The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference.
The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference.
The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference.
And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference.

(Oct. 1986)

Can culture prevent barbarity? Can political sophistication, humanism, wit, music, drama, and philosophy safeguard against the forces of depravity?

"Never confuse culture with morality," my mother told me. "Did Goering have culture? Oh yes! He was of aristocratic heritage. He was a patron of the arts and attended opera, and he probably cried while listening to Wagner's beautiful compositions! But did he have morals? Not a shred! He was the highest official in the Nazi hierarchy to authorize on paper the Final Solution. Morality and culture have nothing to do with each other. Decency and morality come from a divine source, and no amount of culture can substitute for that."

Let us look at the Egyptians, the pinnacle of culture in the ancient world. They had papyrus, pyramids, an incredible embalming technique, astrology, art, hieroglyphics, brain surgery, and achievements in every field imaginable, and yet they were still the house of slavery. They were the place where your male children were thrown into the Nile and your babies were stuck in the wall as bricks if the parents didn't make enough bricks themselves.

Behind many great civilizations you will find incredible barbarism. The Greeks and Romans clubbed their children to death if they were born with any deformity or, sometimes, just for being born female. They would cheer gleefully as they watched thousands of people kill each other in "games" at the coliseums. The Germans were the most cultured people in the world with their composers, scientists, poets, and scholars leading the world in achievements, yet we saw what they were capable of in

 So, what is “Civilization?” If it is the organization of a society around an ideal, whose main thrust is to uplift man while restraining barbarism,then where are we in 2007?   If “Culture” represents the aspirations for man’s perfection, while “Government” restrains aggression I ask again, where are we in 2007?

Our culture has progressed and advanced in a way in which we appear to process images in a kind of second-to-second moment as seen on both Jerry Springer programs and the "Survivor" realistic television programs. It sadly appears that we've become very much desensitized and inured to shock and atrocity and horror. No one seems to just zap the remote to another channel anymore; no one just gets up and leaves the room today. There appears no real distinction between programs that are meant to entertain and programs that are meant to offend. It's all ultimately the same. Everything is fair game for satire and mockery. This is not progress but a cry for civilization to look at its current values.

“...And I myself, like one long soundless scream
Above the thousands of thousands interred,
I'm every old man executed here,
As I am every child murdered here….”

Babi Yar By Yevgeni Yevtushenko

Greta Brewer

Vice President of Education,

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