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t .Nel T.wu H a....I.uFor several hundred yearsat least,Europeans have staged a se

riesof foredoomed revolutions on theEuropean and American continents.The 19705arc merelya continuation of the 17705in America:The revolution isfought and arguedoverand f71/et,but lifegoesonasusual in the West.Thebig fish eat the little fish and thelittle fish starve. Or, as a four-year-oldof my acquaintance put it, the good guys kill thebad guys and the bad guys

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venal law that nquites a peony to growonly from peony seedisa law asapplicable to revolutionsas to planrs.Hthis isth ecase, if phenomrna necessarily ariseout of pre-conditioning

(N" pre.-programmingof inta-rdared phenomena, if life reallyis a circlethatlives and bf'eathe5 in circular, inexorable terms, it I ._1 1

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bo1dings had 5btunk by twO-tbinis since the A1locment Ita. had been ind The c.xisttntial messageof thetn nsxrioo was this: Ci:riliz.cd people erntake ou r inalinublc rights away. le seems fairly obvious &omthis that asociety intent on eradicating thdt in all its forms mu$C eradicate "civilizacion." Cooperativeness,the willingnessto share goods and land, isnorpossible in a basicallysdfisb frameworlt;yet, by thewordsofthe United StatesCongreu. sd6shness is a basic virtue of ciri liurion. And sdf-possc:ssive-De55 -this is mineral)'Oll use it, you awe me IDOllq' foe it - automaticaltrcreateStheft-sysrems.Yetthe ability to thinItin temI5ofooopenrionmakesit: humanly possible to dfectively exert a measure of COCluol ovet' whathappens to you. It eliminateS t need to be ddensive, distrustful, andparanoid, and allows for a greater interplayamong humans on terms thathuman psychesand spirits can comprehend.Whenthe COnceptS of posses-sivenessOf" proprietorship disappear as beingmeaningful in our lives,thehaunq sense of separation &omthe universewiU be jesseeed becausepM .. U:' etlCS5 requiresselfishness, and selSdmcssis sepantioo..

., AUU . ' " , . , IF ' I ' ", ." . ," A ' .ATIIu.c I' .'"'.11" "., ,.,.." ...IIITI.U P....III I I .UTU CIII .. II rAn L I T I I AC TWestern ciriIiution was rrecud 00 twin pillan, so to speak.:po6StUi't'eDt:5Sand Iira-acy.The twin &ceu aUowed the pheoommonmown as politics to detenninf; most of ow behavior for several thousandyears. And yet, on the face of it, the idea that my literacymakes memore

powerful than someonewho is not literate is ludia'ous. In point of fact, theabilityto read does link forme, except possiblyaUowme to eam livingin_ ys that riolate my best insriDcts and potentialities.. Yet it is true that thebig6sh can read- evm tbougb theobverse isDo t true and was, that is,that the Iiale lishcanncx. But10 '00& as the IinIe !ish believe that rudingwill,in andof itself,ttansfornl them 01" their progeny intobig !ish,that themagk pcwtt of litrraCY will allow transformarion of their relativesituation, literacywill be a rool for the exploication and manipulation ofhuman beings-the same kind of roots that land ownel'Ship [possess ion]and domination over ochershave been.

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The ~ e e s wen brokmon thatpuricW.arwheel;tbcr believedwhattheir IitentC reac::ben said about the powerof literacyso theybecame liter.ate, Sequoyahmade public the Cherokee syUabary, and in WI years tbeoverwhelming majority of the peoplewere able to read and write. Theyprinted their own newspaper, The PJ,on,ix, whichwas bilingual; incorporated their nation on paper in a Constitution; wrote letters to each other;wrote down incancatiola, chants,minuleSof meetings;studiedthe Bible I$ -siduously; andculrivaredthecompanionship ofliten.re andimportacrnon

Manymarried whitewomen, some: took blad peopleas slaves,and, byOJeroIteeNarioo law, thty di'f'CSttd ~ e women of poliric:a lrights.In other words, theyrook upal! themecbaniVt15 of power that theybelieved wouldmabie them toliveasa nation, a republicon thiscontinent, allyto the United Stares.Theyread the lawsof the UnitedStates,obeyedwhat theyread, and aa ivatedall due precesses in their fightto retainownership of their homelands. Imagine theiramaument to findthemsdveswalking,destitute, sickanddying,eight bundredmiles fromtheir ancimt:and bdoredhome. in spite of their l i and "ciYiliution...They'lftrt called "ciYilitcd" bywhites, but theywen powerless 10change theirfate.Whea thebig fish said, "It's time toeat you Iitde-fisbCherokee," theywere duly devoured. And all the literacy in the world was useless to savethem.