The Educational Changes Bringing Back Serfdom
And serfdom is being converted into subtle slavery
I was shocked when my mother sent me the fee structure and accommodation for entry into college.
It was equivalent to the salary of a junior doctor.
My initial reaction was that it was instituted slavery. Further contemplation showed that it wasn’t technically slavery. It was more of serfdom, the modern kind.
Following the string of thought showed it for what it was — slavery masked as serfdom.
Serfdom at a time of declining educational value
When I joined college, I was on my own.
More like, I had my family for support that came in spirit. My sister would at times send me something I had to apportion evenly and, with judicious concern for my survival, a week at a time. A meal a day was my biggest concern, since I knew I would always pass my exams, despite the academic demands of becoming a doctor.
High school was relatively easier. From the first year, I made deals with my teachers. I lead a subject, and they reward me by ensuring I get half a loaf every day for a week. Four subjects were enough to earn me a generous diet every day. It was a walk in the park.
My classmates often thought I was loaded, swimming in money. Far from it. In addition, the top students were also rewarded in the same way by the school.
From the third year onwards, they switched it up and started giving us money. I like to say that I started working from this point onward, because I have never stopped. Looking back, I had it easy in high school because campus brought other demands.
In medicine, the top student does not mean you will be the best doctor. The patient is the final test. No half-loaves there. Furthermore, only after you have graduated to become a doctor will you start to reap from the struggles of years' worth of reading. Continuous reading exemplifies the life of a caring doctor. One who cares for their patients and themselves.
I was lucky to get somewhat sponsored by the government after ranking among the top achievers in the national high school examination. Hindsight analysis, however, showed how this was a red-carpeted entry into serfdom.
Campus students are promised financial support from the government by the institution known as the Higher Education Loans Board. HELB in short. We call it for what it is, a loan. Loans carry interest.
Interest, the word, carries two meanings. The first is financial. I lend you money. You return the principle plus the extra icing on the cake.
The second meaning shows just that: an alignment of goals. I am interested in your need for money. You are interested in the pursuit of higher education. Our interests align. I give you money. You promise to return it, but with a heavy condition. You must repay. We will keep you until you pay the last cent. The naïve youth, whose problems are solved with a push of a button, concedes.
I paid my fees from my earnings in my first year. Pressure from back home encouraged me to get HELB’s assistance for my second year, a tough time that was. I had submitted my application just as I had started landing writing gigs. With that single application, I was sold into serfdom.
Serfdom emerged after the Agrarian Revolution, a product of increased conversion of arable land into plantations. Machines had not advanced to convert the hoe into the tractor. Thus, land owners could keep families in bondage with the promise of a fraction of the harvest.
Serfdom is debt bondage. As long as you’re in bondage, the power lies with the one who lends the debt. A smokescreen of individuality clouds one from the reality that they are owned.
When a bank lends you a loan or an overdraft, they own you. It’s a small amount. When you borrow the equivalent of what the bank has in its reserves or more, you own the bank. Ownership switches when the scales of debt increase.
Serfs could never switch this scale. Feudalist owners, therefore, had a ready family to work on their lands. More family members meant more hands. More hands mean more for the family. Numbers were a plus. The family would hardly get out of the bondage because they aren’t educated enough to argue against the unfair debt burdens. Also, the overwhelming ‘mercy’ of the owner cannot be quantified. Forever a serf.
Education is the modern land. More students means more heads to work on this land. Bondage comes through the loans. Loans increase in interest whether or not you have employment. The unemployment rate has always been rising, but is about to lift off to stratospheric levels.
Worry occupies the whirlpool of thought for the campus student, who sees how automation will take over their future work. Up until you leave campus and find that the slot you hopped to occupy is still occupied by someone who completed their undergrad 10 years ago. They have no plans of leaving. Meanwhile, your loan continues to increase. Serfdom.
I felt the pangs of it after I finished my internship. No income. Expenses still knock at your door. These daylight horrors can be so inconsiderate as to visit your dreams. I’ve been a ‘lucky’ victim. Modern serfdom does not give you peace, even when you try to sleep your problems away.
Worse still, you will be blamed for not working hard enough. The magnates create the systemic problem, and then blame individuals. Create a better CV. Where will that land you? A few winners, of course. The rest have just added an extra expense, buying the skill of that guy who plans to embellish your resume with the promise of landing you your next job in record time. For the most part, you’re left with a rosy resume.
Recall that masters control everything in the feudal land. You cannot exit the country without a certificate to confirm you have completed your debt. Thus, you become bonded. The economy makes money through your suffering in pursuit of what we were promised to be the key to success. A small caveat was left out of this dream. When they said education is the key to success, they meant the success of the economy. Not yours.
Oblivious to the cause, prosperously bankrupt.
So when I saw the fee structure for my small brother and sister, I narrowed the scheme down to serfdom.
Lauryn Hill raps:
Publicly perpetrating that “In God We Trust”
Which we can replace with “Education is the key to success”.
Is it?
Slavery is different. Masters expressed complete dominion over slaves. They could be abused, harassed, sold, killed, and, like nothing ever happened, replaced with immediate effect.
So you got your first job. Lucky you. Lucky me. You now start servicing your loan like the law-abiding citizen you are. The employer does not pay you enough to cover your expenses, but just enough to get you by. While you serve your original master, service to your newest one keeps you afloat. Numbers don’t help here.
Neither men nor women can afford to have children. Heck, for men, no woman would want someone like you. No woman would subject themselves to pregnancy and a life of suffering because the next meal is not a guarantee. Education, the new “agricultural land” does not need more heads in terms of reproductive rates. The government can manufacture that. Here’s how they do it.
First, they let math do the work. Interest is their newest reproduction rate. It accumulates. Compound interest serves the feudal landowners. It bonds the victims, the ones in pursuit of knowledge. As long as compound interest is at work, the youth cannot give birth at all, and still, the economy will continue to demand more from them.
Secondly, they make sure education is free. In Kenya, they said that no student should repeat. Everyone proceeds to the next level. That’s another way of ensuring there are always serfs working in the field.
Combine the two to achieve a lollapalooza effect by increasing the tuition fees. We have a winner. A six-figure tuition fee, matching the salary of less than 5% of individuals in the country, is forced on everyone seeking higher education. How, may I ask, is education a right? Isn’t that just the same as saying that serfdom is a right?
Clothed in the sanctified robe of a sustainable development goal, education is preached as necessary for everyone. Meanwhile, the value of the degree holders continues to plummet faster than the rise of tuition fees.
Education is a mirror. And like my seniors like to say, the brain only sees what it knows. For most brains, education is the key. For other minds, it is a ticket into bondage. For yet another minority, it’s a conveyor belt of money.
How is this related to slavery?
Well, it might not be as brutal as we have always known it from history, but it has similarities. Debt recovery units can claim, harass, and forcefully obtain what is owed to them. The risk of incarceration forces individuals to get into further debt. Working for Peter to pay Paul. Peter wants you to report to work on time, but he will reward you with pizza at the end of the quarter for making a lot of money for him. Paul doesn’t care about your relationship with Peter: he wants his money.
In the past, the leaders would gain favour with the public by officiating a year of rebirth. Debts would be written off, and families would be reunited with their loved ones who were sold to keep up with the rising interest rates. When you have suffered for the longest time, this momentary pseudofreedom tastes like heaven. This overhanging method of controlling the oblivious masses would persist.
Nations, however, have no such powers. So what do they do? They negotiate deals to have their unemployed youth work in other countries. They educate you, then keep you unemployed but still in debt, and then sell you to another country. Slavery anybody?
They continue selling the dream of a fruitful future. It almost feels unreal. But you are still in bondage. Once you are there, the responsibility is not theirs; it is solely yours. You will be blamed for any ills, and praises will go back to the government that sold you. Some crumbs might fall at your feet, enough to keep you hooked. Crumbs wrongly perceived as bread:
Children, eat your bread
Little children, eat your bread
’Cause it all, all falls down
Telling you all, it all falls down
Harassment has wound its way back into lives. Death not through the guillotine, but by a thousand cuts. Modern serfdom manufactures low-agency individuals for later serfdom and occasionally, slavery. I am not a fan of this kind of education. In the words of the legendary rapper:
Counterfeit wisdom creating the
Illusion of freedom confusion consumes them
What I’m trying to say is…
Education is a breeding ground for low-agency individuals to continue working in the fields for their entire lives. Like all stories, some people manage to escape. Stories are written about these heroes and sold to the very people in the field, but whose agency has been diluted with years of education.
High agency is feared heavily by the rulers. High agency is what we need to foster. High agency is what George Mark consistently preaches. Several modern practices continue to bleed it out.
Will and Ariel Durant agree that, if there’s anything the rich like, it’s to preserve their freedom while impoverishing the weak by encouraging equality. The rich don’t like equality. The poor do. So they carry on with education, the so-called greatest equalizer. The stinking rich, in contrast, future-proof their freedom through education.
I felt a sense of freedom when I paid the full amount owed to HELB in a single transaction. My steps were lighter. I was debt-free. But then I saw the fee structure of my younger siblings. Then reality hit me — history does its rebounds.
This song inspired some of the lines used in this article. Source — YouTube