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The PURPOSE OF EDUCATION, finally, is to create in a person the ability to look at the world for one’s self, to make one’s own decisions, to say to one’s self this is black or this is white, to decide for one’s self whether there is a God in heaven or not. To ask questions of the universe, and then learn to live with those questions, is the way one achieves one’s own identity. But no society is really anxious to have that kind of person around. What societies really, ideally, want is a citizenry which will simply obey the rules of society. If a society succeeds in this, that society is about to perish. The obligation of anyone who thinks of himself as responsible is to examine society and try to change it and to fight it – at no matter what risk. This is the only hope society has. This is the only way societies change.
Who is James Baldwin?