Book Source: "Yesterday's World" by Zweig, the "modern" and "militarized" education of centuries ago
Pt.1 Cramming and Assembly Line Education#
However, in that enlightened liberal era, only the education of so-called higher institutions, that is, entering university, had real value. Therefore, every upper-class family aspired to have at least one of their sons with a doctorate title before their name. But the road to university was quite long and not at all pleasant. Before that, one had to sit on hard benches and complete five years of primary school and eight years of secondary school, sitting for five to six hours a day, with free time completely occupied by homework, and also receiving regular education outside of school curriculum, that is, learning living languages such as French, English, and Italian in addition to studying classical Greek and Latin, in other words, learning five languages in addition to geometry, physics, and other prescribed courses. The burden of learning was so heavy that there was almost no time for physical exercise and walks, let alone leisure and entertainment.
University? Or rather, do prestigious schools really have any use? This is a portrayal of my extreme pressure learning.
For us, school meant coercion, desolation, and boredom. It was a place where we had to memorize scientific knowledge that had no value. We felt from those scholastic or scholastic-like contents that they had nothing to do with reality or our personal interests. It was a dull and boring learning, not learning for life, but learning for the sake of learning, it was the learning imposed on us by the old education. And the only truly joyful moment was the day I left school forever—I have to thank the school for that.
However, this dislike of school is not a personal bias; I cannot remember anyone among my classmates who did not dislike this unchanging life. It suppressed and smoothed out our best interests. However, it was not until much later that I realized that this indifferent and impersonal life of our youth education was not due to the negligence of the national authorities, but concealed a deliberate and undisclosed intention. The world we faced, or rather, the world that governed our destiny, concentrated all its thoughts on pursuing a peaceful and prosperous idol, and it did not like the younger generation, or to put it more bluntly, it always doubted the younger generation. The civic society that felt proud of its orderly progress and sense of order claimed that calmness and moderation were the only effective virtues in all aspects of life, so any impatience that would lead us forward should be avoided. Austria was an ancient country ruled by an old emperor and managed by elderly ministers. It was a country without ambition, hoping only to prevent any radical changes and thus maintain its safe position within Europe. And the nature of young people is to constantly undergo rapid and radical changes. Therefore, they became a worrying factor that had to be excluded or suppressed as long as possible. So the state had no intention of making our student life enjoyable. We should wait patiently to get any form of promotion. Due to this constant postponement, age was completely measured by another standard, just like today. At that time, an eighteen-year-old high school student was treated like a child. If he was caught smoking on the spot, he would be punished, and if he wanted to leave his seat to go to the bathroom, he had to raise his hand respectfully. But on the other hand, at that time, even a thirty-year-old man would still be treated like an immature bird, and even at the age of forty, he would be considered inadequate for a responsible position.
No one seems to be able to escape being a cog in the machine.
Pt.2 Authoritarian "Education"#
Only by understanding this special concept can one understand that the state wants to fully utilize schools as tools to maintain its authority. Schools must first educate us to regard everything existing as perfect, the views of teachers as infallible, the words of fathers as irrefutable, and all facilities of the state as absolutely effective and everlasting. The second basic principle of this education is that young people should not be too comfortable. This principle is also implemented in families. Before granting young people certain rights, they should first understand that they have obligations, and mainly obligations of complete obedience. From the beginning, we should firmly remember: we have not made any contributions in our lives, we have no experience, we can only be grateful for everything given to us, and we have no right to ask any questions or make any demands. In my time, children were scared from an early age. Maids and foolish mothers scared them when they were three or four years old, saying that if they misbehaved, they would call the police.
Pt3. Fragility#
What we mistakenly called universal suffrage before actually only granted the property-owning bourgeoisie who paid a certain amount of taxes. However, the lawyers and farmers selected from this class sincerely believed that they were representatives and spokespersons of the people in parliament. They were proud to be educated people, and most of them were educated in higher institutions.
They valued dignity, decency, and elegant speech, so when the parliament met, it was like an evening discussion in an exclusive club. These bourgeois democrats sincerely believed that progress would be achieved through tolerance and reason, and they advocated using small compromises and gradual improvements to promote the welfare of all citizens, believing that this was the best way. But they completely forgot that they only represented the wealthy people living in the big cities, not the hundreds of thousands and millions of people in the whole state. During this period, machine production also played a role, concentrating workers who were previously scattered into industries. Under the leadership of a genius, Dr. Viktor Adler, Austria established a socialist party aimed at realizing the various demands of the proletariat; the proletariat demanded true universal and equal suffrage. However, as soon as this suffrage was implemented, or to be more precise, as soon as it was forced to be implemented, people immediately discovered how fragile the revered liberalism was. With the disappearance of liberalism, harmony in public political life also disappeared. Now there are conflicts everywhere. The struggle began.
Large stores and mass production bankrupted the petite bourgeoisie and master craftsmen. Dr. Karl Lueger—a popular, clever leader—used this dissatisfaction and concern to propose the slogan that the little people must be helped, attracting all the petty bourgeois and angry petite bourgeoisie to his side; because their fear of becoming proletarians from property owners far exceeded their jealousy of the wealthy. It was precisely this conscientious social class that later became the first large group of people around Hitler. In a sense, Karl Lueger was a role model for Hitler, teaching Hitler to use anti-Semitism at will. This slogan set a visible enemy for dissatisfied petite bourgeoisie and quietly shifted their hatred from wealthy landlords and feudal nobility.
However, we young people were completely immersed in our own literary interests and paid little attention to these dangerous changes in our country. In our eyes, there were only books and paintings. We were not interested in political and social issues. What meaning did that harsh quarrel have in our lives? When the whole city was excited about the election, we went to the library. When the masses rioted, we were writing and discussing poetry. We did not see the signal of the fire on the wall, but like the ancient King Belshazzar, we tasted various precious artistic delicacies without worry, without looking forward, until decades later, when the roof and walls collapsed on our heads, we realized that the foundation of the wall had long been hollowed out, and we realized that personal freedom had also declined in Europe with the beginning of the new century.
When young people can no longer obtain what they were "promised," when the wealth accumulated by generations is stolen, how can we move forward?