mind-Changing Dialectic Process

Reinventing the World Part 2: The Mind-Changing Process 
by Berit Kjos  

The challenge to humanity is to adopt new ways of thinking, new ways of acting, new ways of organizing itself in society, in short, new ways of living."[2] Our Creative Diversity, UNESCO.
 
“'How do we get a critical mass of people doing things differently? Through the sharing of generative ideas, ideas that can change how people think and act....What we as a planet need in order to transform how our large systems work is a network of people spreading ideas of interdependency and sustainability."[3] Peter Senge. 

"...absolute behavior control is imminent.... The critical point of behavior control, in effect, is sneaking up on mankind without his self-conscious realization that a crisis is at hand. Man will... never self-consciously know that it has happened."[4] Raymond Houghton, To Nurture Humaneness, ASCD (curriculum arm of the NEA), 1970.

The world’s path to success is changing fast. In the new 21st-century institution – be it a school, church, corporation or government -- hard work and dedication won't suffice. Getting ahead in the global community will mean compromise, conformity, group thinking and submission to the ground rules of the consensus process. 

It makes sense. Global visionaries and managers know well that their battle for social solidarity must be won by consensus, not by force. Mikhail Gorbachev, still an unrepentant Communist, showed his commitment to this transforming process in a 1993 editorial. He wrote,
"President Clinton will be a success if he manages to use American influence to accomplish this transformation of international responsibility and increase significantly the role of the United Nations.… Bill Clinton will be a great president… if he can make America the creator of a new world order based on consensus.”[5]

The power of DIALOGUE

This century-old plan [6] for “socializing” the masses gathered momentum when Julian Huxley, brother of Aldous, was chosen to head Unesco. Two years later, he wrote a book titled, "UNESCO: Its purpose and Its Philosophy." This 1947 blueprint for change called for a universal implementation of Georg Hegel’s dialectic process:

"The task before UNESCO... is to help the emergence of a single world culture with its own philosophy and background of ideas and with its own broad purpose. This is opportune, since this is the first time in history that the scaffolding and the mechanisms for world unification have become available.... And it is necessary, for at the moment, two opposing philosophies of life confront each other from the West and from the East.... 

"You may categorize the two philosophies as two super-nationalisms, or as individualism versus collectivism; or as the American versus the Russian way of life, or as capitalism versus communism, or as Christianity versus Marxism. Can these opposites be reconciled, this antithesis be resolved in a higher synthesis? I believe not only that this can happen, but that, through the inexorable dialectic of evolution, it must happen....

"In pursuing this aim, we must eschew dogma - whether it be theological dogma or Marxist dogma.... East and West will not agree on a basis of the future if they merely hurl at each other the fixed ideas of the past. For that is what dogma's are -- the crystallizations of some dominant system of thought of a particular epoch. A dogma may of course crystallize tried and valid experience; but if it be dogma, it does so in a way which is rigid, uncompromising and intolerant.... If we are to achieve progress, we must learn to un-crystallize our dogmas."[7]

Today, the Hegelian Dialectic has become the cornerstone not only of the global education system, but of "Quality" management in all kinds of governmental, corporate and private organization around the world. Meanwhile, the training programs, assessment technology and data tracking systems that complement and monitor this psycho-social process are growing increasingly sophisticated and intrusive.

As Julian Huxley declared more than half a century ago, dogma and absolute truth are out. And today’s postmodern America shows the effects of that revolutionary ideology. So it should not surprise us that a fifth-grade teacher in the Seattle area would use intimidation to twist a student's absolute truth into a personal opinion. 

She had told her class to complete the sentence, "If I could wish for three things, I would wish for..." A Christian student, Matt Piecora, wrote "infinitely more wishes, to meet God, and for all my friends to be Christians."[8]
Since each student's wishes would be posted on a wall for "open house," they had to be just right. Matt's didn't pass. The teacher told him that his last wish could hurt people who didn't share his beliefs. Matt didn't want to hurt anyone, so he agreed to add "if they want to be."

He had to complete another sentence which began, "If I could meet anyone, I would like to meet..." Matt wrote: "God because he is the one who made us!" The teacher told him to add "in my opinion."

When Matt's parents visited the school, they noticed the corrections. "Why did you add this?" his mother asked.
"The teacher didn't want me to hurt other people's feelings."

"But these are just your wishes...."
"I thought so." Matt looked confused. Later, the teacher explained to Matt's parents that she wanted "diversity" in her class and was looking out for her other students. But why couldn't Matt share his views?
"I try to instill God's truths in my son," said Matt's father, "but it seems like the school wants to remove them."
He is right. Both absolute truth and contrary facts clash with the mind-set needed for the global management systems. The planned oneness demands "new thinking, new strategies, new behavior, and new beliefs"[9] that turn God's Word and values upside-down. Facilitated group discussion is key to the transformation, and UNESCO's plan for "lifelong learning" calls for universal participation. Young and old everywhere must be trained to think and work collectively. 

Professor Benjamin Bloom, called the "Father of Outcome-based Education," summarized it well:
"The purpose of education and the schools is to change the thoughts, feelings and actions of students." [10]  "....a large part of what we  call 'good teaching' is the teacher's ability to attain affective objectives through challenging the students' fixed beliefs and getting them to discuss issues." [11]
Since Matt's last comment exposed his "fixed beliefs," the teacher challenged it. Absolute truths such as "God made us" can't be modified or synthesized to please the group. Those who take a firm position on truth or facts will resist compromise and offend the group. 

This mind-changing (Hegelian dialectic) process required students in Communist nations to "confess" their thoughts and feelings in their respective groups. Trained facilitator-teachers would then guide the group dialogue toward a pre-planned consensus. The original thesis and antithesis -- opposing views such as Christianity versus Marxism -- would be merged or synthesized into ever-evolving higher "truths."  

Huxley believed the same process, "the thesis, antithesis and synthesis of Hegelian philosophy," would mold global citizens committed to the oneness of all. Through "the Marxist 'reconciliation of opposites,'" conflicts would cease and a new manageable world would rise from the ashes of the old.[12] 

This revolutionary program was officially incorporated into American education in 1985, when President Reagan and Soviet President Gorbachev signed the U.S.-USSR Education Exchange Agreement. It put American technology into the hands of Communist strategists and sanctioned our use of their psycho-social strategies, including the mass media. As Julian Huxley suggested back in 1947, "the techniques of persuasion and information and true propaganda" must be "deliberately" used "as Lenin envisaged - to 'overcome the resistance of millions' to desirable change."[13] 

Today, a more sophisticated version of this brainwashing process drives the social transformation. Governments, schools, businesses and service organizations -- even churches -- are using it to mold compliant citizens and group thinkers. It usually serves their purpose, for it helps root out individualism and the "intolerant" attitudes that could bring conflict and division. When bonded to the group and trained in the new relational rules, few dare offend the majority by take a contrary stand
 
"We have moved into a new era," said Dr. Shirley McCune, keynote speaker at the 1989 Governor's Conference on Education.  "What we are facing is total restructuring of society.... We no longer are teaching facts to children."[14] The former Senior Director of the Mid-Continent Regional Educational Laboratory knew well that "facts," like “fixed beliefs," anchor the mind in certain absolutes which block the dialectic process. 

Propaganda, institutional pressures and financial incentives pull parents and other adults into the process as well. The masses must learn to feel that traditional values are an intolerable threat to peace, and Christians must be willing to trade their God-given absolutes for Huxley's view of evolving truths and collective thinking.
But God says, “do not be conformed to this world.” Therefore, we make it our aim to “obey God rather than men.” Though the world demands consensus, we take our stand on the unchanging, eternal Word of God. [Romans 12:2; Acts 5:29]


1. William Glasser: The Quality School (HarperCollins, Nov 16, 2010), p.90.
2. Our Creative Diversity, UNESCO, p. 11.
4. Raymond Houghton, To Nurture Humaneness, ASCD (curriculum arm of the NEA), 1970.
5.Mikhail Gorbachev, “New World Order: Consensus,” The Cape Cod Times, January 28, 1993.  
6. See “Chronology of Events events leading to UNESCO's global education program: http://www.crossroad.to/Books/BraveNewSchools/Chronology.htm
7. Julian Huxley, UNESCO: Its purpose and Its Philosophy (Washington DC: Public Affairs Press, 1947), page 61.
8. From a taped interview with Matt's mother, who provided a copy of the assignment with the corrected sentences. See also The UN Plan for Your Mental Health.
9. Lee Droegemueller, Commissioner of Education, "Assessment! Kansas Quality Performance Accreditation (QPA), Kansas State Board of Education, Topeka, KS, January 1992.
10. Benjamin Bloom, All Our Children Learning (New York: McGraw Hill,1981); 180.
11. David Krathwohl, Benjamin Bloom and Bertram Massia, Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, The Classification of Educational Goals, Handbook II: Affective Domain (McKay Publishers, 1956), 55.
12. Julian Huxley, UNESCO: Its purpose and Its Philosophy (Washington DC: Public Affairs Press, 1947), page 11.
13. Ibid., page 60.
14. Shirley Mc Cune, speaking at the 1989 Governors' Conference on Education. Transcribed from conference video. Since Dr. McCune is a Theosophist, you may want to read about her occult beliefs and values in Star Wars Joins United Religions at the Presidio

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