Phoenix
by Dale J. Sprague
White Papers
Oppression
The cause. From childhood, one must develop socially, but this does not preclude developing individually. As much as social relations and individualism may be mutually exclusive, a dichotomy of both is preferred over being incarcerated by one that has become presidiary over the other. If one matures without the nurturing of their imagination, intuition, and inspiration..or without support of their instincts and individualism, one matures under oppression. While spiritual traditions live, they should not to the extent of suppressing one's fundamental freedoms. Daily repression of these freedoms creates the oppression under which the child matures.
Subsequently, the child develops fixed conceptions of their environment made simple enough to enable them to negotiate it emotionally. Eventually, with successful negotiation and navigation, one creates fixed notions of one's self that fit into the fixed environment of one's mind, to become, as it were, like a fixed character in the story of one's life. As the story lives, one's instinct for survival shifts to the reaffirmation and preservation of one's character attributes and conceptions of the environment within which they live. Transcendental ability is seriously impaired. Any change of the real environment poses a threat..any real encounter with the environment pushes one to a precipice of extinction. Oppression causes hysteria. Hysteria causes one to over simplify their environment in order to emotionally negotiate it, and navigate through it.
The effect. Like the rider on Pegasis in John Pitre's "Restricted," one becomes tethered to Earth. One lives disabled from rising above the Earth and one's environment to see a larger territory, a larger context within which one lives. One lives without the wings to see a greater vision and therefore without the inspiration, new light by which one changes as the dynamic living environment changes.