a taste for learning

Dear súbditos,

May I discuss now a third aspect that makes your culture a very improbable home for democracy. It is your lack of consideration and taste for learning. Oh, I know that this statement will look to you as a blasphemy and you are going to tell me that you have a cousin or a friend who is a great scientist or a great man of letters.

Before you do so, let me tell you a little story. One year and a half ago, on Portuguese national day, June 10th, Jornal de Notícias conducted interviews among foreign nationals living in Porto, asking them what they found most interesting about living in Portugal. A French woman, who had been living in the country for several years, said that she found it cute that the Portuguese do not like to be left behind. Then she went on to explain that when she referred to something special existing in France, such as a wine, a cheese, a museum, there was always one of her Portuguese friends saying: "Oh, in Portugal we have that too!".

Yours is not a culture of learning, of hard thought, intellectual debate, science and philosophy. Most of you go to university to get a diploma and a better job. You do not go there for learning. Most of you actually miss half of the classes, despise your professors and they despise you too. A lot of you cheat on the exams or allow your colleagues to cheat. Except if you are a professional, you do not spend time on libraries. Actually, most of your libraries are quite inhospitable places to be. Most of you read books on vacation, at the beach, mostly soft literature. You see books as compulsory reading when you are at school, or as entertainment when you leave school. You do not see books as tools of learning.

A democracy is run by the will of the majority, with elected politicians being the agents of such will. But how can you discuss and decide properly on such complex issues as those of governing a modern society if in your culture there is no genuine interest and taste for learning, and no habits of intellectual discussion? Surely, ignorant people are a most irresponsible bunch and they can talk about everything because they never seem to realize their own foolishness. That is why I found it so interesting the recent debate about airports in your country. Everybody seemed to know a lot about the subject even though it was obvious to any distant observer that the vast majority of them never took the care and the time to learn a little bit about it.

If democracy implies that you and your fellow-citizens must take the helm of society and decide what is best for all what, if not learning, will enable you to do your job properly - divine inspiration?