Arcadia Ignorance

 
"You have a duty to keep her in ignorance!"

My initial reaction? HA. It's supposed to be funny, Thomasina's mother angry at Septimus for teaching her, awakening her to the knowledge of the outside world (although I think this reaction came from his lesson on carnal embrace).  Yes, a certain degree of censorship in front of children can be necessary to their overall development, but we find this statement comical because it is so blatantly mocks the opinion of too many adults: that children are children, and shouldn't know things until a certain age.

In many cases, this age never even comes.  So many adults want to shield their children from the "horrors" of the outside world for as long as they possibly can.  But what is the difference between a "horror" and knowledge? A horror is a horror if we believe it to be so, just as it can easily be turned into a lesson if we so choose.

Yes, there is a world of information I hope that my future children don't discover when they're five years old: the "ideal" (aka fucked-up) body image of an American woman, the overall influence of media over our minds, what it sounds like to hit a loved one, what it feels like to hurt someone so deeply it won't ever be forgotten, war, crime, rape, murder. The list goes on.

But I would hope that my children eventually learn these things, learn everything about them, so that they may develop their own opinions and own identities.  That instead of remaining in ignorance from these horrors, this knowledge, whatever you want to call it, they embrace it and learn from it.

I was blessed enough to be brought into this world by loving parents who have always treated me as an equal.  They have thirty years more life experience than I do. Thirty years more of loving and fighting and messing up and growing up than I do. They have thirty years more knowledge than I do. Yet they never belittled me. By giving me their respect, answering my questions when asked, letting me make my own mistakes and conquests, they gained my respect.  I hope that for every child.

"You have a duty to keep her in ignorance!"

My reaction after having thought about it from a different perspective? Ignorance can be used as a good thing. As Dr. Sexson explained in class, it can pertain to the belief that one must first empty their mind in order that it may be filled with knowledge.  I can think of a number of cases in which this is true.  In order to open yourself to new ideas without bias, you must let go of your previous beliefs.  If you attain to truly listen to what one is saying, you must quiet your own voice first.

And so, we reach the delicate balance (as everything comes to in the end) of emptying oneself, remaining in a state of ignorance in order to welcome knowledge, and soaking up information to create as many beliefs as we possibly can. Or perhaps we can simultaneously retain both states?

I think we can.