Anyone who has ever relocated to a new country or city will know that communities take time to reveal themselves to newcomers, to expose the heart that beats below the surface of day-to-day activity; to divulge the unwritten codes that are at once familiar but different and this has been no less true of my move to St Catherine’s. But what might have been a slow and gentle “reveal” over these last four weeks, has been more like the opening of James Bond film where Bond is invariably dropped into the middle of a Marrakech market (in a tuxedo of course!), and the action is non-stop from there! From Parent Information Nights to Social Evenings; Regattas to Reunions; Open Mornings to Coffee Mornings; Prep Readings to Year 12 lunches and everything in between, the action has been gloriously non-stop, and I’ve relished every moment. Which is not to say that we have been immune from any number of difficult, challenging or downright tragic moments but the unique power of St Catherine’s lies quietly but intentionally, in the way the community responds, and I have been so very impressed by the sheer strength and inherent decency, of the gold and blue.

I have also been impressed by the pragmatic way our Middle Years students have responded to the newly imposed ban on mobile phones during the school day and I thank you most sincerely for your support of this important initiative. The research tells us that Australian parents are more worried about their children using social media and technology than they are about drugs, alcohol or smoking. The study which surveyed parents with children between the ages of 12 and 18 revealed that more than half of the respondents worried about the ramifications of social media; 25% by comparison, expressed concern about their children using drugs, alcohol, or cigarettes. This of course is not surprising – we are completely immersed in a brave new world of online connections about which we know very little. And unlike cigarettes, alcohol and drugs, we are right to fear what we cannot see; to feel threated by that which we do not fully understand. As the spokesperson for the survey noted, “it’s time to call on social media companies to make these environments safer for children and young people…to have them come to the table and say: “Here’s the next step.”

Some would argue, however, that it is a little too late. Professor Neil Postman, Chair of the Department of Culture and Communication at New York University, observed back in 1995 that the computer and its associated technologies are wonderful additions to culture but like all important technologies of the past, they are “Faustian bargains, giving and taking away, sometimes in equal measure, sometimes more in one way than the other.” One of the reasons, according to Postman is that the computer has a powerful bias towards amplifying personal autonomy (and, by association, the dysfunctional connections that can arise for the adolescent user).

Given that schools are widely considered to be the last great universal socialising experience for many of our young people, it is only natural then that such a powerful focus is placed on social cohesion and collaboration; empathy and personal responsibility – the future of our society no less, depends upon it. Postman died in 2003 but not before calling for an investigation into the ways in which our engagement with technology (and social media in particular) “reorders our social relations, political ideas, and moral sensibilities.” As he put it: “One does not need to know the physics of television to study the social and political effects of the medium. It is about how technology creates connections for good or ill that matters.”  The importance of providing a protective forcefield ground in the St Catherine’s ethos of purpose, meaning and belonging, has never been more important.

I leave you this week, with the foreword Postman wrote to his seminal work Amusing Ourselves to Death and a link to one of my favourite books from 2019 by Johan Hari entitled Lost Connections.

We were keeping our eye on 1984. When the year came and the prophecy didn’t, thoughtful Americans sang softly in praise of themselves. The roots of liberal democracy had held. Wherever else the terror had happened, we, at least, had not been visited by Orwellian nightmares.

But we had forgotten that alongside Orwell’s dark vision, there was another—slightly older, slightly less well known, equally chilling: Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. Contrary to common belief even among the educated, Huxley and Orwell did not prophesy the same thing. Orwell warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression. But in Huxley’s vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny “failed to take into account man’s almost infinite appetite for distractions.” In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.

Nil Magnum Nisi Bonum