Going off of the Wikipedia images of the 9 nominees of various parties, one notices a trend in their facial expressions. From the least "experienced" to the most, here is how they appear to me:
I got something to say, and something to learn.
The things that make me happy no longer do.
At least I'm certain about this one thing.
Ow, ow, ow, I have to be better than you.
Holy shit another day of this?
Hey, someone is looking at me!
Is it time to make the smile face now?
As we all know, "holy shit another day of this" is going to win, which is the best one until "I got something to say and something to learn" who don't propose to poison the world any more.
Sunday, August 12, 2012
Saturday, August 11, 2012
Keep The Future In The Past
Crime is up these past couple years, but what is instead talked about in the media, is a "peaceful trend" (June, NBC) that is the result of an "innovative public safety approach that is beginning to show signs of tremendous promise" (Eric Holder), although another piece also includes an aging population, video games, the end of the crack boom (Christian Science Monitor). This is keeping with the anti-democratic tradition of viewing people as a mass, not as individuals, a "herd" that must be controlled from above by elites.
One important elite is Eric Holder. The scholars picked up on his message and are sticking to it.
Holder did note in July briefly that "a number of major cities across the country – including Philadelphia – have experienced alarming increases in the number of homicides over the past year" which he reasons, is a problem for the cops, not the citizens. They are "threats that law enforcement officers face every day." Holder is wrong, although it is considered a perfeclty acceptable way to talk about the subject. In quiet voices they recognize that there's a problem, or something, but then proudly boast that they are on top of it. The FBI has refused to release the data required for independent analysis as of yet.
It appears to me communities are not even allowed to take care of themselves. "The same populations—houseless persons, panhandlers,youth of color—that were being targeted for elimination from the downtown area by the BIDs," writes Urban Habitat, "flocked to Occupy Oakland for the sense of camaraderie it created and the services it offered, including food, medicine,and security. Many of the tents pitched in Oscar Grant Plaza housed persons who had been living outdoors or in cars and tents long before the encampment started." With that in mind, Holder's promise to "learn from the successes" of there, where dozens upon dozens of federal agents "surge" into the city during "this time of economic and budgetary challenges" in a form of "targeted assistance and relief" to address "the need for cooperation among all relevant authorities" has a much more class-oriented significance.
Look at those stories again, the Monitor and NBC. People's security resulting from solidarity is not attributed to actual social movements, but to the miserable state they are in.
Wednesday, August 8, 2012
Mitt's List of Hot Air
I like people's lists, because they aren't too well crafted by the ego. They're pure consciousness, pure id.
So what can I imagine about Romney and his political power? (from today's Daily Kos):
...
Perhaps Romney belatedly caught wind of all this and made one of his patented U-turns Wednesday as his campaign again took him to Iowa:
We have got to take advantage of America’s extraordinary energy resources: coal, oil, gas, nuclear, renewables, wind, solar, ethanol, you name it. We’ve gotta take advantage of all of them.
Boilerplate. But still a change from what he's been saying for months.
Romney specifically noted last week that the production tax credit—which subsidizes wind, solar and geothermal power facilities—should be allowed to expire at the end of the year.
...
In my mind, in Romney's mind, we can assume it's really hard to remember to say he likes ethanol, it requires the phrase "extraordinary energy" for prompting, quick, brain, we need some more E, we've only got w, h, g, t, o and a and that only covers coal, oil and gas!
So what can I imagine about Romney and his political power? (from today's Daily Kos):
...
Perhaps Romney belatedly caught wind of all this and made one of his patented U-turns Wednesday as his campaign again took him to Iowa:
We have got to take advantage of America’s extraordinary energy resources: coal, oil, gas, nuclear, renewables, wind, solar, ethanol, you name it. We’ve gotta take advantage of all of them.
Boilerplate. But still a change from what he's been saying for months.
Romney specifically noted last week that the production tax credit—which subsidizes wind, solar and geothermal power facilities—should be allowed to expire at the end of the year.
...
In my mind, in Romney's mind, we can assume it's really hard to remember to say he likes ethanol, it requires the phrase "extraordinary energy" for prompting, quick, brain, we need some more E, we've only got w, h, g, t, o and a and that only covers coal, oil and gas!
And what a running start it takes to consider the audience's opinion! First, solar (the GOP scapegoat for all global warming denier idiots to absolve themselves of responsibility with) and ethanol (proven to be backward).
To Romeny, I believe, what you want to tell him about how to run the country is something only a backward Obama apologist would put into words. I doubt he's sincerely evil enough to wholeheartedly admit to these opinions, which is why I like to think of politics as a whole batch of perfectly innocent crabs holding each other in a pot of boiling water.
Saturday, July 28, 2012
NYT Gets To Cheer Drug War
More accurately, they get to uncritically report that it's not our fault, which, in my opinion, is a fun delusion. Yesterday's paper reported (or rather, reported that my government believes) that the Venezuelan government is to blame for presumably a huge amount of cocaine coming out of Colombia and into the US. Cocaine demand in the last several years has been lower than it's been in years and years, decades, reportedly, so for the US to make a big deal of this amount is a little suspicious.
I don't have the whole picture, but it's not the first inverted (perverted?) celebration the Times has done on this subject. Another piece of the puzzle is the way the economics were even allowed to be reported in the first place. It was actually informative, if you look at the graph. Increase in demand happened a few times, and each time without fail, the price went up. The reporter, however, decided that the price going up was like some sort of bandaid, from just being punched hard by our government.
Of course, both can be true, but without understanding the first, which is a strong, strong hypothesis as I see it, the problem doesn't go away.
Iran Contra and the 2005 plane crash in Mexico suggest the US government is actively involved in drug dealing. Does this reality charted against the Time's delusional thinking allow, encourage, or even give a little more evidence for that I don't know how to test this, we're talking about a black market. So I think a more generous reading is that the war must go on, real problem or no. The polices are admittedly ineffective at stopping wars, is what it is permissible to say. Can't that be reasonably expected from a Power which has a different agenda?
I don't have the whole picture, but it's not the first inverted (perverted?) celebration the Times has done on this subject. Another piece of the puzzle is the way the economics were even allowed to be reported in the first place. It was actually informative, if you look at the graph. Increase in demand happened a few times, and each time without fail, the price went up. The reporter, however, decided that the price going up was like some sort of bandaid, from just being punched hard by our government.
Of course, both can be true, but without understanding the first, which is a strong, strong hypothesis as I see it, the problem doesn't go away.
Iran Contra and the 2005 plane crash in Mexico suggest the US government is actively involved in drug dealing. Does this reality charted against the Time's delusional thinking allow, encourage, or even give a little more evidence for that I don't know how to test this, we're talking about a black market. So I think a more generous reading is that the war must go on, real problem or no. The polices are admittedly ineffective at stopping wars, is what it is permissible to say. Can't that be reasonably expected from a Power which has a different agenda?
Saturday, July 21, 2012
Where We Went Really Wrong
It shouldn't be a very daring observation that democracy basically won't exist in any meaningful way in a country that was just invaded and had a civil war. I believe this can be traced to political and economic uncertainty. It's here where I think we can start to know the significance of violent personalities. When we look at Iraq, this is also the case -- violence makes democracy very difficult. According to human rights reports, this is the case in Libya too:
...the main hindrance to holding free and fair elections is the deep divisions within Libyan society – a consequence of eight months of civil war
Most Chicagoans know that violent crime is up here, and there's a new mayor with new policies and a police chief quite hostile to nonviolent intervention. Going back in our history there is a more dangerous time and it's instructive when looking here and abroad. The formation of the KKK was after a much more extreme uncertainty, the civil war.
The repression lives on though. It's still common here for people to say things like "the red [train] line is dangerous" and I even had a pot dealer who wondered why the cops weren't just targeting black dealers.
I know these variables don't seem to match up: we had a free election, they had a "free election." But elections are just one aspect of democracy. They are pretty close to the right place to look however. I think if you examine people, influential people, at the root of violence and hate you find a messed up idea of human nature. It's important to get it right because when democracy fails you can get a quite terrible revolution, even with the best intentions. The rise of Hitler, the "revolution" that Marx predicted, was hailed in this country's press as a return to a "moderate," and even someone not from Germany wrote propaganda for his racist cause and contracted with him (Henry Ford). So it seems to me we have a choice. We can love people and condemn violence, or practice it, and therefore love violence and become monsters. It's really that simple.
So I disagree that the reason we can feel good about war, as my government once said and continues to say, is because "insurgence" is "the cause of human nature."
“War, in one form or another, appeared with the first man. At the dawn of history, its morality was not questioned; it was simply a fact, like drought or disease - the manner in which tribes and then civilizations sought power and settled their differences.”
Polatch:
At potlatch gatherings, a family or hereditary leader hosts guests in their family's house and holds a feast for their guests. The main purpose of the potlatch is the re-distribution and reciprocity of wealth.
Hip Hop:
At its best, hip hop has given a voice to the voiceless and poverty-stricken worldwide, particularly in inner citiesand neighborhoods suffering from urban blight, and showcased their artistic ingenuity and talent on a global scale.
Orgams:
The period after orgasm (known as a refractory period) is often a relaxing experience, attributed to the release of theneurohormones oxytocin and prolactin
...the main hindrance to holding free and fair elections is the deep divisions within Libyan society – a consequence of eight months of civil war
So tragic, because you can tell some people just think you're supposed to fight everything out, or encourage people with more power to do that. At that point, I say you are not applying your mind, or looking at history.
An ex-slave observed after our war to abolish slavery "...we still had to depend on the southern white man for work, food, and clothing, and he held us out of necessity and want in a state of servitude but little better than slavery." This same lack of liberty after war is pretty explicit in human rights reports the world over, one example of this in Libya, "thousands of detainees still languish in prisons run by militias, without a formal charge and without any prospect for legal review."
Most Chicagoans know that violent crime is up here, and there's a new mayor with new policies and a police chief quite hostile to nonviolent intervention. Going back in our history there is a more dangerous time and it's instructive when looking here and abroad. The formation of the KKK was after a much more extreme uncertainty, the civil war.
The repression lives on though. It's still common here for people to say things like "the red [train] line is dangerous" and I even had a pot dealer who wondered why the cops weren't just targeting black dealers.
I know these variables don't seem to match up: we had a free election, they had a "free election." But elections are just one aspect of democracy. They are pretty close to the right place to look however. I think if you examine people, influential people, at the root of violence and hate you find a messed up idea of human nature. It's important to get it right because when democracy fails you can get a quite terrible revolution, even with the best intentions. The rise of Hitler, the "revolution" that Marx predicted, was hailed in this country's press as a return to a "moderate," and even someone not from Germany wrote propaganda for his racist cause and contracted with him (Henry Ford). So it seems to me we have a choice. We can love people and condemn violence, or practice it, and therefore love violence and become monsters. It's really that simple.
So I disagree that the reason we can feel good about war, as my government once said and continues to say, is because "insurgence" is "the cause of human nature."
Here's Barack Obama giving up as well, for example:
“War, in one form or another, appeared with the first man. At the dawn of history, its morality was not questioned; it was simply a fact, like drought or disease - the manner in which tribes and then civilizations sought power and settled their differences.”
No, Mr. President, not the manner, just one manner. There are others, that come up spontaneously, despite cultures of violence, and sometimes, however, ended by them..:
At potlatch gatherings, a family or hereditary leader hosts guests in their family's house and holds a feast for their guests. The main purpose of the potlatch is the re-distribution and reciprocity of wealth.
Hip Hop:
At its best, hip hop has given a voice to the voiceless and poverty-stricken worldwide, particularly in inner citiesand neighborhoods suffering from urban blight, and showcased their artistic ingenuity and talent on a global scale.
Orgams:
The period after orgasm (known as a refractory period) is often a relaxing experience, attributed to the release of theneurohormones oxytocin and prolactin
Thursday, July 19, 2012
The Nile Is The Longest River In Africa
Are people going to be more free or less in the future? Open up the New York Times editorial page these days and their are loads of stories about how we're not putting freedom in its place. Heck even a story by the Newsweek editor in chief lamenting the lack of attention span cynically holds a grudge against people paying attention to the Egyptian revolution.
But hey, they're just newspapers. What about someone entrusted with the presidency? Bill Clinton gave the game away that this is power tripping dressed up as science. Before continuing to ruin his own reputation with tainted materials sent to Haiti, he was videotaped telling a TV audience that some corporate hive mind bullshit makes everything okay. The problem, he says, is people don't understand that the elites are actually working in the common man's interest. If only they read some New Age psychobabbler, they'd have a better understanding.
What's so terribly pitiful though, s'that they are allowed not only to research and thereby know things about human nature, but I assume also are trusted to not to really understand them significantly. How else could one discuss the punishing of innocent civilians as a way to reach "complex, high-order thinking"? (http://www.spiraldynamics.org/war_iraq.htm) What a great phrase. If only it weren't surrounded by nonsense.
Another kind of problem (this is kind of just a hunch) We The People are put into a larger system, not just for control, but for something that clicks with our sense of reason. Like, there's no reason we shouldn't have a thyroid gland, but there is also no reason people's will's should be represented only by how much a graph of their purchases goes up and down. In a simpler way of looking at it, just because a person has a brain and a body doesn't mean the Elites and Laborers should serve those functions. It's kind of like reasoning by appeal to poetry. It doesn't really mean anything, but it feels like it has significance.
That's really where it's at, I think. These are superstitions posing as critical thought. Rational thought hurts people's tribal brains. I mean, you can actually become a millionaire just saying the things we're supposed to believe to keep this whole act up, like how Louis CK throws rocks at "nigger cunt deer" for example.
I've looked at this before, and I think it's safe to conclude by consuming corporate media you are being used by a rich person or two, unless of course you are that rich person involved in exploiting both sides of the coin, media fatigue and indoctrination. In that sense, our freedom is already being lost. For example, the suppressed reality of global warming and Frank Caliendo's fall from grace into DirecTV commercials could not have happened without a product, oil or media, take your pick, that needed to be sold.
Do we really need to be controlled in this fashion, or at all? Why?
But hey, they're just newspapers. What about someone entrusted with the presidency? Bill Clinton gave the game away that this is power tripping dressed up as science. Before continuing to ruin his own reputation with tainted materials sent to Haiti, he was videotaped telling a TV audience that some corporate hive mind bullshit makes everything okay. The problem, he says, is people don't understand that the elites are actually working in the common man's interest. If only they read some New Age psychobabbler, they'd have a better understanding.
What's so terribly pitiful though, s'that they are allowed not only to research and thereby know things about human nature, but I assume also are trusted to not to really understand them significantly. How else could one discuss the punishing of innocent civilians as a way to reach "complex, high-order thinking"? (http://www.spiraldynamics.org/war_iraq.htm) What a great phrase. If only it weren't surrounded by nonsense.
Another kind of problem (this is kind of just a hunch) We The People are put into a larger system, not just for control, but for something that clicks with our sense of reason. Like, there's no reason we shouldn't have a thyroid gland, but there is also no reason people's will's should be represented only by how much a graph of their purchases goes up and down. In a simpler way of looking at it, just because a person has a brain and a body doesn't mean the Elites and Laborers should serve those functions. It's kind of like reasoning by appeal to poetry. It doesn't really mean anything, but it feels like it has significance.
That's really where it's at, I think. These are superstitions posing as critical thought. Rational thought hurts people's tribal brains. I mean, you can actually become a millionaire just saying the things we're supposed to believe to keep this whole act up, like how Louis CK throws rocks at "nigger cunt deer" for example.
I've looked at this before, and I think it's safe to conclude by consuming corporate media you are being used by a rich person or two, unless of course you are that rich person involved in exploiting both sides of the coin, media fatigue and indoctrination. In that sense, our freedom is already being lost. For example, the suppressed reality of global warming and Frank Caliendo's fall from grace into DirecTV commercials could not have happened without a product, oil or media, take your pick, that needed to be sold.
Do we really need to be controlled in this fashion, or at all? Why?
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
If I Don't Get To Murder... I'm Not Free
There's a kind of terrible logic to killing murderers. The idea is they had a choice, now they have to pay for it. But I don't agree with it, and here's why. Only by prosecuting another murderer can you get the the necessary blindness for your real satisfaction to happen over and over again. The people who decry murder do so (deep down) not because it is evil, but because it must feel so good Getting Away With It that it's just unfair that I don't get to get away with it. So now I get to murder you, that makes it fair. Here's the government laying out the real logic:
Jason January, the former Dallas County assistant district attorney who prosecuted Hearn for capital murder, said to stop the punishment because of fetal alcohol syndrome "would be a free pass for anyone whose parents drank."This is quite an evil thing to say from my point of view. It follow from this logic it is actually good to murder, because it brings into possibility a more moral murder.
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
What's to come from this blog?
This blog is a curious thing. Some posts work, in ways I didn't know I was capable of allowing. Others, just don't work at all. The posts where I rambled were crap!
In the first case, I have several sources for the reader to check. I was illustrating history, not just my own wishes. (I saved those for the end, the weakest part of the essay, I felt.) So I'm most proud of Frank Caliendo paired up with Gramsci, and my essay on Reagan's Roadmap. Even better is comparing things in the present to history. I always feel I'm cheating the reader by only using a few quotes at the start.
The second case, the post doesn't do what the blog was intended for. All I really wanted from this blog was an energetic quip or two to metabolize the news. I realize now that's an awful way to go about it. There's just no frame of reference allowed for the reader to have. It's the subject posing as the object -- or in plain English, it's just a fairy tale.
From now on, the commentary will be one of two things: in essay form, with citations, or in poetry. I want to be proud of my work. A lot of it depresses me. If it were a song, most of theses posts would be Dr Dre's music, before G Funk. The grand "game" in history was fun to write, maybe even therapeutic, but I'm not sure how true it is. I want to speak from history. The rest is bullshit.
Monday, April 9, 2012
Poem
I put an apple on my head,
it floods me with juice.
I play my old guitar made of bees,
in my days of the week underwear.
it floods me with juice.
I play my old guitar made of bees,
in my days of the week underwear.
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Budgets
Like befuddled deer leaping into a mirage of water
Deluded fools in their ignorance cling to outer forms
And with their thirst unslaked, bound and confined,
They idealise their prison, pretending happiness.
- Royal song of Saraha
According to Alternet, this is what's in the "Budget for All":
So what does a country need to have equality and prosperity?
France and Brazil were the first to have trade surpluses after the recession hit. What's also curious is, according to the Economist, the tax pictures of the two countries look about the same, "Brazil levies enormous taxes on just about everything: despite an estimated half of its economy being informal, its tax burden approaches 40% of GDP." France's comes close. They also have very strong cultures of democracy, but I'm putting that aside for now.
I bring this up because there are other proposed budgets that will be cheered for the wrong reason. When I see his logic, it's impossible for me to take seriously someone like Business Insider's James Pethokoukis who wants to have "economic growth" without taxes, since taxes would be "economy-crippling." He laments that "the middle" as well as "the wealthy and the bankers" are both in it together, getting "pinched." This is common rhetoric in the business press, from the Economist to Business Insider. One simply wags his finger when taxes and regulation come up. Is this factual, or just a superstition?
According to Pethoukoukis's paper, France is always "inventing new forms of taxation" and busily having protests. The paper admits these are what outsiders don't like about the country, and pretty much leaves the discussion there.
As the two countries stand today, France now has a trade deficit, partly due to the Euro. However, they also have a president who is saying things like this:
So maybe France doesn't have the winning strategy. But the picture of crippling an economy with taxes just doesn't hold up. While Coca-Cola warned France that they would lose business for a tax there, it's still obviously operating, and adjusted its policy to the regulations. They also have far more opportunity, the poor can become richer easier.
Moving on to Brazil, what do we see? They still have a trade surplus.
If the hostile rhetoric against the "Progressive" budget tells you anything, it's that whatever good there is in the plan isn't going to be looked at.
More:
Starting with the center of the road budget, the Bowles-Simpson act, which was defeated before I had time to even know what was in it:
So, the priorities, man! Tax the ancient oil, whatever, work out the kinks in the mortgage blah blah, good. But, cuts to school loans, what the heck? Good riddance to this, and Obama's bonanza of tax cuts is hardly any better. The Ryan budget, which puts our spending at a measly 19.8% of GDP, needs to go too.
So is there anyone who has the right idea in the business press? Hard to find them. Dug up this gem though, that Business Insider pretends to link to, who says
Deluded fools in their ignorance cling to outer forms
And with their thirst unslaked, bound and confined,
They idealise their prison, pretending happiness.
- Royal song of Saraha
According to Alternet, this is what's in the "Budget for All":
Look at that. Amazing. It's going to hurt us, somehow. It has too much relevance to the state of reality.• Direct hire programs that create a School Improvement Corps, a Park Improvement Corps, and a Student Jobs Corps, among others.• Targeted tax incentives that spur clean energy, manufacturing, and cutting-edge technological investments in the private sector.• Widespread domestic investments including an infrastructure bank, a $556 billion surface transportation bill, and approximately $2.1 trillion in widespread domestic investment.
So what does a country need to have equality and prosperity?
France and Brazil were the first to have trade surpluses after the recession hit. What's also curious is, according to the Economist, the tax pictures of the two countries look about the same, "Brazil levies enormous taxes on just about everything: despite an estimated half of its economy being informal, its tax burden approaches 40% of GDP." France's comes close. They also have very strong cultures of democracy, but I'm putting that aside for now.
I bring this up because there are other proposed budgets that will be cheered for the wrong reason. When I see his logic, it's impossible for me to take seriously someone like Business Insider's James Pethokoukis who wants to have "economic growth" without taxes, since taxes would be "economy-crippling." He laments that "the middle" as well as "the wealthy and the bankers" are both in it together, getting "pinched." This is common rhetoric in the business press, from the Economist to Business Insider. One simply wags his finger when taxes and regulation come up. Is this factual, or just a superstition?
According to Pethoukoukis's paper, France is always "inventing new forms of taxation" and busily having protests. The paper admits these are what outsiders don't like about the country, and pretty much leaves the discussion there.
As the two countries stand today, France now has a trade deficit, partly due to the Euro. However, they also have a president who is saying things like this:
“There’s no reason why deregulated finance, which brought us to the current situation, can’t participate in the restoration of our accounts.”
So maybe France doesn't have the winning strategy. But the picture of crippling an economy with taxes just doesn't hold up. While Coca-Cola warned France that they would lose business for a tax there, it's still obviously operating, and adjusted its policy to the regulations. They also have far more opportunity, the poor can become richer easier.
Moving on to Brazil, what do we see? They still have a trade surplus.
If the hostile rhetoric against the "Progressive" budget tells you anything, it's that whatever good there is in the plan isn't going to be looked at.
More:
Starting with the center of the road budget, the Bowles-Simpson act, which was defeated before I had time to even know what was in it:
- $200 billion reduction in discretionary spending[13] with proposed cuts including reducing defense procurement by 15% and closing one third of overseas bases, eliminating earmarks, and cutting the federal work force by 10%.
- $100 billion in increased tax revenues through various tax reform proposals,[13] such as introducing a 15 cent per gallon gasoline tax and eliminating or restricting a variety of tax deductions such as the home mortgage interest deduction and the deduction for employer-provided healthcare benefits.
- Controlling health care costs by maintaining the Medicare cost controls associated with the recent health care reform legislation,[13] in addition to considering a public option and a further increase in the authority of Independent Payment Advisory Board.
- A reduction in entitlements, including farm subsidies, civilian and military federal pensions and student loan subsidies.[13][14]
- Modifications to the Social Security program to raise the payroll tax and the retirement age.[13]
So, the priorities, man! Tax the ancient oil, whatever, work out the kinks in the mortgage blah blah, good. But, cuts to school loans, what the heck? Good riddance to this, and Obama's bonanza of tax cuts is hardly any better. The Ryan budget, which puts our spending at a measly 19.8% of GDP, needs to go too.
So is there anyone who has the right idea in the business press? Hard to find them. Dug up this gem though, that Business Insider pretends to link to, who says
For the record, I think the “fiscal responsibility” zeal now sweeping through Congress is equal parts delusion and sham. For a vigorous debunking of the current fixation on deficits, see James K. Galbraith’s recent Nation essay. Real fiscal responsibility would mean ramping down military misadventures and making smart investments in future health, prosperity, and ecological sanity. Devoting real resources to school lunches is a perfect example. Doing otherwise is a grave mistake.
Friday, March 16, 2012
I have a lot of questions about protesting
Will I be arrested and humiliated? How do I help stop war? Is going door to door going to turn people away from the cause? If I don't show up with 29 footnotes in a paper covering Obama's favorite wars, Libya, Afghanistan, the Serbian civil war and World War 2, am I not even helping at all? Am I prepared enough? I sure hope so. I don't know why I'm not going to door to door to hand out fliers. Does that hurt or help the cause?
Do I need a legal permit to protest NATO this May?
This will be my first protest. What happens to people when they do something for the first time? Will I be traumatized like Hitler when he saw where his hot dogs were made?
Do I need a legal permit to protest NATO this May?
This will be my first protest. What happens to people when they do something for the first time? Will I be traumatized like Hitler when he saw where his hot dogs were made?
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Limbaugh Reflects Sick Culture
Rush Limbaugh called a law student, Sandra Fluke, a "slut" -- he says: taxes paying for contraception amounts to prostitution. I don't really expect much better from him. What are the consequences of this?
I want to get out of the way the obvious. Limbaugh is playing his usual game, which is to make his point but let people get distracted by another point. It's very sneaky and he's good at it. It's a fake-out. Bring up government's role, and then come up with a way to make everyone listen to him. You know he's following this rationale when he only apologies for his choice of words. It's why he has some quite stupid people agreeing with him, which is especially depressing. That means that the fact that Limbaugh is not actually exploiting anyone except people dumb enough to listen to him is the minor point. The major point is that he has dumb people listening to him, so he is an influential public figure and controls to some degree the spirit of the nation. He might even be rewarded with new advertisers for what he said.
Let's also get his logic dismantled. Limbaugh isn't the rebel. He's picking on a woman for asking the government to actually protect people. Limbaugh's perspective is protected (maybe) but it should be long gone from the present. The label of "slut" arguably made sense (maybe) before condoms were invented because if you slept around, you'd spread disease. It sure explains why sex is considered "original sin" and "taking foreign wives" is a huge sin in the Bible. But that logic works against Rush here.
This points to the most dangerous thing here. It is not Limbaugh's word choice, as he wants to believe, but his entire argument. The "get the government to stop paying for healthcare" crowd is probably small enough to be its own cult. Bad things happen in cults, you start to adopt a very narrow set of values and hatreds, and you just live in your own little world.
It should be noted that there's a larger cult than Limbaugh's following. It's called the whole country. The country is plugged into the media. It is estimated that Americans watch around blah blah blah, we all know, we watch an enormous amount of television. Not only that, we watch mostly our own television, that is, made by us.
I bring this up because what saturates the media are Limbaugh's very old fashioned gender roles. Viewers are expected to accept women as "passive" sex objects, with men more or less preying on them. In fact, when the roles are reversed, and a woman rapes a man, it's played off as humorous. This is the starting point of entertainment. So even recognizing that advertisers are fleeing Limbaugh, there are still problems.
When you have a culture that totally misinforms you of what women and men actually are, you have to expect terribly evil things to be said. For heaven's sake I used to think you just had to stare at a girl to make her like you, because that's how Bart Simpson did it.
When people ask me what do you want to do about this stuff, I say, "encourage people to challenge what they believe." That means start with yourself. If you're a liberal, read conservative opinion. If you're an atheist, read the bible. If you're a Christian, read Hitchens or something. Otherwise, you might even attribute the very act of prejudice, cult-like qualities, or others to a specific group and believe yourself immune. Don't be a Limbaugh.
I want to get out of the way the obvious. Limbaugh is playing his usual game, which is to make his point but let people get distracted by another point. It's very sneaky and he's good at it. It's a fake-out. Bring up government's role, and then come up with a way to make everyone listen to him. You know he's following this rationale when he only apologies for his choice of words. It's why he has some quite stupid people agreeing with him, which is especially depressing. That means that the fact that Limbaugh is not actually exploiting anyone except people dumb enough to listen to him is the minor point. The major point is that he has dumb people listening to him, so he is an influential public figure and controls to some degree the spirit of the nation. He might even be rewarded with new advertisers for what he said.
Let's also get his logic dismantled. Limbaugh isn't the rebel. He's picking on a woman for asking the government to actually protect people. Limbaugh's perspective is protected (maybe) but it should be long gone from the present. The label of "slut" arguably made sense (maybe) before condoms were invented because if you slept around, you'd spread disease. It sure explains why sex is considered "original sin" and "taking foreign wives" is a huge sin in the Bible. But that logic works against Rush here.
This points to the most dangerous thing here. It is not Limbaugh's word choice, as he wants to believe, but his entire argument. The "get the government to stop paying for healthcare" crowd is probably small enough to be its own cult. Bad things happen in cults, you start to adopt a very narrow set of values and hatreds, and you just live in your own little world.
It should be noted that there's a larger cult than Limbaugh's following. It's called the whole country. The country is plugged into the media. It is estimated that Americans watch around blah blah blah, we all know, we watch an enormous amount of television. Not only that, we watch mostly our own television, that is, made by us.
I bring this up because what saturates the media are Limbaugh's very old fashioned gender roles. Viewers are expected to accept women as "passive" sex objects, with men more or less preying on them. In fact, when the roles are reversed, and a woman rapes a man, it's played off as humorous. This is the starting point of entertainment. So even recognizing that advertisers are fleeing Limbaugh, there are still problems.
When you have a culture that totally misinforms you of what women and men actually are, you have to expect terribly evil things to be said. For heaven's sake I used to think you just had to stare at a girl to make her like you, because that's how Bart Simpson did it.
When people ask me what do you want to do about this stuff, I say, "encourage people to challenge what they believe." That means start with yourself. If you're a liberal, read conservative opinion. If you're an atheist, read the bible. If you're a Christian, read Hitchens or something. Otherwise, you might even attribute the very act of prejudice, cult-like qualities, or others to a specific group and believe yourself immune. Don't be a Limbaugh.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)