Catholic Bourgeois
A bourgeois is a man
who tries to be somebody,
by trying to be like everybody,
which makes him a nobody.
Catholic bourgeois
try to be
like non-Catholic bourgeois
and think they are
just as good
as non-Catholic bourgeois.
Right after the war
Catholic bourgeois
tried to believe
what non-Catholic bourgeois
tried to believe,
that the time had come
in America
for a two-car garage
a chicken in every pot
and a sign “To Let”
in front of every poorhouse.
And Catholic colleges
as well as non-Catholic colleges
turned out stock promoters,
stock brokers
and stock salesmen
who stocked people with stocks
till they got stuck.
Shouting With Rotarians
Modern colleges
give you
a bit of this,
a bit of that,
a bit of something else
and a degree.
The act of giving a degree
is called a Commencement.
And after the Commencement
the student commences
to look for a job.
College Graduates
Sociology is not a science,
it is an art.
The art of sociology
is the art
of creating order
out of chaos.
Bourgeois colleges
turn out college graduates
into a changing world
without ever telling them
how to keep it from changing
or how to change it
so as to make it fit
for college graduates.
College graduates
think in terms of jobs,
not in terms of work.
Since the world is upside down,
taking the side down
and putting it up
should be the task
of college graduates.
But college graduates
would rather
play somebody else’s game
in a position
than to create order
out of chaos.
An Unhappy Lot
But the job providers
are not on the job
and college graduates
are disappointed.
They have degrees,
but their degrees
do not give them jobs.
They have been told
that the road to success
is a college education.
They have a college education
and they do not know
what to do,
with themselves.
The overproduction
of college graduates
is a fertile ground
for social demagogues.
The unemployed college graduates
are getting sore
at their parents
for sending them into colleges
which have not prepared them
for a changing world.
And they ask themselves
if their educators
know what it is
to be educated.
Houses of Hospitality
In the New Masses
a Communist cartoonist represents
a line of college graduates
receiving their degrees
from the Alma Mater
and joining a soup line
on the other side of the square.
Social reconstruction
will be the result
of social indoctrination.
But unemployed college graduates
cannot be indoctrinated
without first being fed,
as well as clothed,
as well as sheltered.
Houses of Hospitality
for unemployed college graduates
are a pressing need.
Indoctrination
In Houses of Hospitality
unemployed college graduates
will be fed, clothed, sheltered,
as well as indoctrinated.
Unemployed college graduates
must be told
why the things are
what they are,
how the things would be
if they were
as they should be
and how a path
can be made
from the things
as they are
to the things
as they should be.
Unemployed college graduates
must be told
how to create
a new society
within the shell of the old
with the philosophy of the new,
which is not a new philosophy,
but a very old philosophy,
a philosophy so old
that it looks like new.
On Farming Communes
When unemployed college graduates
will have been indoctrinated
they will be moved
to Farming Communes.
On Farming Communes
unemployed college graduates
will be taught
how to build their houses,
how to gather their fuel,
how to raise their food,
how to make their furniture;
that is to say,
how to employ themselves.
Unemployed college graduates
must be taught
how to use their hands.
Unemployed college graduates
have time
on their hands.
And while time is on the hands
of college graduates
their heads don’t function
as they should function.
On Farming Communes
unemployed college graduates
will learn to use
both their hands
and their heads.