“He who feeds you, controls you.” – Teach Different with Thomas Sankara

Transcript

Dan Fouts (00:10) 

Hello everybody. Welcome to the Teach Different Podcast. Great to have you here. We have a really great quote, today from Thomas Sankara from the country, Burkina Faso, in Africa, and he’s going to be talking about the idea of control. And the quote, which I’ll get to in a minute, is a really interesting one that you can think about from a lot of different angles, both personally and then also on a national and international level, thinking about countries and how they interact. For those who are new to the Teach Different Method, we’re going to start with this quote. As you know, we’re going to work the claim. We’re going to work the counterclaim, get the competing meanings of a quote. In doing so, you kind of activate those critical thinking juices, so to speak. And then we’re going to ask some questions throughout and see where we head. Teach Different is evolving. We’re definitely in the schools, but we are more and more going out into the community and sharing this method with adults, which we’ve found need this kind of help with communication just as much as students. I mean, we’re all in this together, right? This thing called life. So if you have a good way to communicate and we really think that this method facilitates a good way to communicate, then it’s applicable to all people. So we encourage you to think about using this with a lot of different audiences. So here’s the quote from Thomas Sankara of Burkina Faso, and this may not be a completely direct quote from him. It’s very similar to one that he gave in a 1984 United Nations speech, but the spirit is there, and that’s what’s important. Here we go. He who feeds you controls you. He who feeds you controls you. All right, it’s just Steve and I today. So Steve, what do you think of the quote here? Claim.

Steve Fouts (02:21)

Claim is if someone is responsible for your necessary items that you need for survival and you’re reliant on them, then they can pretty much get you to do anything that they want because they can always hold that from you and threaten you, threaten to take that from you if you don’t do what they say. And there’s a lot of validity in it. Because it’s true, we do need to be quote unquote fed. And I’m understanding feed as just taking care of necessary survival, not even necessarily just food, but anything that you need to survive, if someone has that over you, you’re going to have to do what they want.

Dan Fouts (03:25)

Yeah, I agree. And I think it’s also then implying that you don’t want to put yourself in situations where you are dependent on other people who are providing you basic necessities because then you’re going to be controlled by them. And therefore, I think there’s this nudge in this quote, this moral kind of nudging that you should really figure out ways of building your own self worth and self independence so that you’re never in a position of being dependent on others.

Thank you very much.

Steve Fouts (04:07) 

Yes, if you don’t want to be controlled. Here’s something that you just made me think about maybe that I’ve noticed about certain people, and actually myself on some level. Sometimes it’s comfortable feeling as if someone is controlling you, or is kind of looking after you in a way. You’ll give up your freedom and independence, and although you may have to do what they ask, and there are some expectations, you’d still rather have that than to be off on your own and be free and be autonomous, because if you don’t have someone feeding you, you’re going to have to worry about feeding yourself, and that’s a whole new set of challenges and problems. And that can be a life that is not ideal, right? And you might have made like a decision in your mind. Okay, I don’t have to worry about any of this stuff. I got someone who’s going to feed me. Now I have to put up with them, but that’s the choice I made. So I think that it’s not always a forceful thing, I guess, is a way to say this. It’s sometimes a choice on the part of the person being fed that they would rather live in that world.

Dan Fouts (05:37)

Yeah, and I think applying this to this quote, you could bring in examples of countries, countries in Africa that have over time found themselves in a position of other countries, maybe providing things for them. And then there being a feeling of dependence on others, and so it’s that feeling of control. So you are getting some needs met, but you’re also in a constant situation of having to cater to the needs of the people who are providing you these things.

Steve Fouts (06:18)

Yes.

Dan Fouts (06:19)

That’s a big country way of thinking about this. I think it could also go into a personal level. If someone is providing you basic necessities, they are in a state of controlling you.

And there’s some very dark places you could go with this quote with regard to unhealthy relationships between people and how some people hold over others basic necessities and that person being controlled is sort of trapped.

Steve Fouts (06:53)

It’s the seeds of abuse when it comes down to it. There’s one person that has a little bit of leverage or more leverage over the other. With regard to basic needs and survival and also a mental game that someone might play who has the ability to feed someone else and how they’ll use it as a way to get what they want with everything. And it is, I think that, it is kind of the background behind some very unhealthy relationships. I was going to say one more thing about colonization. When colonization ended, it ended at different times in Africa, and we saw the struggles that some of the countries had when they all of a sudden had more freedom and independence. It’s not as if it’s a hunky dory world, you know, when your provider leaves, right, then you’ve got a whole new series of challenges to overcome. And I’m not saying it’s not worth it. I think it is worth it. But it’s not easy, is the point. There is a comfort in having someone provide for you. I’m just acknowledging.

Dan Fouts (08:16)

Would you say then that is the counterclaim to this? That, I mean, he who feeds you controls you. I got it, right? Yeah, he who feeds you controls you. That seems to be saying that this is a bad thing, but you’re saying that being fed and being provided basic necessities can be a good thing.

Steve Fouts (08:46)

I guess that is the start of a counterclaim. And I would maybe rewrite the quote and say, he who feeds you, provides security for you at a cost, you know, to kind of bring in, it’s not control only. It’s maybe your decision and something that you just said to yourself, okay, I’m going to live in this world. I’ve decided to live in this world. This person isn’t controlling me. I could leave tomorrow, but I don’t want to because I know that the world has a lot in store for me that I don’t want to deal with right now and I’m going to be living in this situation. So I guess yes, I got another counterclaim too that I’m going to keep to myself. Do you have one in addition to–

Dan Fouts (09:42)

I would say back to the claim, dependence is bad. Counterclaim, dependence is good. Or independence is good. You know, being independent, back to the claim, independence is good. There’s a difference, I think dependence and independence could be played with as two words that people might understand better to work this quote out.

Steve Fouts (10:19)

Okay. Yeah, independence is good as implied by the claim. Like he who feeds you controls you. That sounds negative. They’re controlling you, and you shouldn’t want to be controlled, right? No one should want to be controlled. And I’m kind of inclined to agree with that. That’s why I was mentioning that it could be a choice for someone. So, here was a counterclaim, another one that I was thinking about. He who feeds you, controls you. I don’t think that someone who is feeding you, is really controlling you. To me, control is mind control. That’s the strongest type of control. So if you are being fed by someone and they’re telling you to do this and telling you to do this, and yeah, you got to do this because they’re expecting you to do this all the while you, you can have a very free mind. During oppression, maybe is a way to say it, or during subservience. You can have peace, and that is not being touched by this material thing that’s being fed to you. You know, you can be, I guess, okay in the situation. That maybe is a little, I don’t want to say naive, but why not? Maybe that is naive because personally, I’ve never felt that I’ve been controlled by someone that’s feeding me. And we had a great family. Yeah, we have a great family, right? We were provided for, but we never felt, I never felt ever that I had to do this or had to do that because of it. I always felt free and autonomous and, you know, wanting to set my own course and destiny, but that’s a lucky thing on some level. So anyway, that’s my other counterclaim that the mind is really what is free or not free and the feed, and the material things are just second in priority.

Dan Fouts (12:40)

Yeah, I have a different angle on this, depending on the group that this conversation is given to, I don’t, maybe, depending on the age, what if a student or an adult in one of our community events says, what if we think of feeding, not in material food terms, but feeding information? And we get into the idea of social media. And when you’re fed information in a certain way, disinformation, misinformation, that ends up controlling you.

Steve Fouts (13:24)

That’s great.

Dan Fouts (13:26)

That would be different. Now, would that make a stronger claim then?

Steve Fouts (13:35) 

Yeah. That would be, you could say something like the social media platform that you’re addicted to controls you. That’s where you get all your news. That’s where you make all your fake friends. That’s where you make your posts anonymously to people that you don’t know. And that’s where all the vitriol is. And that’s determining your understanding of what it means to interact and communicate and learn. So yes, I think that’s a great feed. There’s an essential question baked in right there. What does feed mean?

Dan Fouts (14:17)

What are things that are fed? What are things that are fed to us that control us get the kids or whoever you’re working with to think much bigger about this. Go counterclaim then? No, a critical thinking, independent mind will not be controlled by bad information because they are able to process this idea and put it up against other ideas and show its lack of veracity and truth.

You’ll never be controlled. And this is the beauty of philosophy. You and I both studied it, Steve. Philosophers are not people who take things at face value, right? We’re always questioning and thinking about competing perspectives.

Steve Fouts (15:10)

I’m going to say this is the purpose of the Teach Different Podcast, right here. We’re basically saying, I hope, that whatever you’re fed, you can choose to eat it. Or you can discard it or you can have half of it and give half to someone else. You are the autonomous creature who is determining what it is that you’re being given and what it means and how much of it is true and good. And then you make those decisions on your own and you can be appreciative of people that are giving you information and you can even seek it out and try to learn, you know, but the people that are telling you things and it’s happening constantly, you don’t have to accept them at face value, like you’re saying, and you can’t if you’re going to be

someone who critically thinks and is going to do the right thing.

Dan Fouts (16:21)

Yeah. And it’s not easy. And it takes habit and routine and back to this is the purpose of this method. The more we think like this together, the less susceptible we are to being fed things that are not true. We have to consider and examine them with critical thinking. Otherwise, you’re going to be fed things, you’re going to eat them, and before you know it, you’re going to be thinking along lines that maybe might not be healthy.

Steve Fouts (16:58)

And going back to that comfort, I was talking about, when sometimes getting fed is a level of comfort and it’s something that you would prefer, you choose. I think that translates perfectly to information, feeding information. After a while, people tire of questioning. They tire of nuance and ambiguity and gray areas and always considering both sides. And a lot of people, I think, just will end up saying this to themselves. I trust this person that’s talking to me. I’m not going to nitpick at everything they say. I am going to go with it. And that’s my comfort. They might not be perfect, but I’m going to stick with it. And I might have someone else tell me what to think.

Dan Fouts (17:50)

Exactly. And that’s the counterclaim because sometimes in life that is a better way to process information, not questioning it because it gives you peace, serenity, security, and you can actually move forward in life in ways that are healthy. So the essential question then is when do I, when do I know that being fed information is healthy for me and when is being fed information something that I need to critically think about and decide for myself? That’s a mealy mouse. That could be better, but yeah.

Steve Fouts (18:34)

How about just when is the food, how do I know the food is good and there isn’t poison in it? You know, I, and I would even add the control as an essential question as well. What does it mean to control someone? That’s the other thing, those two words make this quote, feed and control can be talked about if you just want to picture a classroom or a group of adults in a community conversation, feed and control are their conversations in and of themselves. And this is a good quote because of that, because it’s short, but it’s very rich.

Dan Fouts (19:15)

Yes, and what happened in the podcast today to our listeners notice we started thinking about this quote in kind of a historical context and then all of a sudden, we move to a different context with information and being fed information. This is okay. This is why this method exists. Because there’s deep, big philosophical ideas in all these quotes that you can go off on without losing focus. And that’s the beauty of this. So we encourage you to do that with your conversations, just as we did today. Any closing thoughts, Steve? 

Steve Fouts (19:59)

No, it was a great quote. I loved it.

Dan Fouts (20:03)

All right. Well, thanks everybody. I hope everybody can try this out in whatever setting that they have. And that this was a useful conversation for you. I’ll say it again, Thomas Sankara, revolutionary leader of Burkina Faso in Africa, the quote being, he who feeds you controls you. Good luck with this one, everyone. All right, take care.