Freedom, isolation and privilege by Toby Payne-Cook
The unprecedented (peacetime) economic and social impact of the COVID-19 virus has only just begun. These are deeply unsettling and uncertain times for all of us, to varying degrees, on many fronts.
For me personally, the response to this pandemic [the closed schools, the cancelled exams, the cancelled national and international events, the decimated travel and leisure industry; the irreparable malaise on the high street; the cleaner air; the social and celebratory gatherings on indefinite hold; the strengthening of local communities; the tightening of the family unit] stirs the neurons and brain chemicals of my meandering, existentialist and philosophical mind. This could lead to a lot of thought experiments. And a lot of blog posts. Sorry.
We do not know exactly what in our economic, educational and healthcare systems will irreversibly change after this pandemic has passed but we do know that this extended period of uncertainty and national segregation provides us with an unintended period of reflection. A pause. A period of reflection where quietly supressed questions may come to the fore, questions like, “What is a school?”, “What is a school’s primary purpose?” “Do we really need exams?” “What is the most effective medium or place for learning; for education?” “What is education for?” “What should everybody learn, when and where should they learn it?” “What do we really need?” “What makes us happy?” “Why have we given the global free market economy such a free reign over the last half-century?” “Why are we so surprised this pandemic has happened?” “What is freedom?” “What is social responsibility?” “Does this crisis provide us with a clearer path forward through the climate crisis?” “Does this crisis accelerate our pathway towards universal basic income?” “Will this crisis irreversibly change our culture?” and finally, “Do the advantages of the internet & the smartphone now greatly outweigh the disadvantages?”
Back in early January, I wrote a blog titled “Preservers, Disrupters and Dreamers” about my internal conflict between preserving the status quo, disrupting the system and hiding from mainstream society in a perpetually dreamy, philosophical and literary state. Well, how quickly things change: there is no status quo to preserve (everything is up in the air), the virus has well and truly disrupted the system in an almost completely unforeseen manner so I am left with only my favoured dreamy state for solace and contemplation. For this I am fortunate. My interest in books, ideas, philosophy and a potent mix of analytical and creative thinking are symbiotic with the enforced isolation, social distancing, school closures and simpler lifestyle this crisis demands.
Many are so rooted in our relentless 24/7 culture of entertainment, of instant gratification, of frequent cheap travel, of the modern urban existence and of busy social lives (both personally and professionally) that there is a real risk of a secondary mental health pandemic. My beloved 78 year old Aunt in law is feeling this. She is relentlessly restless; her whole world built upon being busy, being social, never ever being in one place for more than 10 days. She is deeply shaken by this. She has a lovely husband of 84 but will still feel lonely. We will call her daily, twice daily, we will keep her spirits up but there is a real risk that her psychology will consume her. Perhaps half the population are like this? We have routines, rituals and perceived freedoms taken from us that risk rattling our mental states to the core. Singing online, calling up old friends and relatives, singing from balconies, humour – sometimes black humour – and idiots singing wurzel songs from bedroom windows will all help to raise our spirits but ultimately freedom is a state of mind, so we have to dig deep to find out how to free our minds, to let them wander and imagine, to let them dream and think creatively, to read, to write and to play games, to draw, to paint, to learn an instrument and – yes – to make inane TikTok videos.
Only last Saturday – almost a lifetime of news away – did I attend my first #BrewEd gathering, the brilliantly organised #BrewEdNorthLondon, full of lovely people with an inclusivity theme. I think I fitted in, I think I offered something, I know I loved participating, listening and learning but everyone else there was much more transparently driven by the social care, social justice, the more egalitarian, more inclusive, the less privileged elements of school and education as a force for good, a force for improving society. I was humbled by this, working as I do in an independent prep school and teaching Science in KS2 and KS3. The awesome Penny Rabiger (@Penny_Ten) got us all to check our privilege, and I am – undoubtedly – a privileged, affluent, white, middle-aged man. I was born with a pewter spoon in my mouth and my kids through marriage have been born with silver spoons in theirs. But privilege is not something we can eradicate: I cannot help that MY Dad’s sperm met MY Mum’s egg; I cannot help that I was sent to private schools; I cannot help that I went on to university riding a tide of social engineering and intellectual curiosity; I cannot help that I fell in love with chemistry and was influenced by working for three huge great whopping multinational corporations. I CAN help that I choose to teach in an independent prep school. If universal middle schools existed in our educational system I would jump. I may jump anyway. I may have to. Or I may just keep on keeping on, creating a fantasy edutopia in my mind and waiting for someone else to share my eureka moment and say, “Hey Toby, you’ve got this. Your time has come, let’s redesign this clunky beast of an education system and mould it in your image!” That time may come sooner than anticipated in a post COVID world. But that is the subject of a future blog(s).
So we can’t un-invent privilege (but we can check it) just as we can’t uninvent electricity and all its consequences. We can’t uninvent the motor car. We can’t uninvent money, nor the desire for it. But we can – it seems – uninvent freedom. We have to temporarily reduce freedom to secure hospital care for those who most need it, to protect the vulnerable and to curtail this blessed, tiny yet mighty little virus thing.
Freedom is a curious concept. Rousseau said that, “Man is born free yet everywhere he is in chains.” We’re not really free. We are socially conditioned onto an economically driven path through life. A few of us renounce that economically driven path and stick to an older, more tried and tested, spiritually or morally guided path but we are all – to varying degrees – seduced by the trappings of economics. We need money to live, we need money for social status and we need money for most forms of modern leisure activity. So we are not really free because there are numerous unwritten conventions to how we live our lives and how we conform to society. In post war, predominantly affluent, Western societies we have become richer and that has bought us more (perceived) freedom.
As GCSE & A level exams being cancelled this summer is a hot and complex topic for schools and Y11 and Y13 students to grapple with, let’s go back to 1951 when A levels and O levels were first introduced. Back then exams were entry tests for university courses or for sixth form courses. They weren’t the modern clunking beast of league tables, school data, comparative data, measurement of learning or whatever they have become. They mattered but they weren’t the huge cultural phenomenon they are today. There probably weren’t pictures of smiling kids and their certificates on the front page of the Daily Mail.
What would the summer after those exams have been like for those students? Full of work on farms, in fields, in factories, in pubs and in cafés. There may have been an end of year party, one or two perhaps. But there wouldn’t have been Reading festival or Glastonbury; a week in Ibiza or Ayia Napa with your mates; a summer of parties; there wouldn’t have been sexual freedom; of vodka red bull or mild narcotics. There wouldn’t have been TV, Netflix, Fortnite, Instagram, Snapchat or TikTok. No gym, no multiplex, probably no car or no mates with a car either. No Costa, no café in the basement philosophy section of Waterstones, not even any rock and roll (quite yet).
I don’t mean to be a retrograde luddite, but school was just something you did, work was something that happened after school, holidays were still largely multi-generational for one week a year to a thriving British Seaside resort, if you were lucky. Our pleasure seeking, consumer culture had not really kicked off. Life was undoubtedly harder work but maybe not harder, because there was less freedom, therefore less choice, therefore greater acceptance of the status quo.
Since the early 1950s our culture has been transformed. I – as with many readers – have greatly benefitted from this. The contraceptive pill, rock and roll music, cheap flights, the ubiquity of the motor car, pubs, clubs, bars, global cuisine, television and music festivals – especially music festivals – have greatly enriched my life and my faith in the collective seething mass of humanity. Nowhere have I felt more a part of humanity than standing in a field in Somerset with 100,000 others, collectively worshipping in the euphoria of live music. I am so sad for Glastonbury that they have had to cancel their 50th birthday party. I am sad for football fans looking forward to the Euro 2020; sad for our culturally rich, diverse and predominantly inspirational celebration of human determination and sportsmanship that is the Olympic games and I am sad for all those planning parties, weddings and smaller gatherings which will have to be put on hold.
My son in Year 12 had the most ridiculous celebration of post GCSE life last summer which this year’s cohort may not have. My daughter in year 10 is looking forward to the climax of all she finds challenging, boring and exciting in school next year. My kids have the most wonderful freedoms and opportunities in their privileged schooling. They are the over entertained and sometimes trophy, project parented generation. They are wonderful people but lest us not forget that all they see, all they know is on a plate; taken for granted. Their lives are full of consumerist, cultural adornments.
We all need something to look forward to: a gig, a cinema trip, a holiday, a music festival; cheap hostel hopping around Europe. I will be gutted if the two festivals I plan to go this summer are cancelled. But this relentless entertainment, or escape from the day to day is no way to live. If our lives are driven by FOMO, or supercharged by materialism when THIS happens; this huge, society shaking pandemic comes for us we will feel like it is the end of the world. There will be hardship, illness and loss but in the most part there will be a brief (for several months) sacrifice of our freedom.
This is where I feel most privileged. While I am the product of social elitism, while I am an affluent, white middle class, middle aged man my childhood was isolated, bucolic and blissful. Simple too. No holidays abroad. Simple food. Old bangers for the family car. For whatever reason my parents sacrificed all other creature comforts to privately educate me – I have no idea why but they did because it was done to them beforehand; it was the culture bestowed upon them. I grew up in rural, sleepy North Devon, most of my school friends over 100 miles away. I grew up in fields, at the foot of buzzing hedgerows. I grew up in the outdoors, roaming mostly alone. I grew up appreciating nature and my part in it. I lost my Dad at 16. I understand what it feels like to have a parent taken from you. I’ve seen suffering, I’ve felt loss. I was privileged because I found myself early in life. My independence, my imagination, my nature inspired curiosity were shaped by my early childhood experience.
Since my mid thirties, (I’m 47 now), I’ve discovered a love of reading, a fascination with the human condition, with philosophy and with writing. Despite my love of live music; of pubs and social gatherings, of watching my kids play sport being temporarily taken from me, I’m quite happy with a book; a word processor; in my garden; playing games and talking with my immediate family, and walking in our green, pleasant land. I’m lucky. I’m privileged. Freedom is a state of mind.
This difficult episode in our lives will challenge us in many different ways but I hope that it teaches us all to appreciate the simple things in life, to build our happy place around books, gardens, nature, love and true friendship rather than a constant quest for pleasure seeking, or fear of missing out.
Finally we have each other. Perhaps the greatest irony of all this is that our global connectivity both caused this pandemic and it will help us to get through it in a positive frame of mind.
Take care everyone.
Next: What is school for?
CREducATE 