I've reviewed the movie on ANM, because it provides a lot of useful (if inverted) information about Steiner education, and this addendum examines how, in their own critiques of this movie the Steiner critics have continued and extended the inversions used by Schwartz, by which actions they reveal not only a singular lack of ability to self-scrutinise, but also a dangerous lack of awareness of the similarity of their position to the one that they are criticising.
My review examines this mechanism by which the movie succeeds in putting the reality of bullying behind a report that is furthermore presented in inverted commas. Schwartz' movie makes light of a mother's concern for her child, but Schwartz puts the "making light" into the mother's own voice, thus burying any chance of the bullying being taken seriously below several levels of propaganda.
When you put a report of "bullying", in inverted commas, the obvious intention is to draw the recipient's mind to the fact that this is something that has been reported as bullying, but it doesn't mean it was. The inverted commas invite you to question whether that report of bullying might not have been a crock of shit.
Schwarz's movie states that it's about taking bullying seriously, and then inverts it, shoves it into inverted commas, and simply wipes it from view, as in our own experience of Steiner bullying.
So let's examine some of the critics' responses to the movie, in a conversation which begins here :
Dan Dugan was uncharacteristically prolific. Among many other things, he said this:
"I remember lots of parents being angry that there was no or poor supervision on the playground and that there was so much largely unsupervised and potentially serious roughhousing, but I don't remember parents "bursting into tears and running to the parking lot." That's just mean to portray parents are hysterical idiots."
I'm not sure how that typo in the last sentence was supposed to play out. It could have been “That's just mean to portray parents as hysterical idiots”, or "That's just meant to portray parents are hysterical idiots". It obviously doesn't matter, but I couldn't find out anyway because Dan Dugan himself, who says he runs plans as a “public service”, has blocked me for being a hysterical idiot of a Steiner parent and sincerely attempting to bring attention to the lack of supervision in the playground exacerbating unchecked bullying at Steiner.
Dan had other things to say:
"The higher level of wrong is the disrespect of parents implicit in the joke, and the lack of concern for children's safety that the video (and the underlying Waldorf principle) implies."
"But children cannot be expected to behave according to higher principles; ethical behavior must be modeled by adults, and enforced, when necessary."
Hard not to disagree. But Dan is also guilty of putting bullying into inverted commas, breaking all his stated no ad hominem rules to allow parents supporting children reporting such, to be publicly mobbed on his site.
In fact it was when we managed to remain polite in the face of so much virtual violence, that we were banned and our account was deleted. I guess saying one thing and doing the exact opposite counts as modeling ethical behaviour in Dan’s world. To me, that just looks like Steiner.
Here's Alicia Hamberg on the movie:
"It's definitely meant to portray parents as hysterical. The kittens are ok, after all, even though they play rough. But bullying isn't the same as playing rough. I suppose it isn't always easy to draw the lines, but that's no reason to laugh at the problem."
Isn’t it? Isn’t it always easy? Oh that’s just supposition. True lines of fair behaviour may be hard for Alicia to draw, especially as she has extremely visceral feelings that mean she can’t get to that anyway. But two little lines around the word bullying? Well yes, when it suits her.
Putting bullying in inverted commas is brilliant if you want the bullying to appear as someone else’s madness. It must be hysterically “seen” but not actually existing, or the whole edifice crumbles. This mechanism is explained fully in the review.
And of course, in spite of all their “speculative” vitriol, judgement by the Critics of exactly how bogus our, among all the other almost identical situations, is, must eventually depend on the actual bullying at the Steiner School.
Yet exactly the same dependency on inverted commas is found here, in Alicia's latest public attack on me and Steve on her blog:
“You have to like them and not find them ridiculous, otherwise they’ll say they’ll sue you. Like they once threatened to sue that Steiner school, for getting rid of them. Nothing came of it (as they said when I didn’t fulfill obligations they fantasized I had towards them but which I had declined long before). Instead they initiated a bizarre ‘human rights’ mediation. Probably because it was free of charge and they risked no consequences. I don’t know, and explain to me why I should care? This ‘human rights’ institution might be a court of fools, ready to make a mockery out of human rights. Or it might already (and wisely) have tossed the couple out long ago — like they’ve been tossed out of one school and barred from commenting on blogs all over the internet — but I’m sure the two won’t advertise such a major defeat on twitter.”
In a way, this paragraph illustrates the same interface between play and bullying that the Schwartz movie does, employing the same double-speak. Her jokey tone belies the deadly seriousness of her actual intent, which is to do as much damage to our reputation as possible. Alicia's inversion even insinuates that the Human Rights would be a court of fools if they do not join in with our victimisation - they didn't. As much as Schwarz's movie, this statement is only possible by putting inverted commas around our reports of school "bullying".
(Sidenote - the doublespeak in this excerpt goes as far as to ask for a comment “explain to me why I should care”, whilst not allowing any comments on the posting.)
The fact is that even in stating that looking ridiculous is a problem to us, Alicia is teetering on a very skimpy platform of evidence. I'm not saying any of our comedy is funnier than Alicia's writing, ;)
even though it very nearly succeeded in making a difference to the passing of an Education Bill, but I do hope it will demonstrate that looking ridiculous is not something I’ve ever particularly tried to avoid.
This is another part of the inversion, based on putting bullying inside something else, so it disappears.
She also playfully observes that we've been blocked “all over the internet”, to make it seem as if she is part of a wide concensus, and obfuscate the simple fact that whilst we're of course free to go where we like on the internet, there are a few blogs we've been barred from and they are all connected to her in some way, solely due to the way she’s scuttled about breathlessly “having to” warn everybody about two people she’s never even spoken to.
But the "it’s not bullying, it’s play" inversion is as evident in here as in the movie. It's not Alicia bullying us, she’s just a kitten. It's just so “happens” that it’s our 'destiny' to be rejected by everybody because of being ridiculous. This is one of the main standard bullying tactics, in wide use. "Hey don't you think it's funny that I've smashed your face in with an iron bar? I do."
The critics assessment of this movie, when looked at in the light of their own actions, really opens all the doors and turns on all the lights on exactly how the mechanisms of inversion in the Schwarz movie, blunted there by those cute representational kittens, can play out in real life, and it’s a kind of sublime pastiche of its own that the people doing it to ex-Steiner parents are those claiming to offer a public service to exactly that group.
As far as I was aware, a subjective opinion that someone’s a bit ridiculous, was not enough for people to be excluded from public debate on shared interests, or indeed any expectation of democratic treatment. But then again, welcome to 2013.
All these inversions are there to enable deeper levels of propaganda to be disseminated. At one point in the movie the mother asks not to be thought of as a "Nervous Nellie". This is an oblique way of labelling women (sic) who don't "see" the inverted commas around the word bullying. It's just another inversion. The message is "don't be a fussy pants" or you'll be associated with that unfavourable group.
This result, of oscratising the nervous Nellies, and introducing the possibility of this as a deterrent again depends entirely on the "bullying" remaining within its inverted commas. Otherwise it would of course be right to intervene - and possibly immoral not to.
Diana Winters also had things to say:
“Also, it is a different situation when one child becomes the focus of others' aggression - becomes a target, and the kids hatch plots and plans to torment one particular child. This is not about kittens tussling!”
But if she can see that, why can't Diana Winters recognise her own actions in purple appreciation of Alicia's admiration for a school that kicked out all the children of parents that flagged up bullying?
Here is that same worrying inversion, because two Steiner critics egging each other on to the parents who actually challenged bullying in Steiner, is not seen as similar targeting, or tormenting, even when they’re actually discussing bullying. I know. It’s incredible isn’t it.
Alicia playfully poo poohs the very idea that she could be part of a gang and her playful, jokey tone is meant to invite the reader to assume that the circle of ostracisation is incidental to her involvement whereas in fact it emanated precisely from there, and every place we’ve been attacked is by people who know her including the site PLANS, where, the moment we got there, she showed up objecting to our presence. What is stunning is how everyone else falls into line like clockwork. So thanks Dan for your "public (mobbing) service", oh and by the way, how's your action against Steiner going, don't see much mention of that by critics on Twitter, do we...
The "elegant solution" comment is a fabulous example of misogyny - two women targeting a mother and pitying her children for having her as a mother. In my view, women attacking mothers for sticking up for their children is the worst kind of attack. Attacking women through their children is an action of unspeakable cowardice. If it’s framed as a joke, it’s no less misognynistic for that - and coming from other women it does feel like a double betrayal, and for that reason I have termed it MSogyny (although it is ordinary misogynist behaviour) because the fact that it is women viciously attacking another woman, needs to be seen and the word misogyny is used so much in regard to male attitudes. I think it's worth making the distinction.
When it comes in the form of a jokey attack, it’s no less MSogynistic for that.
My 12 year old daughter, who was bullied at a Steiner School knows all about how these critics’ inversions have been made about our stand for her in the Steiner school. Her view of this point of view is that is it "untrue. Predictable bullying". But hey, she's just a stupid kid, right?
To conclude, I'll include a comment by Pete Karaiskos, as it does seem to sum it all up in some way.
"Is it just me, or does Waldorf seem to understand the topic of bullying about as well as they understand the topic of racism?"
Well that may be true, but I don't know, is it just Pete? Or is it just Pete who thought it was funny to say I was shooting myself in the foot with my argument because I happen to be walking impaired?
Gee, I don't know, guess that's just another inversion, the critics seem worryingly professional in producing them!
Of course it shows that behind all the smoke and mirrors the inverted commas can be put on or taken off as necessary to make sure that the target gets bullied but cannot defend themselves.
So why do Steiner Critics exist at all, if they can't even see what twits they're being by targeting parents of bullied children from Steiner schools, while earnestly discussing bullying?
Search me. It took us three and a half years to prove that what we said about the bullying in "our" Steiner school was true. It was hard, especially being attacked all the while my mother was dying of lung cancer by these very unpleasant and cowardly "critics".
But you know what? Following it through with the school wasn't THAT hard. Not so hard that if people actually did that, Steiner wouldn't have been outed long ago, so far in the past in fact that State funded Steiner in the UK might never have been on the agenda.
So why did we get so mobbed for encouraging people to speak out so that journalists could actually report on what goes on instead of having to quote people called things like "Thetis Mercurio". I mean come on!!
It all, down to the pompous silly names, and the insistence of endlessly talking about esotericism, reminds me of Steiner.
And the casual ruthlessness in the watertight job that's been done on us by critics, that it can only lead to one avenue of enquiry. Not one of those in the general camp of ‘critics’, has spoken up about his treatment, yet others, untouched by Anthroposophy, have no trouble in seeing the reality of the repeated mobbings and undemocratic sectarian behaviour.
It appears a distinct possibility that overlong exposure to Steiner theory and methodology stimulates and exacerbates a rather selfish and childlike conviction of your own innocence and illogical sense of entitlement, to the detriment of others, well-beyond school leaving age. Judging by the advanced years of some of those pretending that it's not happening in front of their noses, once inculcated into the dynastic bully-denying inversions of Steiner, this can go on for the whole of your life.
Not one of the critics has spoken up, and it’s easy to see why.
As in Steiner, beyond all the inversions, the posturing, the representations, there is nothing, nothing that can be said, no avenue of even basic democratic communication with people who will not bow to their authority, the mark of a cult.
If you’re behaving like a cult, all the rest is window dressing. You can be as ‘intellectual’ as you like, if you’re victimising anyone at all, even just one family who, like you, had a really bad experience of Steiner education, you shouldn’t be spouting about cults.
What’s really going on isn’t sophisticated at all, it’s naked aggression.
Alicia's most recent no-holds barred personal attack on me and my husband Steve, with no comments allowed, shows how confident she feels that her readers implicitly support her aggressive stance to us, as well as illustrating what’s underneath all the intellectual posturing.
She begins "That obnoxious couple from New Zealand"....
And that says it all really doesn't it. Alicia's critical thinking stretches to saying "they smell" about people who she’s never met, or spoken to, and who aren't there and are blocked from answering. OK. Right. Got it.
We're still firmly in the playground here, aren't we.
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