X-Message-Number: 15413
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 22:49:06 -0800
From: Lee Corbin <>
Subject: Old-fashioned Literacy is Passe

>The "right brain" language of play-acting and theater seems a more likely
>form of advanced communication than "left brain" linear symbol sequences.
>...
>If I were an extropian gray alien from the year 2110 popping back
>in time to communicate with my human ancestors, I'd probably just
>take control of the situation and do puppet shows in order to
>allow the creatures to become enlightened through experience
>rather than making some limited attempt to communicate in a
>linear fashion through spoken language.

Right on.  If gesturing, pantomime, and body language was good
enough for our ancestors 500,000 years ago, it should be good
enough for us, you know what I mean?  With the help of the
internet, puppet shows can become the new mainstay of communication.

All too much attention has been given the last few thousand
years to "literacy", with all of its obvious defects.  Basically,
it's just another one of those linear, outmoded, left-brained
vestiges of traditional heirarchical oppressive Western civilization
which we must discard.  Besides, learning to read is artificial
and UNNATURAL.  Moreover, it requires a lot of unpleasant effort.
Forcing children to learn to read needs to be unmasked as the child
abuse that it is, although we Americans may have to first get
rid of the new "read-my-lips" type administration in Washington
D.C. with its emphasis on traditional education.

Lee Corbin

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