When Oafs and Barbarians Decide "Strategic Priorities"

 

So, our illustrious Education Minister Gavin Williamson says that arts subjects in universities will have their budgets slashed and suggests that they are "not strategic priorities". Presumably what is laughingly termed the "core" subjects - maths, the "hard" sciences, technology etc. are priorities and will not be similarly treated. Mmmmm?

No-one disputes the absolutely critical importance and value of the sciences, they deserve whatever funding is required for they are the backbone and provide the facts upon which our modern world, interconnected, global world operates; they underpin our medicine, our science, our technology our businesses and the rest. Without them every aspect of our modern lifestyle would soon crumble.

But, and it's a big but, whilst maths, science and technology etc. might tell us how much it costs to fly or how the engines on the jumbo jet work and keep the plane high in the sky all the way to Australia, they will tell us little about what Australia is like, or why English is the language of Australians, nor will they help me to understand the spiritual beliefs and sacred nature of Uluru  to the Aborigine peoples. They might produce wonderful technology that streams music instantly around the world but they won't tell us about the beauty of a Bach concerto or a great love song. They might help to build great concert halls or provide sound systems for a great theatre but they won't help us to appreciate a stunning performance of Swan Lake or to empathise and weep when we hear an actor declaim some great lines from Shakespeare or to understand the characters and their world in a musical like Les Mis. They will give me the technology to view my bank account at the click of a mouse button but they won't give me any guidance or understanding to ensure that I spend my money wisely for the good of not only myself but my family and for the world. They might give me a complex mathematical equation or algorithm to calculate what my chances of catching Covid are or whether my granddaughters will get their required grades in their exams but they won't be any help at all in helping me to understand and to have the emotional maturity to sympathise when an old friend dies of Covid or when teenagers struggle with mental health issues, as they did last year, because the algorithm went up the spout and the exam system became a fiasco. They might give me a knowledge of numbers so that I can understand and make meaningful sense of a date like 375BC but won't explain to me that in that year Plato published his great tract The Republic in which are rooted many or most of our modern day views of justice or morality nor, when I read the number 1819 and understand the numerical place values in that number - thousands, hundreds, tens and units - will mathematics or science help me to understand that the Peterloo Massacre occurred in that year and that it had a profound effect upon upon the political life of the nation and upon the very great political and social rights and freedoms that I enjoy today

I could go on. Yes, science, maths and technology are vitally important but they are not greater priorities than the arts - history, dance, archeology, music, literature, foreign languages, philosophy and the rest. Science and maths give us the knowledge, to create the world that we want but the arts enable us to make sense of our world, to understand our fellow man and woman and recognise what makes them tick, to learn to be empathetic, to see the other guy's point of view, to appreciate beauty in whatever form it takes, to think complex thoughts, to be able to appreciate the beauty of a small flower in the hedgerow or a bee buzzing over a garden plant but at the same time be overcome and overawed at the mighty spectacle of the Grand Canyon or the serene majesty of the Taj Mahal, to be moved and inspired by a profound piece of poetry or, because of one's knowledge of the nation's proud history, to be stirred and proud when our country wins the World Cup or we stand in silence on Remembrance Day, to know what is worthwhile and understand what is decent, just, right or fair or to be able to recognise, feel, or perhaps understand our own and wider mankind's spiritual aspects and needs. Equations and theories, wonderful and often magical though they are do not pass on these deeper aspects of our existence.

In short, and to put it another way Gavin Williamson's "strategic priorities" - maths, science, technology etc.- give us knowledge and teach us facts but those areas that he tells us are somehow less valuable and "not strategic priorities" give us so much more, they give us that most precious commodity - it's called wisdom - and they teach us how to be, and what it is to be, human. The man is an oaf - in keeping with the rest of the political rabble that is the modern day Tory party and their outriders. In days gone by the ancient Greeks or the Roman's would have recognised this and he and they would have been condemned as "barbarians" - uncivilized, without wisdom, lacking in any sort of culture