If You Choose Not To Decide, You Still Have Made A Choice
If there is anything Freire, Horton, and the WOKE presenters all have in common, it’s that sharing their stories in an unorthodox, yet simple way connects to people most effectively. The friendships Freire and Horton have built with each other as well as the friendships the WOKE presenters built with each other are prevalent when they share their social biographies and explain why they are educating the way they are. For Freire and Horton, their conversations “soon became like a dance between old companions accustomed to the subtle leads and responses by one, then the other” (ix). The two learned that educating people is not simply being told information and being expected to process it; it’s about both student and teacher (or in a broader sense, two people) actively listening to each other and ensuring that both parties are heard by the other.
Freire establishes a mantra for practice, theory, and knowledge: “Without practice there’s no knowledge; at least it’s difficult to know without practice” (98). He seems to be calling out those who are ignorant when it comes to knowledge — thinking they know things they actually don’t know about. Even if that person has knowledge of a particular subject, what they know turns almost into a waste if they aren’t willing to learn from outside of their textbook or research. In order to engage the mind with knowledge, that’s exactly what needs to happen: engage. It’s important to interact with real people and hear their stories if we’re ever going to create positive change.
What Freire and Horton want to avoid is neutrality. Each define neutrality in their different way:
Horton: “Neutrality is just following the crowd. Neutrality is just being what the system asks us to be. (102).
Freire: “In being neutral, you are just hiding your choice because it seems possible to be neutral in a relationship between the oppressors and the oppressed” (103).
For Horton, being neutral is siding with the dominant group without taking a concrete stance on something. Doing this lacks the engagement of what’s the issue at stake and simply believing what’s popular at face value. Let’s use this example — you live in the Deep South and the popular belief is the Conferdate flag is not a racist symbol but rather an image of Southern pride. Horton’s neutrality would explain that the system predominantly excuses the flag as a symbol of Southern pride, and if the dominant group is okay with it, then there musn’t be an issue. No research or learning necessary. Freire, on the other hand, believes neutrality is equivalent to avoiding confrontation. Back to the Confederate flag example, Freire’s neutrality would say that a person wants to find an equal balance (let’s say: they’re a proud Southerner that acknowledges there’s racism and that they aren’t racist, but the flag is not a connection to that racism…and they keep quiet about this opinion because they don’t want to offend anyone). The problem with this neutrality is that an official stance is not being taken. What I slightly disagree with in Freire’s definition is that he seems to think of neutrality as a gray area that can’t exist. I don’t think neutrality is hiding your choice, it’s deciding not to vocalize your opinion. However, that’s still a choice.
Deciding not to vocalize your opinion on an issue does reap consequences for the ‘other.’ It marginalizes them because it makes their issues feel irrelevant to the dominant society. When people from the ‘other’ freely share their stories (like in the WOKE presentation), they feel liberated and heard. They are given the chance for their social biographies to be told. In the words of Freire, “I cannot fight for a freer society if at the same time I don’t respect the knowledge of the people” (100–101).
As for my personal experiences, I grew up in a working-class family, which in my hometown, was a subordinate group to the upper-middle class families at the time. Dealing with that experiences has absolutely shaped me into the person I am today. I enjoy working in the community because it gives me the opportunity to talk to people and discover many grew up in the same environments as me, if not worse. I’ve learned from the colloquium themes and the community work I’ve done is that everyone has a social biography, and everyone has some struggle once they truly look into themselves and find it. The more you’re willing to learn from others, the more you’ll learn about yourself.
