John Dewey | Camouflaging One's Self

Above World War I photograph of a British soldier, dressed in bark mimic sniper's outfit, posed beside a bark-covered observation post, disguised as a dead tree. From Ferdinand Foch, et al., The People's War Book. Cleveland OH: R.C. Barnum, 1920. Public domain.

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From Randolph S. Bourne, in J.W. Cunliffe and G.R. Lomer, eds., Writing of Today. New York: Century Company, 1919, p. 175—

In all his [John Dewey's] philosophy there is no place for the psychology of prestige. His democracy seems almost to take that extreme form of refusing to bring ones self or ones ideas to the attention of others. On the college campus or in the lecture room he seems positively to efface himself. The uncertainty of his silver-gray hair and drooping moustache, of his voice, of his clothes, suggests that he has almost studied the technique of protective coloration.