One of the best indications we have for the state of any society is its education system, or rather. Since the beginning of Covid-19 and the disruption of the schooling system, the negative phenomena that infested schools have penetrated our homes and placed a very unpleasant mirror before us. Now we are experiencing firsthand what our children have been “learning” at school.
With no place to vent aggression, domestic violence and abusive language toward parents and vulnerable siblings have increased dramatically, and parents are aghast at what they are seeing. But they are seeing now what their children have been living through for years. Better now than never.
If there is any lesson to be learned from the pandemic as far as education goes, it is that the education system teaches nothing but bad values.
Nevertheless, now that we see that our education system is fundamentally flawed, I hope it will incentivize us to make amends. Now I hope we understand that the education system must, first and foremost, teach youngsters how to communicate with one another positively and constructively. Any person, however intelligent, will not be able to succeed in today’s society unless he or she knows how to communicate constructively with others.
Constructive communication requires much practice, and a profound realization of the interdependent nature of society. We cannot succeed in life if we think only of ourselves. We also cannot succeed if we forget about ourselves altogether. Currently, we are immersed in narcissistic tendencies and feel it is legitimate to ignore other people’s feelings and care only about our own. While this may feel good when we exercise it, it produces loneliness, depression, and anxiety when others exercise it toward us. For this reason, self-absorption is not a sustainable approach if we want to maintain a healthy society. Balance is the key.
Changing the education system alone will not work. You cannot expect children to change if they come home at the end of the day to a family where the parents inculcate egocentrism. There needs to be an overall effort in society to change the social paradigm. Now that we see the results of a sick education system, I hope it will give us enough of an impetus to change the way we operate on all levels of society. Otherwise, children will grow up just as they have been educated, become parents themselves, and the vicious cycle will continue with worsening consequences until life becomes Hell on earth, if it isn’t already.
We have built all the technology to lead an affluent life with abundance to everyone. The only reason for people’s misery today is our lack of education, our lack of mutual responsibility and our excessive self-absorption. Even poverty is not a curse from above; it’s a result of carelessness for one another, a lack of education of the poor and of the affluent. When we don’t understand that we are all parts of the same society, we close our doors before each other until the streets become battlegrounds. In the end, neither the rich nor the poor will enjoy living in such a country. Education toward mutual responsibility is the first step toward healing society; everything else will be mended afterwards.