ILF POST

By Mary Catherine Bateson The news that President Obama has been awarded the Nobel Peace prize was greeted by a chorus of “too soon” in the United States. This early in his administration, he is still seen as a figure of hope rather than a figure of achievement. Even his strongest backers are waiting [...]

By Mary Catherine BatesonPresident Obama’s comments on abortion and his record in Illinois suggest a likely course on the death penalty: reduction and better regulation rather than abolition. This seems to be his style – reasoned and moderate reform. When it was found that there had been a number of mistaken convictions in Illinois, [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson. Following last year’s elections, debates about same-sex marriage continue in a number of states that have legislation pending. The possibility of gay marriage has the potential to strengthen, rather than weakening, the social fabric. Marriage involves both rights and responsibilities and it may be that the demands by the gay community [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson. It strikes me that it is time to look at the way candidates for the presidency are sometimes damaged by the process, at least temporarily and perhaps permanently. Yes, we are all no doubt flawed and it is wise to maintain that awareness and remain alert, to conserve a hint of [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson. Once again, current events, this time the financial crisis, are pressing voters into short term decisions, but it is important to address the current crisis with a positive vision of how the system should work in the long term, and a memory of the steps that led up to it over [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson.Hillary Clinton’s comments on Dr. King and President Johnson have set off a fire storm. What commentators have failed to realize is that they reflect both Clinton’s strengths and her weaknesses, as well as the real difference between her and Barack Obama. “Dr. King’s dream began to be realized when President Johnson [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson As the primaries approach and the endless campaign for the presidency heats up, we will be hearing a strange mixture of religious rhetoric and promises of violence. As a nation, we have apparently become more interested in having a president ready to “kick ass” than one with the vision and [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson In an earlier post on whether the Democrats should announce a detailed plan for Iraq before the elections, I advocated the prior necessity of affirming a number of basic principles in international relations on which the two major parties sometimes differ. One of these was the value of sustained interaction [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson All societies use respect and inclusion to reward socially valued behaviors, and embarrassment and shame to discourage unwanted ones. In small rural or tribal communities it is often possible to do virtually without sanctions or coercion other than mockery and the threat of ostracism — but it is [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson We often forget — and make far too little use of — the desire of people to belong to a community and to enjoy the respect of their neighbors. Distorted as they often are by hypocrisy and competition, these are the wellsprings of human sociality and our best hope for [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson Campaign rhetoric suggests that, while voters believe the policies of the Bush administration are not working, Democrats need to offer a specific “plan” for getting out of Iraq with some modicum of honor and responsibility and ending the constant loss of lives and billions of dollars. I want to suggest [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson Americans today are sharply divided and antagonistic about matters of religion. Suddenly the separation of Church and State seems to be under attack in a new way, and at the same time sectarian conflicts are increasing all over the world. Differences that could once largely be ignored have [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson Aging? Who wants to think about that? Probably most people don’t want to, but they do, usually with anxiety and without bringing much intelligence to bear. There are those reminders that keep you from forgetting for too long. A few gray hairs, a receding hairline, a forgotten errand. [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson Vice president Gore has made a movie which attempts to do two things: it attempts to make Americans really worried about climate change, worried enough to change their behavior, and it attempts to teach them to think about the issue. Personally, I would go for [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson Was it fear or anger that has made us so unthoughtful in our response to 9/11? Both tend to create stupidity – and probably there has been a mix. But let’s look at 9/11 to explore the way we think about intention and causation.
Certainly the terrorists set out to hurt [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson Back in 1986, when I started work with my colleague Richard Goldsby on a book about dawning global awareness of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, we chose the title Thinking AIDS in order to emphasize the fact that the emergence of a new disease was a moment to stop and think about human [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson Whatever happened to the youthful idealism of the 60s and 70s, and why do students today seem so preoccupied with careerism and their financial futures? One possible answer is that students today know that most of them will be in debt when they graduate.

By Mary Catherine BatesonIt is logical to assume that increasing diversity in the classroom will offer children and young people the opportunity for broader and deeper learning, and certainly one of the main goals of school is to expose children at every age to different kinds of people and challenge them to get along across [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson Will you be wise when you grow old? Don’t count on it, work on it. Traditionally, wisdom comes at the opposite end of the life cycle from education.
This model fits a society that is fairly stable, so that by maturity individuals have a basic competence in their culture that can [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson Does schooling in our society work against lifelong learning? Several years ago I had the pleasure of teaching a series of graduate seminars at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. I soon noticed that conversations about learning tended to slip over into conversations about education and from there into conversations about [...]

By Mary Catherine Bateson At this season of the year, as the days grow longer and spring approaches, households all over the country are awaiting news about college admissions and financial aid. At the same time our philosophy of education is being tested in debates about the federal budget for 2007 and [...]