Back in 1978, Bob Seger sang “I Feel Like a Number.” Today, the zeroes and ones that pervade the data-driven culture of the tech sector are spilling over to the public education sphere…again. Not that it ever went away, and not that a technocratic society is a new phenomenon. Rather, the methods of scientific management Fredrick Taylor pioneered at the end of the 19th Century are at the foundation of the current technocratic culture. In the 1960s, Mario Savio at UC Berkeley spoke passionately against that culture by highlighting to his fellow students that they were the raw materials of the university machine; a machine so “odious” that he urged them to put their bodies “upon the gears and upon the wheels…to make it stop.” In 1999, the Wachowskis released the science fiction action film, “The Matrix.” The movie warns of the illusions created by technology to mask the slavish conditions of humans a la Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. In these examples, the tug of war between the rigidity of technology-induced conformity and the yearning to feel fully free as a human expresses itself in more ways than one.
Today, we’re seeing version 4.0 of the rise of the technocrats. Leading the charge is Bill Gates – a billionaire education reformer who believes that a more rigid, “free-market,” and technocratic curriculum should replace what’s currently being taught in public schools. Certainly, the public school system has many technocratic processes in place like the testing, tracking, and segregation of students. However, it’s not that the quantitative metrics generated by something like standardized testing is inherently bad, the issue is that the preeminence of such – easily manipulated – metrics marginalizes critical and creative thought in the school system. And it’s the decentering of critical engagement that’s the focus of Adam Bessie and Dan Carino’s critique of the education reforms sought by Bill Gates and his ilk. Don’t be fooled into thinking Bessie and Carino’s project is an anti-technology screed. Rather than being the proverbial servants of technology, they use current technology and the genre of comic books to critically and creatively interrogate Gates’ educational reform movement to spur an informed counter-movement that can push back against those “free”-market ideas that engender what Henry Giroux calls the “dead zones of imagination.”
We’re not backing down in the face of Trump’s threats.
As Donald Trump is inaugurated a second time, independent media organizations are faced with urgent mandates: Tell the truth more loudly than ever before. Do that work even as our standard modes of distribution (such as social media platforms) are being manipulated and curtailed by forces of fascist repression and ruthless capitalism. Do that work even as journalism and journalists face targeted attacks, including from the government itself. And do that work in community, never forgetting that we’re not shouting into a faceless void – we’re reaching out to real people amid a life-threatening political climate.
Our task is formidable, and it requires us to ground ourselves in our principles, remind ourselves of our utility, dig in and commit.
As a dizzying number of corporate news organizations – either through need or greed – rush to implement new ways to further monetize their content, and others acquiesce to Trump’s wishes, now is a time for movement media-makers to double down on community-first models.
At Truthout, we are reaffirming our commitments on this front: We won’t run ads or have a paywall because we believe that everyone should have access to information, and that access should exist without barriers and free of distractions from craven corporate interests. We recognize the implications for democracy when information-seekers click a link only to find the article trapped behind a paywall or buried on a page with dozens of invasive ads. The laws of capitalism dictate an unending increase in monetization, and much of the media simply follows those laws. Truthout and many of our peers are dedicating ourselves to following other paths – a commitment which feels vital in a moment when corporations are evermore overtly embedded in government.
Over 80 percent of Truthout‘s funding comes from small individual donations from our community of readers, and the remaining 20 percent comes from a handful of social justice-oriented foundations. Over a third of our total budget is supported by recurring monthly donors, many of whom give because they want to help us keep Truthout barrier-free for everyone.
You can help by giving today. Whether you can make a small monthly donation or a larger gift, Truthout only works with your support.