| Editor’s NOTE: Now that the new school year is on our doorstep, I chose to focus this issue on the role of education as a tool for social transformation. With this in mind, I would encourage you to access the Forcing Change archives and download the following editions; Volume 1, Issue 9 – “Education for Indoctrination: UNESCO and Seven Complex Lessons,” and Volume 1, Issue 3 – “Educating for Global Citizenship.”
Please keep in mind that education for social change transcends the school system – it has become a culturally embedded reality, impacting media and entertainment, churches, government programs, business practices, and law. In other words, we need to be alert and wise to the changes taking place both in school settings and society as a whole. And we need to be tactful and truthful in our response to the worldview challenges. |
Assaults on Faith and Family
Parental Rights, Mandatory Training, and Re-Education
Note: This is a combination of articles by my friend, Berit Kjos. They were originally penned a few years ago. Nevertheless, the information is as important today as when first published.
“…some opponents of Humanism have accused us of wishing to overthrow the traditional Christian family. They are right. That is exactly what we intend to do.” – The British Humanist Association, 1969.1
“…if you give me any normal human being and a couple of weeks, …I can change his behavior from what it is not to whatever you want it to be…. I can turn him from a Christian into a Communist… We can control behavior.” – Psychology Professor James McConnell, 1966.2
“The child shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers…” – UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.3
“Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ.” – Colossians 2:6-8
Don’t be deceived! The twenty-year-old plus, United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), has little to do with personal rights. It has everything to do with changing values and undermining the traditional family. Since it transfers parental authority to the state, Christian children are legally free to reject safe family guidelines. The state will back their choice! As Hillary Clinton wrote back in the nineties, It Takes a Village!
This process started long ago. Its milestones include the birth of the United Nations in 1945 and, starting in 1948, its consultative relationships with the new World Federation for Mental Health. The Federation’s founding document, Mental Health and World Citizenship, exposed the mind-changing agenda behind the social sciences:
“Studies of human development indicate the modifiability of human behaviour throughout life, especially during infancy, childhood and adolescence… Social institutions such as family and school impose their imprint early… It is the men and women in whom these patterns of attitude and behaviour have been incorporated who present the immediate resistance to social, economic and political changes.”4
The CRC is designed to erode that resistance!
For example, its Article 14 tells parents to “respect the right of the child to freedom of thought, conscience and religion.” That might make sense if parents were free to teach them safe moral and spiritual boundaries. But it spells disaster in today’s boundary-free culture, which bombards our children with promiscuous, pornographic and pluralistic suggestions and images.
Article 14 includes this qualification:
“Freedom to manifest one’s religion or beliefs may be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary to protect public safety, order, health or morals, or the fundamental rights and freedoms of others.”
But who are those “others” that need protection? All who despise the Bible and are offended by moral standards? That’s already happening! As one school administrator warned a student: “Leave your faith in the car.”5
Article 15 grants children the right to “freedom of association,” while Article 16 forbids “interference with his or her privacy… or correspondence.” Their freedom to choose would fling the doors open to every lewd kind of literature, texting, and internet communications.
Notice the strange twist. With ratification of this Convention, the state terminates parental rights to set wise boundaries and maintain moral standards. It “frees” children to follow their new pied pipers into a world of corruption, group thinking, and government control. Meanwhile, Christian children lose their traditional right to express their faith, since Christian beliefs and values are too divisive for today’s changing world.
This heartbreaking process is illustrated by a Canadian family. Since Canada has ratified this Convention on the Rights of the Child, it must conform to United Nations’ standards. [Editor’s Note: When a nation binds itself to an international treaty, such as the Convention on the Rights of the Child, that nation technically and legally obligates itself to the furtherance of that mandate].
“The father had ordered the daughter… to remain off the Internet. She didn’t, chatting on websites her father had tried to block and then posting ‘inappropriate’ pictures of herself online, using a friend’s Internet portal. As punishment, the father refused to let her go on a scheduled school trip, so the 12-year-old went to Canada’s judicial system to get her way… [she] had access to the courts using a court-appointed attorney representing her in her parents’ custody dispute.”6
“Quebec Superior Court rejected the Gatineau father’s appeal of a lower court ruling that said his punishment was too severe for the wrongs he said his daughter committed. The father is ‘flabbergasted’.”7
Such biased verdicts complement the deceptive language in the UN’s celebrated Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Notice how it parallels the CRC: Its Article 18 guarantees “the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion.” And Article 19 affirms “the right to freedom of opinion and expression…” But Article 29 warns that: “these rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.”
In other words, UN “rights” won’t be granted to those who disagree with its goals. They include:
• A New World Order ruled by unelected globalists with a socialist agenda
• The end of national sovereignty, absolute truth and the traditional family
• Social solidarity and spiritual pluralism purged of “divisive” Christian values.
• A communitarian network of partnerships between three sectors: (1) government, (2) business, and (3) social. The latter includes community organizations, churches, families, etc. In this unequal partnership, the government becomes the controlling “partner.” It would set the standards, measure (assess) compliance, reward group “progress,” and punish resisters.
This agenda may sound good to utopians that put their hope in global change – and who ignore the duplicity of today’s powerful and pragmatic globalist change agents. Today’s clever disinformation “speaks” louder than the truth, especially to listeners trained to follow feelings rather than facts!
So it’s not surprising that “double-speak” is central to UN propaganda. UNESCO’s Declaration on the Role of Religion is a good example. It calls for tolerance and dialogue – but shows no tolerance toward Christianity. Its unchanging truths simply don’t fit UNESCO requirements:
“We will promote dialogue and harmony between and within religions… respecting the search for truth and wisdom that is outside our religion… We call upon the different religious and cultural traditions to join hands… and to cooperate with us.”8
The word “cooperate” is a benign way of saying “submit to the new global standards.” And any substandard results of that “search for truth” would soon be silenced by today’s ever-present dialectical “group-think.”
No Room For Resisters
The CRC brings this interfaith agenda right into our homes and schools. Following the UN pattern, its promised “rights” are reserved for those who embrace its socialist, anti-Christian values. The Preamble sets the stage:
“Considering that the child should be fully prepared to live an individual life in society, and brought up in the spirit of the ideals proclaimed in the Charter of the United Nations, and in particular in the spirit of peace, dignity, tolerance, freedom, equality and solidarity…”
Each of the CRC Articles listed below either opens the door to justify action by the State, or to impose global values as a replacement to Bible standards.
ARTICLE 3. “…ensure that the institutions, services and facilities responsible for the care or protection of children shall conform with the standards established by competent authorities…”
ARTICLE 9. “…a child shall not be separated from his or her parents against their will, except when competent authorities subject to judicial review determine, in accordance with applicable law and procedures, that such separation is necessary for the best interests of the child…” Might faith in God’s unchanging Truth be considered incompatible with those “best interests”?
ARTICLE 12. “…assure to the child who is capable of forming his or her own views the right to express those views freely in all matters affecting the child, the views of the child being given due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child.”
ARTICLE 17. “States Parties recognize the important function performed by the mass media and shall ensure that the child has access to information and material from a diversity of national and international sources, especially those aimed at the promotion of his or her social, spiritual and moral well-being and physical and mental health. To this end, States Parties shall…
(c) Encourage the production and dissemination of children’s books…
(e) Encourage the development of appropriate guidelines for the protection of the child from information and material injurious to his or her well-being.”
Article 17 is infused with many troubling points. First, the reference to “spiritual and moral wellbeing” is based on politically correct, not Christian, values. Second, in the dissemination of children’s books, what kind of message will be paraded? Today, most popular children book books immerse the reader in suggestions, images, beliefs and values that clash with Christian values. Finally, what material will children be protected from? Might those “injurious” materials include the Bible? Missionary stories? Traditional history books or other information that could clash with UN ideology? Probably!
Since the goal is change – establishing a New World Order – any hindrance to that vision is already censored in public schools. The Globalist Elite have no tolerance for the America we have treasured!
[Editor’s Note: The message conveyed by Berit extends beyond America’s boarders. Group think, collective action, political correctness, a global ethic, and top-down management have become dominant themes throughout much of the Western World – where, in the past, Biblical ethics and morality, individualism and responsibility, free enterprise, and traditional families have provided the backbone for strong communities and nations.]
Inciting Hatred For Resisters
This socialist revolution reminds me of the anger that followed the 1996 Oklahoma bombing. Day after day, the media’s accusing pens pointed to suspected foes of American togetherness – those whose “enraged rhetoric” had created a national “climate of hate and paranoia.” They ranged from “rabid” radio hosts and “extremists” to concerned Christian parents. “Their coalition,” wrote Time, “included well known-elements of far-right thought: tax protesters, Christian homeschoolers, conspiracy theorists… and self-reliant types who resent a Federal Government that seems to favor grizzly bears and wolves over humans…”9
Apparently, the controversial report from the Department of Homeland Security was simply one of many expression of the socialist agenda. Do you remember its amazing report on ‘Right-wing Extremism?’ It suggests that economic woes, “the return of military veterans” and “individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration”10 could lead to the “emergence of terrorist groups” and violence.
Notice what’s happening. In spite of their call to unity, our socialist leaders are stirring up division. That’s because this intentional vilification of ordinary, peace-loving Americans serves a useful purpose.
Hitler understood the importance of social division as a mechanism for cultural change. He, too, was determined to separate followers from resisters, and in the process he solidified the National Socialist worldview. Remember what he wrote in Mein Kampf:
“The art of truly great popular leaders in all ages has consisted chiefly in… concentrating always on a single adversary… It is part of a great leader’s genius to make even widely separated adversaries appear as if they belonged to one category…”11
[Editor’s Note: By branding critics as “saboteurs of progress,” it allows change agents to rally emotional support against “resisters.” This, in turn, places enormous pressure on opponents. Their voices become marginalized as the collective will of the people – shaped by the new worldview – no longer tolerate the “old values.” In the case of Hitler’s Germany, Mao’s China, and Lenin and Stalin’s Soviet Union, “resisters” become silenced for the general good of the new order.]
The Convention on the Rights of the Child is an invitation as well as a curse. It would “free” our children and grandchildren to be World Citizens, immune to the call of God and traditional parental values. But for those who refuse to compromise, it spells the end of freedom. Ordinary Americans are demonized as an enemy, while the actual enemy has become a friend. Thomas Sowell said it well:
“While the rest of us may be worried about violent Mexican drug gangs on our border… the Director of Homeland Security is worried about ‘right-wing extremists.’ …[S]omehow they just know that you right-wingers are itching to unleash terror somewhere…
“So-called ‘honor killings’ by Muslims in the United States… does not seem to arouse any concern by the Department of Homeland Security… When it comes to the thuggery of ACORN… the Department of Homeland Security apparently sees no evil, hears no evil and speaks no evil.”12
Saving The Earth
Article 29 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child states: “…the education of the child shall be directed to… (e) The development of respect for the natural environment.”
That vision could be good if it wasn’t wrapped in a political and spiritual agenda. But countless environmental and religious groups are now sharing their strategies for a new earth-centered ideology. Many so-called churches are persuaded that green religions are more beneficial than the “obsolete” certainties of the Bible. Al Gore leads the way. Ponder this quote from Earth in the Balance:
“The richness and diversity of our religious tradition throughout history is a spiritual resource long ignored by people of faith, who are often afraid to open their minds to teachings first offered outside their own system of belief.
“But the emergence of a civilization in which knowledge moves freely and almost instantaneously throughout the world has… spurred a renewed investigation of the wisdom distilled by all faiths. This panreligious perspective may prove especially important where our global civilization’s responsibility for the earth is concerned.” (pages 258-259)
Mocking truth is a sign of our times, and “fear” has become a common accusation against us. Yet, of all the world’s people, Christians have the least reason to fear. For our sovereign God reigns – all the more in the midst of today’s unholy changes:
“…in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” – Romans 8:37-39
Meanwhile, “Be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armor of God…” – Ephesians 6:10-12
Mandatory Training
“The bourgeois family will vanish… Do you charge us with wanting to stop the exploitation of children by their parents? To this crime we plead guilty. But, you say, we destroy the most hallowed of relations, when we replace home education by social. And your education! Is not that also social, and determined by the social conditions under which you educate…? The Communists have not invented the intervention of society in education; they do but seek to alter the character of that intervention…” – Marx and Engels, Communist Manifesto.13
“John Dewey wrote… that the Bolsheviks were engaged in ‘a most interesting sociological experiment…’ using progressive educational ideas and practices to ‘counteract and transform… the influence of home and Church’.” – Dr. Dennis Cuddy.14
“Years before he had inflicted… dialectical materialism on a long-suffering world, Marx called for what had to be accomplished – the ‘ruthless destruction of everything existing.’ That destruction would wipe out religion, the family, morality… and everything that made Western civilization… The seemingly modest instrument was the [Frankfurt] Institute of Social Research… dedicated to neo-Marxism.’
…the greatest harm came when the Frankfurt School decamped to America, courtesy of John Dewey and Columbia University.” – Cry Havoc.15
Remember that proverbial frog in a pot of water? It finally died, since it didn’t notice the slow-rising heat. Few saw the early signs of the Neo-Marxist ideology that has invaded our schools and universities. But back in Teddy Roosevelt’s day, who would have guessed that a major goal of John Dewey’s “progressive education” was to weaken the traditional family, trade freedom for collectivism, and replace Christianity with an evolving form of “spiritual” solidarity?16
In his 1908 article, “Religion and our Schools,” Dewey wrote that “dogmatic beliefs” were “disappearing.” Decades later, while presiding over the American Humanist Association, he co-authored the 1933 Humanist Manifesto. Notice how his words reflect today’s emerging churches:
“Any religion that can hope to be a synthesizing and dynamic force for today, must be shaped for the needs of this age. To establish such a religion is a major necessity of the present.”17
Fast-forward to the 21st century. The ever-present dialectic process now reigns in churches as well as schools. And in cities across America, Alinsky-trained “community organizers” work side-by-side with students doing their “service-learning” from coast to coast. Meanwhile, Christian families face rising opposition. For example,
“A 10-year-old homeschool girl described as ‘well liked, social and interactive with her peers, academically promising and intellectually at or superior to grade level’ has been told by a New Hampshire court official to attend a government school because she was too ‘vigorous’ in defense of her Christian faith. The decision… reasoned that the girl’s ‘vigorous defense of her religious beliefs to [a court assigned] counselor suggests strongly that she has not had the opportunity to seriously consider any other point of view.’…
“…a guardian ad litem [assigned to represent the interest of the child] concluded the girl ‘appeared to reflect her mother’s rigidity on questions of faith’ and that the girl’s interests ‘would be best served by exposure to a public school setting’ and ‘different points of view at a time when she must begin to critically evaluate multiple systems of belief… in order to select, as a young adult, which of those systems will best suit her own needs’.”18
Did you catch that? The court tells us that this Christian girl – an excellent student – does not have the right to “choose” which religion best “suits her own needs” until she has examined many other “systems of beliefs.” Only as “a young adult” would she know enough about the world’s diverse religions to choose a suitable system.
Would that rule apply to Muslim children? Buddhist children? Hindu children?
Of course not! In today’s “progressive” global culture, the “enemy” is Christianity. Other religions are protected. After all, they are essential to the new vision of “unity in diversity.”
You see, today’s change agents consider Biblical Christianity a major obstacle to global solidarity. And nothing erodes Christian values more effectively than immersion into small groups led by trained facilitators who guide the diverse members toward a pre-planned unity of heart and mind.
The Marxist Practice of PRAXIS
But there’s more to this manipulation. The path to pluralism calls for a strategic blend of group consensus [an evolving THEORY] and collective PRACTICE: active immersion into a community with diverse social and moral values. Such “service-learning” has become a norm in schools, colleges, and service organizations everywhere.
Based on Hegelian dialectics, Marxist ideology, and Antonio Gramsci’s gradualism, this manipulative process spread around the world during the 20th century. Its blend of an evolving consensus or THEORY and collective PRACTICE would be called PRAXIS. It would seal the new lessons in “open” minds, while undermining all forms of traditional certainties. It would shift the public mindset from the solid rock of Truth and facts to the shifting sands of collective opinion.
Karl Marx first mentioned PRAXIS in 1844. According to the double-speak of the Encyclopedia of Marxism, it’s “just another word for practice in the sense in which practice is understood by Marxists.” And according to various Marxist documents, Marx saw it as the continual interaction of “theory-and-practice, in which neither theory nor practice are intelligible in isolation from the other.”19
In other words, the group must continually confirm its evolving theories with corresponding practice. Its members must be ready to compromise for the sake of consensus (the evolving THEORY), and then PRACTICE its new views through some kind of group action or service – followed by a time of group REFLECTION. The process is repeated again and again, ad infinitum.
Not all groups fit this mold. Many Christian groups are grounded in facts, truth and certainty. They seek God, not change! They act on His Word, not popular opinions. Their hope cannot be quenched by the world’s changing opinions: “This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast…” Hebrews 6:19
The Marxist View of Christianity – The “Religion” of His Time
To Karl Marx, Christianity was detestable! He hated it! And since its various expressions had spread throughout Europe, it had to be eradicated. So, in his Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Law, he wrote,
“Man makes religion, religion does not make man… Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of spiritless conditions. It is the opium of the people.”20
From a Communist perspective, it makes sense. But from a Biblical perspective, it’s nonsense! Marx believed in continual change. Christians believe in unchanging Truth, which clashes with that dialectical progression. Christianity can’t be squeezed into the Marxist revolutionary process. Nor can Marxism fit into God’s churches without perverting both Truth and faith. The two are incompatible!
The Encyclopedia of Marxism rationalizes the word “absolute” to fit its evolving theories:
“…the progress of knowledge never comes to an end, so the absolute is relative. However, even a relative truth may nevertheless contain some grain of the whole absolute truth, so there is an absolute within the relative.”21
This distinction is important. Apart from God’s unchanging Truth, there is no concrete hope or certainty to stand on, because man’s unending desire to redefine reality knows no bounds. Few examples are more disturbing than the distortions of God’s Word in today’s postmodern churches.
Training our Youth in Marxist Praxis
An Internet survey of American colleges will quickly expose the acceptance and popularity of Praxis. Take the University of Wisconsin. Its page on “Service Learning Pedagogy” sounds innocent enough. It seems to reflect the Christian tradition of loving and serving the poor and needy, but it actually fits right into the Marxist formula for change: Facilitated Dialogue (establishing a pre-planned, transformational OBJECTIVE) or THEORY + PRACTICE (practical experience that changes values) = PRAXIS. Its website affirms this process:
“The process of critical reflection is an essential element of service learning. It enhances student learning by connecting the service and the academic experiences. It links THEORY with PRACTICE.”22
The real purpose is calculated change. Whether the students’ assignment involves homeless shelters, drug and addiction issues, community organizing, medical care, or environmental issues, they will be led toward emotional involvement with those who “hurt,” be they humans, animals or a “fragile earth.” They learn to evaluate reality through subjective feelings, which can easily be manipulated. Like the students in the infamous Clinton’s Governor School, they are trained to see life from an irrational – often a revolutionary – perspective.
When students are immersed in morally “diverse” contexts that mock Biblical values, they are likely to emerge with a disturbing familiarity with unforgettable corruption. They learn to “tolerate” practices that mock our God, empathize with those who face the painful consequences of bad choices, and accept social evils as a normal condition.
The actual transformation in student values will usually be measured by assessments done before and after each service-learning experience. These assessments are key to documenting the effectiveness of the program. The website for Minnesota State Colleges and Universities shows the significance of “reflection” and “assessments:
“Service-learning is not volunteerism. Reflection allows students to think critically about their experience, including how the experience affected them emotionally and how their values may have changed… Student assessments may include pre-service and post-service assessments…”23
This transformational strategy may sound kind and compassionate to its numerous supporters, but it virtually immunizes most participants against God’s moral guidelines. And those who don’t flow with the changing values will pay the high cost of low assessments and poor grades.
Julea Ward, a Christian student at Eastern Michigan University, was expelled from graduate school “for not affirming homosexual behavior as acceptable.”24 Though she wasn’t involved in formal “service-learning,” she illustrates the general university attitude toward Christian values.
This seductive PRAXIS is now the norm in “service learning” programs from elementary schools through college – and on through adulthood. With President Obama’s universal service plans, and the Serve America Act as a plank, generations will be exposed to manipulative, mind-changing experiences.
Redefining Rights and Freedom
The 10-year old girl mentioned earlier illustrates a battle that has raged in Germany since the days of Hitler: Should parents have the right and authority to raise their children according to their Christian faith? The Convention on the Rights of the Child was designed to end that right in America and elsewhere. Of course, in modern Germany, parents never had such a right:
“A critical hearing is scheduled in Germany in that nation’s war against homeschoolers to determine whether a family can continue to control the education of its high-performing son, 14. …the Schmidts have been fined about $18,300 for homeschooling, and since they are unable to pay all of the fines, they have been subjected to a government lien on their home. ‘Testing [of] both children showed that they have extraordinary academic abilities… The tests also showed the children to be socially competent. This is critical as the Germans still hold to the disproven belief that homeschool children are socially retarded.’…
“Several hundred families are believed to be homeschooling in Germany. Virtually all are in some type of court proceeding or living underground. One family even fled to the U.S…
“…one of the first acts by Adolf Hitler when he moved into power was to create the governmental Ministry of Education and give it control of all schools and school-related issues… In 1937, the dictator said, ‘…we have set before ourselves the task of inoculating our youth with the spirit of this community of the people at a very early age… And this new Reich… will itself take youth and give to youth its own education and its own upbringing’.”25
Like persecuted Christians around the world, we must make a choice: will we please the world and follow its ways – or please God and follow His Way? Since America is rapidly embracing Neo-Marxist ideals, Christians who refuse to conform may soon reap the wrath of the world.
Please stay alert to this transformation. The pressure to compromise our Biblical values starts in elementary school or earlier. Once the anchor to Truth is torn away, most young minds will flow with the strongest currents. Dear friends, don’t let go of that anchor! Warn your children! And train them to trust, follow and “abide” in our wonderful Shepherd.
Re-Education
“The purpose of education and the schools is to change the thoughts, feelings and actions of students.” – Benjamin Bloom.26
“As the home and church decline in influence… schools must begin to provide adequately for the emotional and moral development of children… The school… must assume a direct responsibility for the attitudes and values of child development. The child advocate, psychologist, social technician, and medical technician should all reach aggressively into the community, send workers out to children’s homes…” – Joint Commission on Mental Health of Children.27
“A proposal for new social studies curriculum in Texas public schools removes a mention of Christmas in a sixth-grade lesson, replacing it with a Hindu religious festival…” – Houston Chronicle.28
“…the breakdown of traditional families, far from being a ‘crisis,’ is actually a… triumph for human rights against ‘patriarchy’.” – UN Population Fund leader.29
The traditional Christian family has been a continual obstacle to the globalist vision of solidarity. And for over sixty years, the United Nations and its mental health gurus have fought hard to eradicate those old “poisonous certainties” that stood in their way. They seem to be gaining ground!
Since Hitler outlawed homeschooling about 70 years ago, German parents have faced the harshest battles. Now other nations are catching up. Notice the government attitudes in the following examples:
“A critical hearing is scheduled in Germany in that nation’s war against homeschoolers to determine whether a family can continue to control the education of its high-performing son, 14… ‘One of the fundamental rights of parents is the right to educate their children according to the dictates of their own religious beliefs’.”30
That “fundamental right” is fast being replaced by government-defined “community” or “collective rights.” The fact that those homeschooled children have “extraordinary academic abilities” and are “socially competent” doesn’t matter. Today’s rising global system doesn’t want “competent” Christian leaders. Not in Sweden, not in America – not anywhere!
“A North Carolina judge has ordered three children to attend public schools this fall because the homeschooling their mother has provided over the last four years needs to be ‘challenged.’ The children, however, have tested above their grade levels – by as much as two years… The judge… explained his goal …to make sure they have a ‘more well-rounded education.’ …the judge also said public school would ‘prepare these kids for the real world and college’ and allow them ‘socialization’.”31
Such socialization tactics “worked well” in the Soviet Union. Based on the Marxist/Hegelian dialectic process, they include collective thinking, manipulative peer pressure, denial of absolutes, shameless “tolerance” for immorality, and irrational intolerance for contrary views.
The results can be disastrous. Students trained to scorn God’s guidelines and conform to the crowd are anything but free. Most are soon driven by evolving new notions that undermine all truth and certainty. Loosed from moral constraints, many are bound by their own lusts, obsessions, and (ultimately) despair.
A Model School for Future Leaders
Bill Clinton’s “Governor’s School” – one of many across America during the eighties – demonstrates the tragic results. For six weeks each summer, it isolated selected Arkansas high school students from the outside world and immersed them in liberal ideology, sensual literature, group dialogue, and mystical thrills – both real and imagined.32
“Students do me a favor,” urged author Ellen Gilchrist, a guest speaker at the school. “Totally ignore your parents. Listen to them, but then forget them. Because you need to start using your own stuff, your real stuff that you have.”33
Her aim was to free students from “obsolete” family values, not promote personal independence. They must reject the old ways and become “open-minded” – ready to accept the unthinkable practices that would bombard their minds.
By the time they left the Governor’s School, their utopian dreams seemed more real than the actual world. Like the planned results of Soviet brainwashing, they had been weaned from truth, facts and reality. With seared consciences, new ideals, and volatile emotions, they would now face the old world they had left behind only six weeks earlier.
The Marxist change agents behind this transformation are too numerous to list, but behavioral psychologist Kurt Lewin gives us a simple formula. Linked to infamous psychological research institutes in London (Tavistock) and Germany (Frankfurt Institute), Lewin moved to America when Hitler began his reign. His influence spread through MIT and other universities, then paved the way for “sensitivity training” and the formation of National Training Laboratories that would prepare transformational tactics and textbooks for public schools.
Lewin outlined his program with a 3-step formula:
• UNFREEZING minds: Questioning the old ways through facilitated dialogue, peer pressure, and group “experience” – real or imagined.
• MOVING the students to the new level: Using cognitive dissonance (mental, moral and emotional confusion), peer pressure, and manipulated consensus to loyalties from the old ways and to the new.
• FREEZING group minds on the new level: The new views become the norm. They feel good! The old views become offensive as well as wrong!34
For the students, the transition back to reality – to home, family and normal life – was painful. For some it was lethal.
“When I came back home, I sort of wrote a suicide note to myself,” confessed LeAndrew Crawford. “Not actually wanting to kill myself, but wanting to kill the reality of what society had been teaching me for so long… I was totally down, because my family just didn’t feel like my family… I didn’t want to be back.” [See footnote 33]
Brandon Hawk did kill himself within a year. Hearing about his death, other concerned parents contacted Brandon’s parents.
“They see the same thing in their kids that we saw in Brandon,” the father explained. “They just sort of walk off and leave the family.” [See footnote 33]
But Brandon wasn’t the only one who chose death rather than life. After the third suicide, the Joint Interim Education Committee of the Arkansas legislature held hearings that exposed some of the problems. Perhaps the most revealing testimony came from Brandon’s mother, who read from her son’s log. In his first entry, he wrote,
“‘Moms are the best people around, and my mom is the best mom on earth.’ But three weeks later, he wrote: ‘My mom is so closed minded I feel like we will have a standoff soon over issues.’ And his final entry stated: ‘After I came back from the [three day, July 4] break, my friends and I could tell that we had suddenly been transformed into free thinkers’.” [See footnote 33]
Another mother testified that, “My son came back from Governor’s School and his favorite line was ‘There are no absolutes; there are no absolutes.” [See footnote 33]
It didn’t take long to change the students’ minds and hearts, did it? Yet few teachers or parents are aware of this subversive agenda.
Back in 1982, Professor Benjamin Bloom, an internationally known behaviorist, defined “good teaching” as “challenging the students’ fixed beliefs and getting them to discuss issues.”35 (Sounds like Kurt Lewin, doesn’t it?) He added,
“The evidence collected thus far suggests that a single hour of classroom activity under certain conditions may bring about a major reorganization in cognitive as well as affective (attitudes, values and beliefs) behaviors.”36
The most revealing evidence that this scheme really “works” comes from those who participated in the Clinton’s Governor’s School. In light of today’s rapid changes, it makes sense to remember their testimonies as recorded in the documentary video titled The Guiding Hand:
1. ISOLATE STUDENTS FROM TRADITIONAL FAMILY VALUES
“For the six weeks … they are not allowed to go home except for July the Fourth. They are discouraged from calling home…. They can receive mail but they are encouraged to have as little contact with the outside world as possible.” (Shelvie Cole, Brandon’s mother)
“I felt that I needed not to talk about it. I don’t know why. Maybe because we were supposed to stay here and the fact that we couldn’t leave… No one… who had gone before would talk to me about it.” (Kelli Wood, former student)
The “effectiveness” of such mandatory separation may help explain why (1) educational change agents want to put 3-year-olds in pre-school programs and (2) why “Obama says American kids spend too little time in school.”37
2. REINFORCE NEW LIBERAL, ANTI-CHRISTIAN VALUES
“We watched movies like Harvey Milk. We learned about gay life – those things that your parents say, ‘This is wrong… You shouldn’t see this type of thing because, hey, that’s just not right…’“ (LeAndrew Crawford, former student)
“[The instructors] tear down their authority figure system and… help establish another one… They convince the students that ‘You are the elite. The reason why you’re not going to be understood when you go home – not by your parents, your friends, your pastor or anybody – is because you have been treated to thought that they can’t handle.’ …[This] intellectual and cultural elitism gives them the right… to say, ‘We know better than you’.” (Mark Lowery, former director for Governor’s School publicity)
3. EMPHASIZE FEELING-CENTERED (affective, not cognitive) TEACHING:
“Rather than learning what 2 and 2 equals, they would be asked what they feel about 2+2. Right now we have a move going on in our Arkansas schools called restructuring, where they are trying to get away from more objective, substantive learning into this subjective area of feelings.” (Mark Lowery)
“You would think that there would be some academic challenges… getting ready for college… The main textbook that I remember from there is a book called Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and the book is totally Hindu religion defined.” (Steve Roberts, former student)
4. SHAPE A PERSONAL, ALL-INCLUSIVE SPIRITUALITY:
“A lot of places… even Christian camps, you get that stress about ‘What am I doing wrong?’ …There it was like, hey, I can talk to God! Me and God are one, the world is one… Jump up and down, you know, just twirl around. It was kind of like that Baha’i idea. How you have Islam, Baha’i, Muslim, Christianity… They’re all different kinds of trees, but underneath, its root system grows together [and] is the same god.” (Steven Allen, student)
5. INSTILL THE TARGET BELIEFS – A ‘NEW’ SOCIAL AND POLITICAL AGENDA:
The next quote fits Bill Clinton’s experience. He was selected as a potential future leader – a Rhodes scholar – worthy of the required indoctrination:
“I think the whole intent of the Governor’s School in taking 350 – 400 students per summer, is to pick out the four, five or six students that could be political leaders and then to mold their minds in this more liberal and humanistic thinking… [T]o be considered intellectual…you have to be a liberal thinker…” (Mark Lowery, former director)
“They’re bringing a political agenda in the guise of academic excellence… It was something that was well orchestrated, well organized, it was mind-bending and manipulative.” (Steve Roberts)
“Prominent themes promoted by this school include radical homosexuality, socialism, pacifism and a consistent hostility toward Western civilization and culture, especially Biblical foundations.” (Jeoffrey Botkin)
6. BUILD ALLEGIANCE TO THE NEW COMMUNITY:
“You could dress just about any way you want. We had almost naked people. It was real liberal… an awful lot of cursing.” (Mike Oonk, former student)
“The students… say, ‘This is the perfect place. I never want to go home.’ I caught myself saying that several times.” (Mike Oonk) [See footnote 33]
Indoctrinating students with diverse beliefs, socialist values, utopian dreams, and idealized love leads to deception, disillusionment, corruption and chaos. But that fits the battle plan for global transformation just fine. Today’s change agents need chaos and crisis to justify their oppressive action. Not only does it unravel the old social order, it gives an illusion of newfound freedom – from family values as well moral restrains.38
“It would be impossible for me to describe to you just how exciting and unusual this educational adventure is,” said Bill Clinton. [See footnote 33]
It wasn’t exciting for re-programmed students who returned home. But that problem may soon be resolved. Through “service-learning” and other long-term re-learning projects, today’s students can stay rooted in the new environment – even if they sleep at home.
This is where we are headed, dear friends! During this last year, three students at a top-rated high school in California committed suicide – one of the many consequences of today’s emotional confusion. One evening, as desperate parents met with school officials to seek solutions, a fourth student attempted suicide at the nearest railroad crossing. He was pulled off the track seconds before the train thundered down the track.39
Standing Firm in this Social and Spiritual War
The school offered no real solutions. But our God does! Please take these guidelines to heart:
• Pray! For as Jesus said, “…apart from Me you can do nothing.” (John 15:5)
• Prepare yourself. “Be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Put on the whole Armor of God…” Eph. 6:10-11
• Equip your children to discern evil and resist compromise. “Do not be deceived…” 1 Cor.15:33
• Trust God, not yourself. “O our God… we have no power against this great multitude that is coming against us; nor do we know what to do, but our eyes are upon You.” 2 Chron. 20:12
• Inform and warn all who will listen. “I now send you, to open their eyes, in order to turn them from darkness to light…” Acts 26:17-18
“Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord…” 1 Corinthians 15:57
“…do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” – Romans 12:2
Endnotes:
1 “Marriage and the Family,” The British Humanist Association, 1969. Cited by Dr. Dennis L. Cuddy, The Globalists
(Oklahoma City: Hearthstone Publishing, 2001), p.124.
2 Dr. Dennis L. Cuddy, The Globalists (Oklahoma City: Hearthstone Publishing, 2001), pp.133-134.
3 Our Creative Diversity, 1995, page 46. Note: I picked up this UNESCO publication in Istanbul during the 1996 UN
Conference on Human Settlements. It was a real eye-opener.
4 Mental Health and World Citizenship, pp.7-8. Distributed by the National Association For Mental Health, Inc.
5 “Student Told: ‘Leave Your Faith in the Car,” WorldNetDaily, 6-3-04.
6 “Dad Grounds Daughter, But Court Ungrounds Her,” WorldNetDaily, 06/18/2008.
7 “Quebec dad sued by daughter after grounding loses his appeal,” CBC News, online edition, April 7, 2009.
8 See, “UNESCO’s Declaration on the Role of Religion” at www.crossroad.to/Quotes/globalism/declaration-on-religion.htm
9 Philip Weiss, “Outcasts Digging in for the Apocalypse,” Time, 5-1-1995; p.48.
10 “Homeland Security on guard for ‘right-wing extremists’,” WorldNetDaily, 04/12/2009.
11 See, “The Enemy of the People” at www.crossroad.to/text/articles/teotp1196.html
12 Thomas Sowell, “Are You an Extremists?” www.TownHall.com, April 21, 2009.
13 Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Manifesto of the Communist Party, downloadable at www.marxists.org .
14 Dennis L. Cuddy., quoting John Dewey, “Impressions of Soviet Russia,” The New Republic, December 5, 1928, pp.65-66.
15 Cry Havoc by Ralph de Toledano, Reviewed by Nathanael Blake, Human Events, 5-15-2007.
16 See, “Marching toward Global Solidarity” at http://www.crossroad.to/articles2/006/solidarity-1.html
17 The Humanist Manifesto, 1933. http://www.americanhumanist.org/about/manifesto1.html
18 Bob Unruh, “Court orders Christian child into government education,” WorldNetDaily, 8-28-09.
19 Encyclopedia of Marxism at www.marxists.org/glossary/terms/p/r.htm
20 Karl Marx, “Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Law,” cited in Encyclopedia of Marxism.
21 Encyclopedia of Marxism, www.marxists.org/glossary/terms/a/b.htm#absolute
22 “Service Learning Pedagogy,” University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee, www4.uwm.edu/isl/faculty/pedagogy.htm
23 Minnesota State Colleges and Universities, Office of the Chancellor, Service Learning.
24 “University Removes Student Who Refuses to Affirm Homosexual Practices” at ReveLife.com, May 31, 2009.
25 Bob Unruh, “State could take custody of teen homeschooler,” WorldNetDaily, 8-29-2009.
26 Benjamin Bloom, A” Our Children Learning, (New York: McGraw Hill, 1981), p.180.
27 Joint Commission on Mental Health of Children. The unabridged report is no longer available, but the 1969 report is
summarized at Education Resources Information Center (eric.ed.gov).
28 For more on this, please see the Houston Chronicle, online edition, September 11, 2009.
29 Matthew Cullinan Hoffman, “United Nations Population Fund leader says family breakdown is a triumph for Human
Rights,” February 3, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com)
30 Bob Unruh, “State could take custody of teen homeschooler” WorldNetDaily, 08/28/2009.
31 For more, see Bob Unruh, “Judge Orders Homeschoolers into Public District classrooms,” WorldNetDaily, 03/11/2009.
32 From The Guiding Hand, a video produced by Geoffrey Botkin in 1992.
33 Ibid. Quoting Ellen Gilchrist, author of In the Land of Dreamy Dreams, quoted by a student.
34 Kurt Lewin, “Group Decision and Social Change” at www.crossroad.to/Quotes/brainwashing/kurt-lewin-change.htm
35 Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, The Classification of Educational Goals, Affective Goals ( McKay Publishers, 1956), p. 55.
36 Ibid., p.88.
37 “Obama would curtail summer vacation” at http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090927/ap_on_re_us/us_more_school
38 See, “Paradigm Shift” at http://www.crossroad.to/charts/paradigm_shift.html
39 3rd Caltrain Teen Suicide Spurs Action” at http://cbs5.com/local/caltrain.teenager.suicide.2.1141695.html
Quotes on Education for Transformation
1. “I have suggested that the textbooks be rewritten in terms of right human relations and not from the present nationalistic and separative angles… To all of these I would like to add that one of our immediate educational objectives must be the elimination of the competitive spirit and the substitution of the cooperative consciousness.” – Alice Bailey [a leading occultist who influenced Robert Muller, founder of the United Nations World Core Curriculum], Education in the New Age (Lucis Trust), p.74.
2. “Educational institutions play an important part in most societies as agents of social control, cultural change, and, not least, social selection.” – A.H. Halsey, “Education and Social Selection,” Power and Ideology in Education (Oxford University Press, 1977), p.167.
3. “…since the world to-day is in process of becoming one, and since a major aim of UNESCO must be to help in the speedy and satisfactory realisation of this process, UNESCO must pay special attention to international education – to education as a function of a world society.” – Julian Huxley [first UNESCO Director-General], UNESCO: Its Purpose and Its Philosophy (Public Affairs Press, 1947), pp.29-30.
4. “The task of education for the immediate future is to assist in activating an ethic of planetary sensitivity that will assist us in practicing disciplines that protect us from the allurements of our morbid commodity culture… We must pass from a human-centred to an earth-centred sense of reality and value.” – Budd Hall and Edmund Sullivan [Professors of Transformational Learning], “Transformative Education and Environmental Action in the Ecozoic Era,” Empowerment for Sustainable Development (International Institute for Sustainable Development, 1995), p.102.
5. “…global education must transcend material, scientific and intellectual achievements and reach deliberately into the moral and spiritual spheres.” – Dr. Robert Muller [former UN official and developer of the World Core Curriculum], New Genesis: Shaping a Global Spirituality (World Happiness and Cooperation, 1982), p.8.
6. “The principle of the oneness of humanity must be wholeheartedly embraced by those in whose hands the responsibility for decision making rests, and its related tenets – including the concept of world citizenship – must be propagated through both education systems and the media.” – Jaime Duhart [representative of the Baha’i International Community], Social Priorities of Civil Society: Speeches by Non-Governmental Organizations at the World Summit for Social Development (UN NGLS, 1996), p.2.
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Carl Teichrib is the editor of Forcing Change (www.forcingchange.org), a monthly online publication detailing the changing worldview and transforming agendas now shaping society, the church, and nation. FC is a monthly, online publication dedicated to documenting and analyzing the socio-religious transformations now sweeping our Western world. Forcing Change is a membership subscription service, with an annual fee of $54.95 US. Membership in Forcing Change allows access to the full range of FC publications, including special reports, audio and media presentations, FC back issues, expert documents, and more. FC receives neither government funding nor the financial backing of any other institutions; rather, FC operates solely on subscription/membership support. To learn more about Forcing Change, including member benefits, go to www.forcingchange.org. Note from Berit: May I suggest you subscribe to this great online magazine. This vital information will help us prepare for the challenges we will be facing in the years ahead. Benefits of Forcing Change membership…
Membership in Forcing Change allows access to the full range of FC publications, including e-reports, audio and media presentations, Forcing Change back issues, downloadable expert documents, and more. FC receives neither government funding nor the financial backing of any other institutions; rather, Forcing Change operates solely on subscription/membership support. To learn more about Forcing Change, including membership benefits, go to Forcing Change, P.O. Box 31 Plumas, Manitoba, Canada, R0J-1P0 |
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