[…] we live in a world where a multitude of very powerful forces have worked upon us, from birth through school to work, attempting to suppress our individuality, our creativity and, above all, our curiosity — in short, to destroy everything that encourages us to think for ourselves.
Our parents wanted us to act like the other children in our neighborhood; they emphatically did not want a boy or girl who seemed “weird or “different” or [Heaven forefend] “too damned clever by far.”
Then we enter grade school, a fate worse than Death and Hell combined. Whether we land in a public school or a private religious school, we learn two basic lessons:
- There exists one correct answer for every question;
and- education consists of memorizing the one correct answer and regurgitating it on an “examination.”
The same tactics continue through high school and, except in a few sciences, even to the university.
Robert Anton Wilson