Systemic Beliefs...

Conformity is the foundation of many schools today. The way the school functions is that the school creates a binary sphere. In this right and wrong environment conformity towards the right way of doing things is the only possibility for the student’s progress. This is what Joel Springer calls, “prostitute of powers.” “The ultimate power, [Illich] believes, is the school’s effect on one’s self-concept; that is, education teaches individuals about their own personal abilities and character traits. People learn to think of themselves as stupid or bright, as being worthy or as being failures” (29). That is to say, students do not have a choice to venture in the grey area of a black and white sphere. In my opinion, they become products of the system which forces them to conform into a functioning society.
The prostitute of powers all seems a terrible outcome of the schooling system. When I looked back at my past experiences through the school system, I recall one particular incident where I got in trouble. We were all coloring in a coloring book and I kept going out of the lines. The teacher kept yelling at me about it…saying that that isn’t the right way of doing things. Looking back on it…do all artist color in the lines? Why can they have artistic freedom and I must conform to the school ideology and demands of right and wrong? Why could I not have that power to color the way I thought was fit? I still don’t understand the answer to this.