Blanket Man, Wellington 2008, photo by Jubalj, Wikimedia Commons.
Detail of Diogenes, painting by John William Waterhouse (1849–1917), Wikimedia Commons
Blanket Man, Wellington 2008, photo by Jubalj, Wikimedia Commons.
Detail of Diogenes, painting by John William Waterhouse (1849–1917), Wikimedia Commons
I was reading about industrial-strength education, the sort that delivers economic miracles which are supposed to make us prosperous and happy. It reminded me of the industrial-strength advertising campaign which sells beer through little jokes which always finish with ‘Yeah right’.
One of the consumers of beer was Ben Hana, mostly known as Blanket Man, who died on 15 January 2012. He showed no interest in economic miracles and knew that it was provocative to be smelly, visible, under-dressed and idle. He was loved and loathed. He earned a solid entry in Wikipedia* and became more famous than most of his critics. He was a de facto philosopher, perhaps not as smart as Diogenes but not so different.
Diogenes was a provocative Greek who was born about 2400 years before Greece’s current debt problems. He sometimes lived in a tub, wore little or nothing, and wandered with a lamp in the daylight looking for an honest man. He achieved lasting fame as one of the founders of ‘Cynicism’, a philosophy which has become an ordinary word in our language. For Diogenes, Cynicism was approximately in line with the lifestyle of Blanket Man.
When we talk about economic transformation we have to confront the Blanket Man question, which is: ‘Why bother?’ If our schools and universities produce more innovative scientists, will it make any difference? Will we still need to help some of our local kids to get breakfast every day? Will 34% of Maori leave secondary school with no qualification?
Ponder this. In 1978 the percentage of Maori leaving school with no qualification was 67%. On the face of it, industrial-strength education is making a difference. Would Diogenes have been impressed? Probably not. Cynics had no interest in property, conventional values, fame, power or reputation. They celebrated self-sufficiency and believed that the goal of life is happiness (to be achieved by living in harmony with nature). They spent no time on the internet and didn’t watch television. They demanded fierce, uncompromising integrity.
Can we build education in which money is a by-product of meaning rather than the object of meaning? Can we build education in which connectedness and relevance is more important than the annual presentation of the Budget?
One of the provocations of the TLC diploma programme is that we invite students to explore their creative purpose. What do they want? What has creative meaning for them? It’s a powerful experience and the results turn out to be different from anything that Diogenes might have predicted. In finding their personal meaning students discover how to support and encourage each other. They don’t need to wear a blanket and sit on a footpath all day because they connect with something that makes sense in their own world. They are no longer ruled by the folly of politicians and economists. The result, among other things, is what we call creativity.
At a national level there is a taboo about ‘meaning’ and ‘purpose’. Hence governments focus on economic matters which are supposed to enable us to do whatever it takes to make life meaningful. The paradox is that meaning has to come first. If people don’t have a sense of meaning then the Budget is going to be meaningless.
Another paradox is that meaning can’t be imposed in the manner of a budget. Collective meaning emerges from personal meaning. In TLC classes there are vast differences in personal meaning and yet we reach a collective balancing place where it is possible to work together.
It is important that Diogenes and Blanket Man poke at hypocrisy, remind us of our folly and assault our nostrils with the smell of humanity. It is also important to remember that folly doesn’t prevent us from making meaning and choosing creativity.
*(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Hana)