Just recently I discovered John Taylor Gatto and just like you this guys gonna help us heal the world . Thanks to John Gatto I wont be handing my daughter over to school for brainwashing / dumbing down. Going to homeschool / natural learning style my little one.
Another thing effecting our childrens developing brains apart from food and emotional nourishment is water fluoridation currently being forced upon us by our government. On the subject of water fluoridation and dumbing down any one opposing it can help by telephoning Get Up ( on line fast growing Aussie action group ) and asking them to help end water fluoridation in Australia starting with exposing government officials constant lies on effectiveness and fluorides hidden dangers.
GET UP Contacts : (02) 9264 4037.

Thanks again Robin!

Ch 52 Losing Control
I’m going to quote a great man here, a man named A. S. Neill. He is
the author of Summerhill. Neill says that the sign of a sick child
is that he is always hovering around his parents; he is interested in
persons. The healthy child has no interest in persons, he is
interested in things. When a child is sure of his mother’s love, he
forgets his mother; he goes out to explore the world; he is curious.
He looks for a frog to put in his mouth — that kind of thing. When
a child is hovering around his mother, it’s a bad sign; he’s
insecure. Maybe his mother has been trying to suck love out of him,
not give him all the freedom and assurance he wants. His mother’s
always been threatening in many subtle ways to abandon him.
So we were given a taste of various drug addictions: approval,
attention, success, making it to the top, prestige, getting your name
in the paper, power, being the boss. We were given a taste of things
like being the captain of the team, leading the band, etc. Having a
taste for these drugs, we became addicted and began to dread losing
them. Recall the lack of control you felt, the terror at the
prospect of failure or of making mistakes, at the prospect of
criticism by others. So you became cravenly dependent on others and
you lost your freedom. Others now have the power to make you happy
or miserable. You crave your drugs, but as much as you hate the
suffering that this involves, you find yourself completely helpless.
There is never a minute when, consciously or unconsciously, you
are not aware of or attuned to the reactions of others, marching to
the beat of their drums.
A nice definition of an awakened person: a person who no longer
marches to the drums of society, a person who dances to the tune of
the music that springs up from within.
When you are ignored or disapproved of, you experience a loneliness
so unbearable that you crawl back to people and beg for the comforting
drug called support and encouragement and reassurance. To live with people in this state involves a never-ending tension.

Ch 56 The Land of Love
I’ve got a lovely quote here, a few sentences that I would write in
gold. I picked them up from A. S. Neil’s book Summerhill. I must
give you the background. You probably know that Neill was in
education for forty years. He developed a kind of maverick school.
He took in boys and girls and just let them be free. You want to
learn to read and write, fine; you don’t want to learn to read and
write, fine. You can do anything you want with your life, provided
you don’t interfere with the freedom of someone else. Don’t
interfere with someone else’s freedom; otherwise you’re free. He
says that the worst ones came to him from convent school.
This was in the old days, of course. He said it took them about six
months to get over all the anger and the resentment that they had
repressed. They’d be rebelling for six months, fighting the system.
The worst was a girl who would take a bicycle and ride into town,
avoiding class, avoiding school, avoiding everything. But once they
got over their rebellion, everybody wanted to learn; they even began
protesting, “Why don’t we have class today?” But they would only
take what they were interested in. They’d be transformed. In the
beginning parents were frightened to send their children to this
school; they said, “How can you educate them if you don’t
discipline them? You’ve got to teach them, guide them.” What was
the secret of Neill’s success? He’d get the worst children, the ones
everybody else had despaired of, and within six months they’d all be
transformed. Listen to what he said — extraordinary words, holy
words. “Every child has a god in him. Our attempts to mold the
child will turn the god into a devil. Children come to my school,
little devils, hating the world, destructive, unmannerly, lying,
thieving, bad tempered. In six months they are happy, healthy
children who do no evil.” These are amazing words coming from a man
whose school in Britain is regularly inspected by people from the
Ministry of Education, by any headmaster or headmistress or anyone
who would care to go there. Amazing. It was his charisma. You
don’t do this kind of thing from a blueprint; you’ve got to be a
special kind of person. In some of his lectures to headmasters and
headmistresses he says, “Come to Summerhill and you’ll find that all
the fruit trees are laden with fruit; nobody’s taking the fruits off
the trees; there’s no desire to attack authority; they’re well fed
and there’s no resentment and anger. Come to Summerhill and you’ll
never find a handicapped child with a nickname (you know how
cruel kids can be when someone stammers). You’ll never find anyone
needling a stammerer, never. There’s no violence in those children,
because no one is practicing violence on them, that’s why.” Listen
to these words of revelation, sacred words. We have people in the
world like this. No matter what scholars and priests and theologians
tell you, there are and have been people who have no quarrels, no
jealousies, no conflicts, no wars, no enmities, none! They exist in
my country, or, sad to say, they existed until relatively recently.
I’ve had Jesuit friends go out to live and work among people who,
they assured me, were incapable of stealing or lying. One Sister
said to me that when she went to the northeast of India to work among
some tribes there, the people would lock up nothing. Nothing
was ever stolen and they never told lies until the Indian government
and missionaries showed up.
Every child has a god in him; our attempts to mold the child will
turn the god into a devil.

Now . . . back to Neill. He says, “And I am no genius, I am merely
a man who refuses to guide the steps of children.” But what, then,
of original sin? Neill says that every child has a god in him; our
attempts to mold him will turn the god into a devil. He lets
children form their own values, and the values are invariably good
and social. Can you believe that? When a child feels loved (which
means: when a child feels you’re on his side), he’s O.K. The child
doesn’t experience violence anymore. No fear, so no violence. The
child begins to treat others the way he has been treated. You’ve got
to read that book. It’s a holy book, it really is. Read it; it
revolutionized my life and my dealings with people. I began to see
miracles. I began to see the self dissatisfaction that had
been ingrained in me, the competition, the comparisons, the that’s
notgoodenough, etc. You might object that if they hadn’t pushed me,
I wouldn’t have become what I am. Did I need all that pushing? And
anyway, who wants to be what I am? I want to be happy, I want to be
holy, I want to be loving, I want to be at peace, I want to be free,
I want to be human.

I repeat what Neill said: “Every child has a god in him. Our attempts
to mold the child will turn the god into a devil. Children come to
my school, little devils, hating the world, destructive, unmannerly,
lying, thieving, bad tempered. In six months they are happy, healthy
children who do no evil. And I am no genius, I am merely a man who
refuses to guide the steps of children. I let them form their own
values and the values are invariably good and social. The religion
that makes people good makes people bad, but the religion known as
freedom makes all people good, for it destroys the inner conflict
[I've added the word "inner"] that makes people devils.”

end quotes.

what a different world it *could* be.

neal.