00:03:41.360And Forbes magazine also said that it is costing,
00:03:44.140that statistic, that 54% is costing the U.S. economy $2.1 trillion a year.
00:03:52.4802.1, might've been 2.2, $2.1 trillion a year. So when people say, why does that matter? Well,
00:04:02.800there it is. And the reason why that matters, the reason why that two point, they're like,
00:04:07.580I don't understand. Well, because these individuals haven't been given, haven't been,
00:04:12.480allowed in some senses, haven't been educated well enough to be successful in the ever-changing
00:04:21.500market that is the United States of America. They haven't been taught how to be successful
00:04:26.880in this growing technological and socially diverse cultural reality that not just the
00:04:35.160United States finds itself in, but as do Canadians. A lot of people are like, well,
00:04:38.940what's the Canadian number? Well, this number is about 14% higher than the Canadian. There's 14%
00:04:45.880more illiterate people in the United States than in Canada.
00:04:52.420When I think about that, there's a lot of factors that go into that number, right? Let's assume,
00:04:59.440because I don't know if they can really, I didn't see a breakdown, but let's assume this.
00:05:03.360Let's assume there's a significant part of that number, maybe not significant, but a portion of that number who are new immigrants and new immigrants with English being their second language.
00:05:17.100So it's not that they're illiterate. It's not that they're not have that capacity of education. It's that they are now relearning or learning a whole new language and a whole new vocabulary as they enter the United States.
00:05:32.640maybe they spoke English as a second language from the country from which they came. But
00:05:37.400nonetheless, at this one, they're really having to sort of up that game. So I'm going to place
00:05:44.240them separately because I don't think that's an educational flaw. I'm also going to place
00:05:48.320separately individuals, let's say, that are battling dyslexia or battling learning differences
00:05:57.000that have made it incredibly hard for them, given, you know, the level of ability that
00:06:05.940they're working with and what they have to fight through, I think that we can definitely
00:06:18.700Although what I'm about to explain, I think, disproportionately affects people that don't
00:06:25.160necessarily learn in the given structure, especially that American educational institutes
00:06:31.400have just thrown down and called it a day. And as I'm thinking about all this, I can't help but
00:06:38.280bring my mind to things like standardized testing. I can't help but bring my mind to things like
00:06:46.920IQ tests, bring my mind to the fact that there's no nationalization of education,
00:06:53.160and there's not in Canada either. But as far as state curriculum and state imposition of what is
00:06:59.360to be taught and how it's to be taught and how it gets funded and who gets funded, those are
00:07:04.300different state to state, county to county. And all of that, to me, allows for a level of
00:07:12.000injustice, allows for a level of foundational cracks that won't let this country progress
00:07:23.980to where it is, or to where it's supposed to be.
00:07:26.500The United States is, what, the richest, most powerful nation in the world, and 54% of its
00:07:34.320people can't understand a vocabulary higher than that of a grade 6 student.
00:07:40.960Now, what are the reasons? And this is where I get agitated, right? The number one reason has to be a lack of funding, a lack of consistency, a lack of accountability, government accountability when it comes to funding and giving resources and ensuring the educational system in each state, each county, each town is at a very basic minimum of
00:08:10.960you know, their capacity is at a minimal. They cut funding left, right, and center.
00:08:18.220And as we've seen things go on in the last few years, you've seen a real attack on education,
00:08:23.980haven't we? You've seen a real attack. Now, pulling money from education is a great way
00:08:29.840to save money. And you have a lot of political leaders doing so, saying they don't need all
00:08:33.760this money. Teachers don't need all this money. You know, they just need, they just want handouts.
00:08:38.300they just want this, because education is expensive. Make no mistake. Education is
00:08:44.380expensive. But $2.1 trillion is the consequence of poor education. It's not a poor people.
00:08:54.260It's not an incapable population. This number, this 54%, and since it's not nationalized,
00:09:05.440it has to reside on state government laws. Then I start to think, why? Why in this country,
00:09:14.040where we can recognize, especially since the 70s and 80s, this major, major shift of economy,
00:09:22.920this major shift of globalization, this major shift of where jobs are located,
00:09:28.180and the absolute fundamental need of more education.
00:09:46.160Saying that we need to get back to the principles, reading, writing, arithmetic, right?0.98
00:09:51.500They love to say those three freaking words.0.56
00:09:53.900They love to say it as though the failure of education isn't about anything I've just stipulated, isn't about not having a consistent curriculum, isn't about resigning yourself to standardized tests as though that's the only means of testing, which in fact, it's the most ridiculous, lacking source of judging somebody's intelligence or capacity.0.97
00:10:18.040I'm going to come back to standardized testing. But it's a way of hobbling, limiting
00:10:24.120individuals within states for what? Because it's not making their economy any better.
00:10:31.860It's not giving them transferable skills. It's not making them aware of an ever-growing
00:10:37.780worldwide global need to understand the economy, to understand social networks, to understand
00:10:46.140all of these foundational ideologies that a lot of people are trying to cut out of education
00:10:52.320altogether. Why? Why are they doing that? And again, I'm not a big conspiracy. Anybody who
00:10:59.640knows me and listen to anything I've done, I'm not big on conspiracies. I'm really not. They
00:11:05.460give me a headache. I don't think that way. I don't know if this is much of a conspiracy as it
00:11:10.660is a control of political forces in order to make sure that kids aren't growing up with the sense
00:11:21.700and the capacity to understand the big conversations that politicians are having.
00:11:27.040And if we can't understand the conversations they're having, how in the hell are we supposed
00:11:30.820to vote on them? How are we supposed to have a functional democracy? When they aren't talking
00:11:37.300at a grade six level, they are talking at a highly academic, highly political, with
00:11:45.080complicated economic structures and ideologies that, for the most part, the majority of Americans
00:11:54.200can't understand. How are we supposed to have a functional democracy in that capacity? And
00:11:59.560they're using it as this wedge issue, right? They're using it, and again, predominantly
00:12:06.540the alt-right is using it as this wedge issue, as though education's gotten worse. No, it hasn't.
00:12:12.920The only reason it's gotten worse in any way, shape, or form is because you have hobbled the
00:12:16.840educators. You have limited their power. You have created no functional curriculum, no rational
00:12:24.280curriculum. You have limited time after time after time the arts, the liberal arts, history,
00:12:32.620philosophy english politics society world religions all these courses you have deemed
00:12:39.700not useful in any way shape or form are the conversations and the vocabulary that we need
00:12:47.620to understand politicians before we vote so they're pushing us into step a lot of these
00:12:54.720individuals do i do i understand the need for math and science of course i do do i understand
00:13:01.000the need for math and science in in absolution no in negation of the social science are you crazy
00:13:11.560are we supposed to just be a science-based society where we don't speak about art and music and
00:13:18.040literature we don't speak about the interconnectedness of humanity we don't speak about the philosophical
00:13:26.120sociological and psychological connections between all of the people on the planet that
00:13:31.000make everything else happen the only reason those people don't want to speaking like that
00:13:37.880is because if they can dumb it down and pit person a versus person b on the basis of language they
00:13:47.400have yet to understand they can drive their power without any real accountability because the people
00:13:55.960don't understand the language they're using. So I think about this 54%, and I think this has to be0.50
00:14:06.120the national emergency. We're talking about gas, we're talking about pandemics, we're talking about1.00
00:14:13.080whether we're wearing masks. People on Twitter are arguing virology as though they understand it,
00:14:19.640Yet, 54% have the reading and comprehension skills of that of a grade six.
00:14:47.700So when I talk about Trump being on Twitter, a lot of people are like, what's the connection? Well, the connection is this. If 54% of the population likes what he says because he can't distinguish between their and they are, and they're drawn to his, let's say, dumbing down of the issues, the issues that shouldn't be dumbed down.
00:15:10.840The issues that if any intelligent person was to have a conversation about them can't be dumbed down.
00:15:17.500As soon as you dumb down big issues, you make them useless to be spoken about.
00:15:27.440Anybody who is anybody, if they're talking about education, should be saying how much we need to pour more money into it.
00:15:34.600We need to have more robust education.
00:15:36.580We need to have different areas in order to inspire and get at different learning styles, different types of genius, different types of individuals.
00:15:47.220We need to ensure that things like learning, you know, learning exceptionalities and things like dyslexia and all of these things that get in kids way.
00:15:55.260We need to learn how to break down those walls.
00:15:57.100We need to have more proficient and educated individuals step into the classroom with super high proficiency in order to help those individuals.
00:16:06.580And that, guys, is not a waste of money.
00:29:41.840I think having a more holistic, all-encompassing, renaissance type of education is what we should
00:29:49.820be pushing for. Stop narrowing the field for these kids. But it's going to cost money.
00:29:58.160And the first place we have to start at, the only place that is the foundation for everything
00:30:03.080is literacy and comprehension. Building a vocabulary, talking about these words that
00:30:10.500control our lives. Words matter. Vocabulary matters. Language changes and it adjusts.
00:30:20.100And it's about time that we see how that can adjust. It's about time that we allow our students
00:30:29.700the capacity to embolden that language, to push forward in that language rather than to resign
00:30:36.380themselves only occupying and relegating a grade six level language is it reading and writing
00:30:46.620don't make it sound like it's so easy it's not just reading it's comprehending it's applying
00:30:53.340it's critically analyzing do those words work anymore what value do they have when you hear
00:30:59.420about the right talking about what is a woman and they and they use it as this simplistic terminology
00:31:06.380An educated individual understands there's nothing simplistic about it. There's nothing simplistic about genetics. There's nothing simplistic about socialization of gender. There's nothing simplistic about the social construction of binaries, about how we present ourselves and the way the world in which looks at us and grants us favor or excludes us.
00:31:29.520There's nothing simplistic about those conversations, but they set it up as a dichotomy.
00:32:10.560But we're going to all learn every word I use that maybe is too big for a grade seven, maybe is too big for a grade 10, but in one sense.
00:32:24.220but in another sense, there is not a single age that we can't intensify and expand vocabulary.
00:32:33.160And in some instances, challenge it. Some instances say the English language is limited.
00:32:39.080So if it's limited, we need to challenge language. If it's not serving us anymore,
00:32:43.980we need to learn how to expand that language base in order for it to serve
00:32:48.380what we need for it to do. Language is a tool. It's not a definitive end.
00:32:54.220At some point, somebody made it up. What if they were wrong? What if they were just limited in the words they used because their awareness of science and culture and interconnectivity and socialization was limited at the time, so we need new words?
00:33:13.580What if that's the case? Because that is the case. And we're constantly telling so many people,
00:33:23.940you know, well, the left just wants to change everything. What if things need to be changed?
00:33:29.900What if language is limiting? It's very postmodern. People hate postmodernists because
00:33:35.740they say language is the root of all of our social structures. I don't believe them to be wrong. I
00:33:41.540just believe it to be scary. Right? The way we talk, the tone of our voice, our mannerisms and
00:33:50.780our language creates our reality, creates our perception. If that's the case, we need to
00:33:58.240understand the very fundamentals of language and, and, and we need to be able to change it when it
00:34:03.640needs to be changed. We don't just sit on the science from 1215, do we? Why would we sit on
00:34:11.420their language? We don't just sit on the mathematics from 1450. Why would we just
00:34:19.240simply sit on our understandings of philosophy and psychology and sociology? All of that needs to
00:34:27.600grow. And are there ever simplistic answers? No. Nope. Never are. But does that mean we don't have
00:34:36.860that conversation? All the big questions don't have definitive answers. And maybe it's not having
00:34:46.000a definitive answer that makes people not want to go down that road, that they don't want to talk
00:34:49.780about it, that they don't want any part of it because it's too uncertain. It's too big. It's
00:34:54.460too overwhelming i don't want any part of it so they reside themselves to old answers old language
00:35:00.540old definitions because they were never given the chance to think critically about definitions
00:35:08.080and language and english and and you know uh critical theories economics and politics they
00:35:19.180were never allowed to be exposed to all of that. It wasn't considered basic fundamental tools. It
00:35:25.720might not be basic, but it sure as hell is needed. Why are we residing ourselves to basic ever?
00:35:32.220Why is a grade 12 student in any classroom in North America with all of our money, all of our
00:35:37.500privilege, all of our access, why are we allowing anybody to leave there with a basic understanding
00:35:43.960of anything. These kids have access to the world over in their hand. That's new. That's in the last
00:35:54.26015, 10, 15 years. They can get access to language. They can get access to interpretation. They can
00:36:01.280get critical responses to so many different theoretical perspectives. And we're sitting
00:36:06.160here saying, we can't talk about CRT? Are you joking? We can't talk about Marxism?
00:36:14.980Are you joking? We have to be able to talk about it all. We should be expanding, not limiting.
00:36:21.580It should be a wider range. Teachers should have more education, not less.
00:36:28.140We should be more of an expert. We should be constantly pushing ourselves to understand
00:36:33.700more because we need to understand more in order to vote for the people and have any functional
00:36:39.140democracy whatsoever. And then to operate in an economic system that is so incredibly challenging
00:36:45.860and so quickly changing that having a basic understanding of anything,
00:36:51.480it does you such an incredible disservice that it will impoverish a nation. It'll make them angry.
00:37:00.940it'll make them weak, it'll make them poor. And I don't just mean economically, I mean it'll make
00:37:06.740them poor when it comes to the halls of power because they don't understand the conversations
00:37:10.920that are being talked about. And if they can't understand the conversation, how can they
00:37:17.680effectively vote? And if they can't effectively vote, what happened to democracy? You want to
00:37:23.960know about financial literacy? Do you need to know how to do your books? Of course you do.
00:37:28.580of course you do. But to say to a student that they shouldn't have to understand micro and
00:37:35.000macro economics in a world in which every time you hear politicians speak, they're speaking about
00:37:41.340the economy, it should be a crime. It should be criminal that they're allowing kids to graduate
00:37:50.280from grade 12, possibly never have any further education and not understand basic economic
00:37:56.400principles that they now get to vote on the constitution their legal rights what rule of
00:38:05.560law in a democracy should really mean and sometimes i think jesus are they not letting
00:38:10.420them under are they not pushing these narratives because if they really push these narratives
00:38:14.840then a lot of these structures of power that we've so heavily leaned on crumple is that it
00:38:22.080and again i'm not a conspiracy theorist i'm not but are we trying to make our population
00:38:30.660less intelligent are we trying to stunt that growth or are we simply and this is my scary
00:38:39.600conclusion trying to spend as little money as we possibly can because we have better ways to spend
00:38:45.660the money and we want to pay our debts and we want a bigger military and we want corporations
00:38:51.160to have more power. So we have this economy because all of that, all of that is a house of
00:38:57.080cards. It's all a house of cards and it will all crumble. It will crumble in the digital age,
00:39:04.180in the economic age. It'll crumble when we're talking about world systems theories that run
00:39:10.020the world and they'll be left in their houses talking about the WEF as though they understand
00:39:16.180it. Or they'll be talking about the United Nations as though they understand it and can
00:39:21.400apply it. Or world power structures as though they can understand it because they've never
00:39:27.420been given the opportunity to understand the language that is required to understand the
00:39:33.520issues at hand. Discourse. I want you guys to remember that before I get off here. Discourse
00:39:39.460is an incredibly powerful thing and if i can manipulate discourse
00:39:45.660if i can control what you know and control how you understand me and then lead you down that path
00:39:52.560i can then be all powerful it's very god-like isn't it that's what geez is that what this is
00:40:03.380you know the one thing that brought the church down i don't mean down like people don't believe
00:40:10.520in god i mean brought the power of the church down was the printing press gutenberg invented
00:40:17.560the printing press he printed the bible eight billion times and all of a sudden people learned
00:40:22.240how to read and as soon as people learned how to read and understand language and think for
00:40:28.040themselves you saw power structures crumble and i'm not advocating for this because people do their
00:40:35.700own research listen i'm not that i'm not that because people that are doing their own research
00:40:42.580in so many capacities don't have the education to understand the language
00:40:47.060so they challenge power structures without even understanding the language but they're
00:40:53.340challenging it because they feel limited. They feel, they feel, and they are inadequate.
00:41:00.600They're inadequate to understand the big issues. You go sit in an office with a doctor
00:41:04.760and they talk about, you know, what an antibiotic is going to do for your system. You don't get
00:41:11.600that. They talk about, you know, actually having, actually having, you know, understanding what's
00:41:19.320going to be done so you can sign off it. Those words are slipping, slipping my mind. But that
00:41:24.040kind of accountability, how on earth am I ever supposed to really understand the risks and the
00:41:30.940concerns and the benefits and the drawbacks about a procedure or a drug or a whatever, unless I go
00:41:36.140through medical school? There's limits to our learning. I understand we can't all be doctors
00:41:43.220and lawyers and politicians and economists. But what I am saying is this, voting and voting for
00:41:50.360those things and not doing every single thing we possibly can to maximize education, to maximize
00:42:00.820schools, to funding them equitably. And I do mean equitably, by the way, guys, because there's
00:42:06.560schools that get a certain amount of funding per student, but then we all know those schools that
00:42:11.220are in the right areas, get a library donated. And the other school that's getting the same
00:42:15.800funding per student have to spend it all on busing them to and from school because those
00:42:20.700kids don't have enough money for school. Equitable funding of education of schools
00:42:25.780is essential. Absolutely essential. You cannot have a just fair basic model of anything ever
00:42:34.960unless you have a just fair basic model of education that comes with buckets of money.
00:42:39.860So you have to ask yourself, you want to pay it?
00:42:45.200You want to just take care of your kids?
00:43:06.680If you don't care about that society, house of cards, guys. It's all a house of cards. And it will crumble because you've decided to just care about you in a situation, in a society in which unless there's foundational building blocks of growth and empowerment, it will crumble.