Education is not broken by accident. It’s broken by design.

For too long, we’ve been told that education is a local matter, a family matter, a teacher’s matter. But the truth is: it’s a power matter. What we teach, who gets taught, and what gets left out are all shaped by those who hold the reins of political and economic power. Education flows from the top down—not just money, but mindset. And when the top is corrupt, short-sighted, or self-serving, it poisons the well for everyone below.

We live in a society where billion-dollar defense budgets are approved in minutes, while public schools beg for basic supplies. We send Marines overseas to “solve” international conflicts, but won’t send qualified teachers into struggling districts to solve the quiet crisis at home. We subsidize fossil fuels but slash funds for public universities. This isn’t oversight—it’s a pattern. A system designed to keep people obedient, distracted, and under-educated, while feeding power to the few.

Violence, debt, and ignorance are not symptoms—they are tools. A nation in permanent war teaches its people that force is the only way to settle disputes. A nation addicted to credit teaches its people that living beyond their means is normal. A nation that defunds education while funding propaganda teaches its people to obey, not to think.

And yet we keep training therapists to help individuals manage stress—as if burnout, anxiety, and despair are just personal issues. They are not. They are the natural responses of people trying to stay sane in a system that keeps them small, exhausted, and confused. Mental health is not just a personal matter; it’s a political one. So is education. A system that fails to educate its citizens while flooding their minds with distraction is not a broken system—it is a well-oiled machine doing exactly what it was built to do.

Education must be reclaimed—not reformed, but reclaimed—as a national, collective, and revolutionary project.

And let’s be honest: the masses don’t control the curriculum. They don’t choose which histories are erased or whose voices are silenced. They don’t decide whether teachers are paid living wages or whether students graduate with crushing debt. Those choices are made by elites—politicians, corporate lobbyists, media owners—who benefit from a passive, poorly informed public. A critical, curious, and educated population is dangerous to them. That’s why they don’t invest in it.

George Carlin was half right. Yes, ignorant leaders reflect an ignorant public—but that ignorance is carefully cultivated. We don’t just elect poor leaders; we are shaped to tolerate them. We are raised not to question, not to connect the dots, not to demand better. That’s why education is the battleground—because it determines whether the next generation will ask questions or swallow lies.

So what do we do?

We tear off the polite mask and expose the rot. We stop treating education policy as a boring issue for committees and school boards and start treating it as the frontline of democracy. We demand that every candidate for office—local or national—be held accountable for their vision (or lack of vision) for education. Not just test scores, but real learning. Not just buzzwords, but plans. We demand that education be funded like the future depends on it—because it does.

We stop waiting for the system to fix itself. We organize, we speak out, we teach each other. We create schools, books, media, and networks that challenge the factory model of education. We teach not to produce workers, but to awaken citizens. Not to memorize, but to liberate.

This is not about raising test scores. This is about raising consciousness.

Because if we don’t change who controls education, the cycle will repeat. The same politicians who smile at graduation ceremonies will keep voting to defund your child’s future. The same talking heads who praise “school choice” will quietly funnel resources into elite institutions and let public schools decay. And the same people who claim to love children will keep them shackled in outdated systems that kill imagination before it even has a chance to bloom.

Enough.

Let this be the generation that stops asking permission to think freely. Let this be the generation that understands education not as a service, but as a right. Not as preparation for a job, but as preparation for a just, thoughtful, and fearless society.

The revolution begins in the classroom. And the classroom begins in the minds of those brave enough to imagine something better.