Part of the series Hangups
Written by Léo Gaumont, published on 2015-11-09.
Directing and exploiting world views is usually not in the best interest of the person being manipulated.
We are generally all ignorant of what is actually happening around us. This ignorance can either be perpetuated and capitalized upon or fixed to empower the masses. It is time to enlighten home educators who have generally been kept in the dark respecting what is occurring within their community. (Ephesians 4: 11-16)
Bible Reference: Col. 2:8
Last week, I described world view: that everyone has one; why everybody’s world view is corrupt; and how we defend what we believe to be true. This week I want to show how our world view can be directed and/or exploited.
Those who would desire to control people have long understood the importance and power of world view development and how we become the collection of things we experience. Read or listen to the news with a critical mind and you will quickly see how information can be presented to direct or influence the world view of the readers or listeners. People naturally assume that what is being presented or experienced is, in fact, true. All human institutions, including not only the media, but academia, government, schools, even some modern day churches can be quite adept at “programming” the world view of it’s adherents.
To direct the formation of a world view, all one has to do is to carefully present one side of an issue, throw in a bit of negative information for the opposing view and people will usually come to believe the information without questioning it. Whether the intent or the information is good or bad, deliberately programming people’s world view, using either guilt or threats, is nothing short of brainwashing. This is quite easy to do when people are not engaged in determining right from wrong or truth from lies. People who express an opinion without supporting argument are likely simply repeating what has been placed in their minds by others.
Our understanding of what constitutes a good, “standard” education is a case in point. Since we have had little outside the secular school model presented, advanced, normalized and experienced for several generations, “doing” school has become a fixed element of our collective educational world view, by default. In fact, even though the secular version of education is based on the non-existence of God, those professing a Christian faith in God are still far more likely to advance it or blend it with their faith than to search and follow the directives given in the scripture. Lacking biblical understanding of what constitutes a God directed approach to the training and teaching of children, we default to employing familiar secular educational philosophies creating a rather confused mix of ideas called “Christian Education”. This is true even of home educators, although the likelihood of having a better understanding of the issues is greater for those who are not unquestioningly involved in public education.
To exploit a world view, one simply has to agree with the people, whether their world view is based on truth or lies, developed or directed. Understanding that it is far more difficult to change a world view than to rectify it when in error, manipulators and exploiters will agree with people’s faulty understanding and say or do whatever “seems right” in the eyes of the “potential client”, clearly motivated by self-interest.
Any world view that is ignored and/or exploited will naturally self-perpetuate and normalize. When a particular world view is carefully advanced, it should go without saying that alternatives will be stigmatized as radical. When directing and/or exploiting a faulty world view, people do not “come to” but are “provided with” a knowledge of the “truth” or what an outside agency wants them to believe is true. Basing our world view development on anything less than a sincere desire to come to the knowledge of the truth will only lead us to error in a corrupted world view and result in bad judgments and decisions respecting our lives and those we in turn influence.