Eli Siegel Day in Baltimore
“In this issue we publish three of the statements presented on August 16 at the Dedication of the Eli Siegel Memorial in Druid Hill Park, Baltimore, Maryland…”
Learning Can Succeed — and Racism Can End!
“Now we publish … the statement by New York City teachers Lois Mason and Rosemary Plumstead on the tremendous importance of Mr. Siegel’s thought for American education. Ms. Mason teaches history at New Utrecht High School in Brooklyn, Mrs. Plumstead science at Fiorello LaGuardia High School of the Arts in Manhattan. Both are instructors of the course for educators “The Aesthetic Realism of Eli Siegel As Teaching Method.”
And we publish the statements of August 16 on the fact that Aesthetic Realism is the means to end racism truly at last. Arnold Perey, PhD, is an anthropologist and Aesthetic Realism consultant. His Columbia University doctoral dissertation (1973) is based on Aesthetic Realism. Monique Michael is a New York City teacher; and Allan Michael is a Maritime Captain and photographer. Jaime Torres, DPM, is Chief of Podiatry at Coler-Goldwater Memorial Hospital and on the advisory board of the National Hispanic Medical Association….”
Objection, Unions, and Art
“Some of what unions have objected to — what men and women literally risked their lives objecting to; were blacklisted and beaten by thugs and shot at for objecting to — is described in this sentence by Eugene V. Debs, 1918:
I am thinking this morning of the men in the mills and factories; I am thinking of the women who, for a paltry wage, are compelled to work out their lives; of the little children who, in this system, are robbed of their childhood, and … forced into the industrial dungeons, there to feed the machines while they themselves are being starved body and soul.
The fundamental objection had by unions is described here by Timothy Lynch. It is an objection to that which Eli Siegel identified as the source of all cruelty: contempt. …A person’s wages and safety, should not depend on the wishes of someone who wants to make money from that person’s body, mind, and life…”