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December 29th, 2015 
Awake Goy During the Middle Ages society was divided between those who could read and write and those who were illiterate. The former, likely to be no more than a few percent of the whole, were the political, religious and military elite. The peasants, serfs in service, swineherds, shepherds and market gardeners were uneducated. As recently as the mid-18th Century, European villagers had only the vaguest of ideas of where their capital city was located, unlikely to know who their monarch was, and unable to read or write. Prussia, in 1763, was the first country to introduce a mandatory tax-funded educational system for all. England and France caught on about 120 years later.
I was reminded of this when, on a whim, I shifted my attention from internet resources to conventional media. Such was the unworldliness of the mainstream media set it was apparent that I had descended into a different world. A little over 100 years ago the great American novelist, Jack London, lived in London’s East End that he might better draw on his experiences of the frightful poverty and ignorance prevalent in the First City of Empire. As a consequence his book was appropriately titled The People of the Abyss.
When recently I browsed readers’ comments in the Daily Mail Online I realised that, like Jack London and George Orwell (The Road to Wigan Pier), I had discovered today’s People of the Abyss. The unworldliness of many mainstream media readers was depressing. Given less than two-minutes it is doubtful they could point to Moscow on a map. Given two-months there is doubt they could give a coherent opinion on global realities. I had descended into a trivia and spin chaos that had no moral compass. Here was a different kind of illiteracy. People can now read, write and sign their names but otherwise here was illiteracy writ large. You think I am given to exaggeration? Think again: according to a recent poll, about one in four US voters supported the bombing of Agrabah, the fictional kingdom in the Disney movie Aladdin.
There was an excuse for the peasants of Medieval Europe. All avenues of self-expression and personal betterment were denied to them. What excuse for tabloid and television zombies who slurp news and trivia swill from the troughs of mainstream media?
In Medieval Europe there was no possibility of serfs crossing to the other side of the railway line. Today’s lumpen proletariat face no barriers. I am left with the feeling that the serfs of Medieval Europe, obliged to live off their wits rather than state benefits, were far brighter than today’s generation. Few people today set foot in an art gallery or museum, or visit any cultural activity other than that prescribed for steerage class. When I was eight-years of age the teacher couldn’t get my head out of Jack London’s book, White Fang. By today’s standards that is a tough read.
Another classic written for schoolboys was Geoffrey Trease’s 1934 novel Bows against the Barons. I recall the story had a happy ending with the serfs overthrowing their political and religious elite. I doubt very much the serfs of today could get the better of their elite. Maybe to go forward we need to go backward.
Source Article from http://renegadetribune.com/the-people-of-the-abyss/
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