{"id":15981,"date":"2016-11-30T18:08:12","date_gmt":"2016-11-30T23:08:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=15981"},"modified":"2016-11-30T18:08:12","modified_gmt":"2016-11-30T23:08:12","slug":"brocks-banter-the-power-of-knowledge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/brocks-banter-the-power-of-knowledge\/","title":{"rendered":"BROCK’S BANTER: The Power of Knowledge"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

Nobody wants to be a captive audience, but sometimes it is just easier \u2013 and more fruitful \u2013 to simply go with the flow.
\nLast Wednesday night I had the pleasure of sitting through the final dress rehearsal of the musical Spring Awakening, now on stage at Theatre Aurora.
\nBrought to life by director Sergio Calderon and a cast of 13, it is a potent and evocative mix of teen angst, sex, and the exploration of sexuality, sexual identity, intolerance, abortion, and rape.
\nYou\u2019re right; this is no Sound of Music. Despite the iconic Rodgers & Hammerstein musical being set in Austria, and this period musical by Steven Slater and Duncan Sheik set next door in Germany, it is there the similarities end.
\nThere are no happy-go-lucky nuns or lonely goatherds here in this unusually gritty tale.
\nThat is not to say taking in Spring Awakening is not a fun and indulgent way to spend an evening, because it certainly is, but it provides plenty of food for thought.
\nOne of the plot threads that particularly caught my attention was the relationship between the enlightened leading man Melchior and his na\u00efve, sheltered leading lady Wendla.
\nAlthough his knowledge of the sex is largely limited to knowledge gleaned from books \u2013 and trial and error \u2013 Melchior, by comparison to his peers, is a \u201cman of the world.\u201d The same can\u2019t be said for Wendla, who can\u2019t even root out from her mother how and why her married sister is popping out kids faster than the Kaiser is popping out machines of war.
\nThe teens eventually give into their base desires, Melchior knowing full well what the outcome could be, but Wendla having no inkling whatsoever that a quick roll in the hay could result in something tangible nine months down the road.
\nIt raises the question of whether Wendla, with such a deficit of knowledge could possibly be in a position to give consent to Melchior, a very modern question posed in material going back 125 years.
\nIt certainly piqued my own curiosity and arriving home after the show I headed over to my bookshelf and pulled a volume I hadn\u2019t picked up in quite a while \u2013 \u201cPurity & Truth: What A Young Man Ought To Know\u201d by Sylvanus Stall.
\nDating from 1897, it is something I picked up as a voracious collector of the weird and wonderful, rather than as how-to manual foisted upon me by my parents. Nevertheless, it provides some interesting reading and a synopsis of future volumes in the \u201cSelf & Sex Series\u201d including what young boys and girls \u201cought to know.\u201d
\nThe difference between the sexes is quite revealing.
\nAccording to the synopses, young boys ought to be aware of the \u201creproductive power\u201d God has bestowed in him, \u201cthe difference between creating and making\u201d, \u201cthe mama and papa nature\u201d in a stalk of corn, an oyster, a flower, schools of fish, nesting birds, and in the Garden of Eden.
\nMoving onto the spicier stuff, the book touches upon \u201cthe manner in which the reproductive organs are injured in boys by abuse\u201d compared to other animals, \u201cthe consequences in boys of the abuse [of said organs], need for proper information, how to preserve their bodies in purity and strength,\u201d and so on.
\nAs for the girls?
\nWell, it\u2019s quite simple: \u201cthe origin of life\u201d (as illustrated by the relationship between seed and soil, and the birds and the bees), \u201cfishes and their young \u2013 the parent fishes and the baby fishes, the seeds of plants and eggs of fishes, how fishes never know their baby offspring, lessons from birds, the relationship between parent and child, the body being a temple to keep holy\u201d and the importance of receiving \u201ctheir instruction from their mother.\u201d
\nFrom that, I think it is safe to surmise that the boys were slightly better equipped to enter the 20th Century compared to their female counterparts. If knowledge is power, the girls, undoubtedly by design, were in a distinct disadvantage.
\nBut is knowledge really power? Recent events have certainly called that into question.
\nAlmost all of us were raised in the belief that knowledge is indeed power. If we were lucky enough to grow up in a family where the resources were available to support a university or college education, or any part thereof, this was held as the standard to shoot for.
\nAlarmingly, however, it seems that knowledge and education in and of itself are acquiring something of a stigma, being a breeding ground for \u201celitism\u201d and those against the public at large.
\nThe fact that aspiring to higher education is being seen as elitist is alarming in itself, but so are the consequences.
\nThe examples in the United States are self-evident, with men and women with some sort of post-secondary education overwhelmingly choosing one presidential candidate over another, those in the other camp railing against the \u201celites\u201d and the characteristics ascribed to them, yet themselves being unable to discern between real and fake news.
\nNow, for better or worse, we know what that potent cocktail can lead to.
\nBut what of Canada?
\nWhile some of those aspiring to succeed Justin Trudeau in 2019 are railing against this \u201cother\u201d, seeming to be defined loosely as (a) those with resources, (b) those with education, or (c) all of the above, there is a common pattern when push comes to shove in a school budget.
\nThe first items invariably to hit the chopping block are arts-related subjects, often the only outlet students have for creative and intellectual self-expression, followed by the always beleaguered Civics, the very lessons of which teach students the rights they have and how to fight for the issues they hold dear.
\nTogether, both subjects are integral in ensuring the up-and-coming generation have the wherewithal to be critical thinkers, but they are somehow seen as expendable.
\nRecently, however, I was heartened to see a swift response to a November article in Macleans which
\nsuggested the Province is \u201cis quietly floating the idea of removing the\u2026mandatory civics course\u201d as a requirement of education.
\nThe thankfully overwhelming backlash to that trial balloon promoted the Ministry to issue a statement to allay fears that this is not the case.
\n\u201cThe passionate outcry to protect the Civics course over the past few days was inspiring to me as a Minister of Education, but also as a member of the elected assembly whose main job is to serve the people who gave me this responsibility by casting a vote,\u201d responded the Minister. \u201cStudents have contacted my office and told me about how Civics inspired them to get involved in public service, to consider roles that enhance our freedoms and rights as Canadians, and for some very ambitious young leaders out there, I have heard about how this course has piqued their interest in one day having my job as a Minister of the Crown.
\n\u201cIt is a right and a freedom to be engaged in this very democratic discussion about education in our province, and keeping Civics in our schools is integral in shaping young people to become Canada\u2019s next generation of engaged citizens.\u201d
\nBut it is also important to ensure young people realise that education, regardless of the path taken, is integral for them to be fully equipped in life, something to be celebrated, and it is not an aspiration for which they will be mocked when anger and dissatisfaction in other quarters bubble to the surface.
\nCivics teachers of tomorrow might have quite a task ahead of them.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir Nobody wants to be a captive audience, but sometimes it is just easier \u2013 and more fruitful \u2013 to simply go with the flow. Last Wednesday night I had the pleasure of sitting through the final dress rehearsal of the musical Spring Awakening, now on stage at Theatre Aurora. Brought to life […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[29,28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15981","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-columns","category-opinion"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-49L","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-14 21:39:27","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15981","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15981"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15981\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15981"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15981"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15981"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}