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A Brief History of Dumbing Down

In today's world, the necessity to "dumb down" has become increasingly vital in popular culture. Artists in all genres have been avoiding complex and debatable issues in order to capitalize and garner mass appeal in the mainstream. This raises the question "are we being forced to dumb down because people are getting dumber?" Or is the public being subliminally taught to dumb down in this manner by the "ruling" classes. Lets take a look at how this was done in the past and see how it's done today.

If we look into history, we see the always present separation of classes which is still eminent today (on top is the nobility and, all the way at the bottom, we have the working class). The fact is, this is a social hierarchy that has been put in place to maintain the status quo of the times because, as many have frequently said, knowledge is the tool that gives power to the weak and oppressed. Therefore, in order for those in power to maintain their statuses, they must keep that tool and discoveries away from the masses and/or sell them watered down versions of such to uneven the playing field in their advantage.

For instance, during the slave eras (Hebrews, blacks, etc) the "masters" prohibited slaves from learning any literature or sciences in attempts to numb their minds, enabling them to only perform the manual labors that the masters wouldn't do for themselves. However, as slaves were seeking empowerment and freedom, they began to learn that knowing some literature and thinking critically was a good step towards leveling the playing field. Eventually, after many many years, the new struggle to acquire knowledge gave birth to the resultant empowerment of slaves which paved the way for the great leaders of our time, such as Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr, amongst others. Of course, however, with new laws being set in place to allow slaves access to libraries and various sources of information, the obsessed rulling class became more unsettled. Consequently, they secretly devised new and more subtle control tactics which led us to what we are seeing today.

Although we once fought for the right to seek understanding of technology, science, and ancient history, we are now willingly regressing back to the ignorance that was forced upon our predecessors for years. Gone is the impulse that gave birth to the Malcolms, the Martins, the Bob Marleys, the Public Enemys, and the Rakims, in is the new era of "dumbing down for [your] audience to double [your] dollars". But what is most surprising is that this widespread apathy towards wisdom has been openly accepted by the masses. Not only in music, but in all forms of entertainment and media.

What I'm ultimately getting to here is: instead of artists and all those who hold the spotlight dumbing down for us, why can't they try and raise the bar of wisdom while motivating us to keep up?" That's my stance dear world.... UNLEARN!

- Soulogik

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