Project Vision 21

I recently read a news story about a high school principal somewhere in the United States who went to buy a cup of coffee and, when paying, handed over 75 cents instead of paying a dollar. Instead of alerting the educator about the missing 25 cents, the store employee called the police and filed a theft report.

The police responded, and the school principal was arrested and charged with theft, even though he insisted that this was a mistake (he had inadvertently taken the wrong size cup) and was offered to pay for the difference. However, the employee insisted that it was theft and that, for that reason, charges would be filed. When that happened, the principal was fired from the school.

All for 25 cents.

Meanwhile, other people who surely do not work 60 hours a week (as, according to statistics, educators do) or earn a salary even minimally above the average salary (according to official data), nor are they interested in education or future generations or commit unspeakable atrocities with impunity.

There are those who steal millions and millions of dollars, who loot sites of high historical value, or who sell absolute garbage passing it off as "medicine" or "food", and there, they continue with their great life, their very large bank account and their countless collection of objects quickly destined for obsolescence.

And there are also those who kill left and right, or who send others to do it for them, who steal the culture, the soul, and the future of the people, and dismantle all signs of hope and solidarity. Despite all that and perhaps because of it, they are rewarded, but not punished, for their actions.

Moreover, if an educator, perhaps tired from a long day of work or perhaps in low spirits due to the constant complaints of his teachers, decides to buy a cup of coffee and choose the wrong size, then he is considered a thief. Charges were filed against him, and he was fired from work.

All for 25 cents. If this is not a compelling example of the world upside down, then I do not know what example can convince us that we live in a society with the level of spirituality of a Las Vegas show, the level of intelligence of an amusement park, and the level of ethics of a small, capricious, and hungry child.

All this happens precisely when the problems we face as humanity are unprecedented challenges and when these challenges often arise at a global level, without prior announcement, in an irreversible manner and with no solution in sight.

Of course, this is nothing new. We can express that we indeed live in an “ill-educated society that despises authority and does not respect its elders. People gossip while they are working. We mistreat our teachers.” However, 2400 years ago, Socrates had already said it. The problem is that two and a half millennia later, nothing has changed. We still refuse to live an examined life.