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Quotation

Show me a man or a woman alone and I'll show you a saint. Give me two and they'll fall in love. Give me three and they'll invent the charming thing we call "society." Give me four and they'll build a pyramid. Give me five and they'll make one an outcast. Give me six and they'll reinvent prejudice. Give me seven and in seven years they'll reinvent warfare. Man may have been made in the image of God, but human society was made in the image of His opposite number, and is always trying to get back home.

Glen Bateman, Sociology Professor in "The Stand" by Stephen King

The Majority Is Always Wrong

by Traute Klein, biogardener

When everyone seems to agree on what is right or wrong, do you have the courage to stand up against the crowd? I am thankful to the teacher who showed me that the majority is always wrong.

The "Smart" Class

Of the two grade 12 classes at St. John's High School in Winnipeg, we were in the "smart" class. We had Latin and Physics on our timetable. Girls aren't supposed to be good in physics, so 32 of the 36 students were boys. The rest of the girls were in the other class, equally large, who took French and Biology. Almost all the students in the school were children or grandchildren of European immigrants who were motivated to aspire to the education which had been denied to their parents. Most of them, in fact, were of Jewish heritage whose parents had impressed on them that they were God's chosen people and were therefore expected to excell intellectually, and they did not let their parents down. They did excell. In the 1950s and 60s, that school graduated more future celebrities than any other high school on the continent. You would recognize many of the names of my fellow students.

Two of us girls had come from Germany within the last couple of years. We had some trouble with the English language, but in mathematics and physics we were as good as anyone else in the class.

Math Class

After every chapter in the book, Mr. Silverberg gave us a written test which we had to pass before he would allow us to continue into the next chapter. I got a perfect score in almost every test. Mathematics was my easiest subject all through school, in Germany and in Canada. I don't take credit for my gift. I was born with the ability to visualize a math problem from beginning to end without ever putting pencil to paper. A few of the boys did equally well, but all marvelled that the "girl" was able to keep up to them and occasionally even beat them. The system had brainwashed them to believe that they were born with superior gifts.

Remember, we were the "smart" grade 12 class. Anyone who failed a chapter math test simply was not applying himself. After failing a test, a student had to spend the following math classes in the study room until he felt he could pass the same test. And then he had to catch up on the next chapter all on his own as well.

I am not debating the merits of this method of instruction. It certainly would not be allowed in today's Canadian school system. It might, in fact, get the teacher fired. I can assure you, though, that Mr. Silverberg was renowned to have the highest passing rate of any grade 12 teacher in the province. Certainly everyone in my class passed the provincial test at the end of the year on which 100% of the year's mark was based.

Trap Question

One of the chapter tests contained a question which year after year fooled almost everyone in class. Well, in 1954, Mr. Silverberg decided to teach us a valuable lesson. Before he handed the marked tests back to us, before anyone knew the results, he had us working out the problems on the board with everyone following along.

When the trick problem came up, five of us protested that it was not being solved correctly. We were ridiculed by the rest of the class. Mr. Silverberg took a class vote. 31 to 5 in favor of the wrong answer. Since that problem formed the bulk of the test, all 31 students had failed the test and spent the next few days in the study room. I was the only girl left in the class with four boys to move on into the next chapter.

Conclusion

Mr. Silverberg, after explaining where the class had gone wrong, summarized his philosophy like this:

Remember, the majority is always wrong.

That lesson left a deep impression on me, helping me to stand up for what I believe to be right for the rest of my life.

Andrew Jackson (1767-1845), 7th American president, put it this way:

One person with courage makes a majority.