comment #1

The Perils of Thinking says ...

"..a pervasive cynicism that holds that [an order of] inequities and oppression is the best that can be achieved."

Those who want to maintain the status quo have long since recognized that while direct opposition can often galvanize a movement for social change, the most corrosive element is shoulder-shrugging apathy.

A close second is the reactionary embarrassment felt by those who don't like being told that they're eating a shit sandwich, because the ads that tell them it's a fine filet make them feel so much better while they swallow it.

comment #2

Pjm says ...

An ironic post on the day when we're about to celebrate a film that brings us to tears as we watch the stirring efforts of the King of England to communicate nobly to the vast unwashed multitudes. Who thought thirty years ago we'd be watching movies where we end up rooting for the plucky King of England! Rooting for the fabulously wealthy and powerful! That is, if we can afford the matinee, since we all lost our jobs or are woefully underemployed these days...

comment #3

Ray DeRousse says ...

How is this surprising? As Inside Job showed perfectly, they're doing it to the American people as well. Everyone needs to see that movie. I hope it wins Best Doc tonight.

comment #4

DuluozGray says ...

Obama is a corporatist as well.

That said, Noam Chomsky is an old fool. He still believes in Utopia on Earth, like most Leftists. He believes life should be fair and equal. He is a moron. The Universe tends toward entropy, and so does life. Deal with it.

And Chomsky has real balls decrying self centered egoism, since he himself is a huge egotist.

comment #5

THE MovieBob says ...

Or, y'know... it could be that these people are actually upset at their own leadership over immmediate tangible concerns, and that the U.S. is NOT so all-important that it's both the cause of and solution to all the world's problems.

The worst kind of liberals are identical to the worst kind of conservatives in that they just can't fathom the idea of post-colonial brown people not being totally dependent on Western/US influence - differing only in that one thinks the West does ONLY good, the other ONLY bad.

It's the same basic arrogance you see in overstating the all-importance of Twitter etc. in these things - as though these poor downtrodden simple Eastern folk had NO chance at charting their own revolution until some American college brat invented microblogging. Wow... OUR gimmicky internet toy is THEIR weapon of social upheaval? Man, we're even more special than we thought!

comment #6

JR says ...

"In the United States, where 45 per cent of young African-Americans have no jobs..."

Yeah, and that percentage if not more of the same peeps don't finish high school, either, and most of those that do "graduate" function at an 8th grade level; i.e., unemployable in the information age economy.

I am sure that along with the unemployment, the failure to finish school is somehow my fault, or it is the sinister plot of the evil doer "corporatists."

comment #7

The Perils of Thinking says ...

I love that your argument for Chomsky being an "old fool" consists of citing two things he's never said and laying on the exact same 'pervasive cynicism' he derides in a quote in this very blog post. All the while ignoring the fact of his historic contributions to the field of linguistics and his years of leading involvement in social movements we all take for granted now (civil rights, women's rights, Vietnam, etc.).

It's fascinating how people like Chomsky are held to an amazing standard of perfection that they couldn't possibly meet by the same people who gloss over the comparatively enormous deficiencies of politicians like Obama or commentators like Thomas Friedman.

comment #8

The Perils of Thinking says ...

The above directed at Dgray...

comment #9

dangovich says ...

"He still believes in Utopia on Earth, like most Leftists"

Did you post this from the 1930s? I can assure you, the goals of "leftists" in today's America are far more modest. In fact, they are in line with what many if not most of Americans believe: i.e., preserving Social Security, ending the wars in the Middle East, reducing unemployment, improving the infrastructure, etc.

comment #10

George Prager says ...

Just checked out DuluozGray's blo. A rant about Obama's farts and gas prices and then "tits of the day". A class act.

comment #11

The Perils of Thinking says ...

JR: I wanted to just write something like "You're an ignorant twat" and leave it at that, but I'd like to add that if you'd set aside your reflexive defensiveness (no, it's probably not your personal responsibility, which was clearly the accusation), you might come to the conclusion that regardless of whether or not it's anyone's "fault", it might be decent of us to care about and try to alleviate the plight of another group of human beings.

Instead of assuming that every mention of a problem among some group of Americans is an accusation requiring immediate defense, one could maybe try not immediately thinking of oneself and showing some concern for others.

comment #12

Rashad says ...

Inside Job lost its credibility when they showed all Barney Frank in the trailer as if he was one of the good guys.

comment #13

Jeff and/or Danny Is Always Wrong says ...

Anyone who believes a word of this is an ignorant idiot.

The Arab nations did it to themselves. They had their freedom, and they surrendered it to kings, dictators, soldiers, pan-Arab communists, and bearded 12th century jihadists. When it inevitably all went wrong, they found it easier to blame the Jews next door or the Americans far away or some other villain rather than own up to their own societal failure.

The Japanese homeland was literally burned to the ground, and in fifty years they were the second-largest economy in the world. Every word written on this site depends on the prowess of engineers in Taiwan or South Korea, two nations that didn't even exist sixty years ago. India was colonized more thoroughly than any of Chomsky's perpetual Afro-Arab victims and the world enjoys Bollywood musicals and can't relocate jobs there fast enough.

Once the Chinese dictatorship realized that it was better to let their people make money than to starve them exporting grain out of a hungry nation, their wealth, welfare and well-being has exploded. If they ever freed their people as far as the West, they'll have nothing to hold them back.

Time and again, the world provides Arab nations with examples of how an uneducated and poor nation can turn their lot in life around. Time and again, they reject those lessons and refuse their opportunities... and it's OUR fault?

You believe that, go fuck yourself, so the rest of the world can ignore you and get on with their lives.

comment #14

DuluozGray says ...

Jeff and/or Danny Is Always Wrong, your name may be too long, but you are right the f on. Very succinct history of imperialism and its (non) effects.

THE Movie Bob is also 100% correct, especially the bit about Twitter. So f'in true.

The Perils of Thinking - pervasive cynicism? gimme a break with that crap. It's LIFE! Life is not fair, people are not equal, some are smart, some are dumb, you cannot change that! There haver always been rich people, and there have always been poor people, and these groups are not fixed, they are fluid. Poor people become rich, rich people become poor, so on and so forth, cause that is LIFE. It is not government's responsibility to legislate away basic humanity.

We are humans, and this is what we do. If I can be classified as a pervasive cynic merely for recognizing certain basic truths about reality, than it certainly cannot be argued that Chomsky is a typical Left wing Utopian who thinks that with the right amount of gov't intervention, society, and therefore, man, are perfectible. How can you argue that this is not the logical outcome of his line of thinking?

And I love the fake "concern" for the African American community on Chomsky's, when it is the very policies of the left he championed that have served to destroy the black family and wreak havoc in the inner cities, inner cities that have been controlled by Democrats for DECADES!

George Prager - thanks for reading, I appreciate the hate.

Hate is always better than indifference.

comment #15

DuluozGray says ...

forgive the typos, if you will be so kind.

comment #16

elzilcho says ...

DuluozGray the logical outcome of your way of thinking is to just do nothing, try to change nothing, just lie down and accept it. Imagine if the American colonists thought like you. "There's always been kings and royalty. It's the way it's always been. It's human nature. No use trying to fight it or change. Just accept it." Lucky for us they didn't recognize "certain basic truths about reality" the way you do.

comment #17

George Prager says ...

It's not "hate" Gray. I don't "hate" the pile of dogshit that I might find on a sidewalk in front of me, I merely step aside and continue walking.

comment #18

gnosis says ...

For an interesting counterpoint,check out the article in the latest New Yorker - "Prophet Motive" which maintains that Islam itself RESISTS the modern corporate world with its strictures.

comment #19

DuluozGray says ...

elzilcho - then you're another dopey Utopian? Or what? What did I say that was incorrect?

Prager - thanks for reading, I appreciate the hate.

comment #20

George Prager says ...

You can't hate jackasses. You feel sorry for them. And I won't be looking at your titsoftheday blog anytime soon. Thanks for playing.

comment #21

Gaydos says ...

I will try to contain my disdain for Pilger's bilge, since it explains nothing except a kind of myopia that would be laughable if it weren't so hideously deficient as an analysis of our current world mess.

To buy it, you have ignore the facts about various totalitarian regimes, including the ones that collapsed from both evil and incompetence as well as the exploitation of religion by power-mad thugs.

And while you're overlooking the genocidal thieves from Assad to Mugabe to Ghaddifi, ie those blood-thirsty loons whose catastrophes can't be cleanly blamed on "corporatism" in order to bolster a thesis you began to develop back in the days when people were pretending the cleansings and gulags of Stalin were okay in order to rail against the failings of capitalism, you might as well also pretend that nothing in the world has changed since that pure wintry day when Trotsky was sent into exile and an entire century of evidence began to stand between you and the tenets of your doctrine.

Whatever it is.

I'd suggest "The Denial of Death" by Ernest Becker as a better analysis of the root causes of our planetary woes.

Pogo was right.

comment #22

The Perils of Thinking says ...

Gaydos: "...the tenets of your doctrine. Whatever it is."

Yup. Understanding the enemy, FTW.

DG: Most people aren't Utopians in the sense that they think a perfect social, economic, and philosophical order is attainable, but if you're going to lower the bar for dopey utopianism to "trying to improve upon the current state of things" then, yes, I guess you caught me. Along with the rest of the non-nihilist human race.

comment #23

Kakihara says ...

JR: "I am sure that along with the unemployment, the failure to finish school is somehow my fault, or it is the sinister plot of the evil doer "corporatists."

Well, when their parents can't find work, and they live in shitty crime-ridden neighborhoods, what else do they have left?

J+DIAW: "The Arab nations did it to themselves. They had their freedom, and they surrendered it to kings, dictators, soldiers, pan-Arab communists, and bearded 12th century jihadists."

I don't recall the Shah or Saddam being people they picked, but they were people *we* picked. Also, don't give me this bullshit that they always chose the fascists. We propped them up because we wanted their oil, and the people of those countries complied only because they got a piece of that economic pie. Now, they're getting screwed by the same greed-heads who helped blow up real estate prices. P.S., I love the irony of us blaming it on the Arab countries when we not only decided to renew trade ties with Gadaffi, but also freed one of the culprits for the Pan Am bombing to help BP's bottom line.

"The Japanese homeland was literally burned to the ground, and in fifty years they were the second-largest economy in the world. Every word written on this site depends on the prowess of engineers in Taiwan or South Korea, two nations that didn't even exist sixty years ago. India was colonized more thoroughly than any of Chomsky's perpetual Afro-Arab victims and the world enjoys Bollywood musicals and can't relocate jobs there fast enough."

Japan was the second-largest, and now they've gone through a decades-long recession we might be in, too. Also, don't be too proud of South Korea, as we helped them committ war">http://rawstory.com/news/2008/AP_U.S._Okayed_Korean_War_Massacres_0705.html">war crimes. As for Taiwan, we're willing to sell out their freedom to keep our sweatshop-made industry going. And India's popular for out-sourcing, because their engineers are willing to work for *anything*, even if it's a fraction of what our workers earn here.

"Once the Chinese dictatorship realized that it was better to let their people make money than to starve them exporting grain out of a hungry nation, their wealth, welfare and well-being has exploded. If they ever freed their people as far as the West, they'll have nothing to hold them back."

Um, newsflash, the only thing capitalism did was increase the disparity between rich and poor in China.

"Time and again, the world provides Arab nations with examples of how an uneducated and poor nation can turn their lot in life around. Time and again, they reject those lessons and refuse their opportunities... and it's OUR fault?"

You're using the same ethnocentric argument["Dur, there's more than one sect of Islam?!"] which got us stuck in Iraq in the first place, which is that these countries can become industrialized power-houses like Germany and Japan, even though they don't (normally) have the same resources or culture clashes. And if you really wanna go there, we had to fight Germany twice and see them murder millions of people before they "reformed".

Anyway, I think Vonnegut said it best
about democracy.

Duluoz: "cause that is LIFE. It is not government's responsibility to legislate away basic humanity."

Unless it involves denying women reproductive rights or gay people the right to marry, or even have sex in their own homes. of course. Oh, and arrest people for smoking pot.

Gaydos: Well, when capitalism's only answer to these power vacuums is to maintain the status quo so communism doesn't win, [See South Africa.] how can we possibly claim the moral high ground? About the only issue we've been right on in recent years has been female genital mutilation and human trafficking, and even our corporations are looking the other way on the latter problem.

comment #24

Kakihara says ...

Need to fix a link.

comment #25

JR says ...

To my critic above: We throw more money at schools in our country, and have less to show for it, than virtually every nation in the world. At some point, people need to take it on themselves to acquire the education that will lift them out of their poverty and misery. The free education and helping hand is already there; failure to finish high school at the 50 percent rate is ridiculous.

How do we alleviate the plight of people who don't, or won't, even finish high school that is provided to them free? And it is not as if it stops there - no high school means no college, and the best jobs are open to college grads.

comment #26

The Perils of Thinking says ...

JR: You are aware that those kids that represent to you how little we have to show for all that money we throw at schools includes white kids, right? Kids who have a family history of academic success, who live in neighborhoods or cities that offer economic opportunity if they do well in school, and who more often than not go to schools provided with more funding per student?

When will someone stand up to the scourge of lazy white kids sucking the marrow from our nation? Do better with all the opportunities and helping hands you're given, you slothful bastards!

comment #27

Rev. Slappy says ...

The American educational system is subpar for one and only one reason: deep down Americans don't value education. Of the millions of dollars we throw at education, how much of it actually does to pay teachers and supply classrooms? How much of it goes to buy football helmets. I was a high school teacher for ten years and last school I taught at didn't have enough textbooks for all students to get one and yet they were installing astroturf on their football field. How do you think parents would react if they were told their kids' school was going to suspend sports programs and put all that money back into classroom teaching?

comment #28

JR says ...

Perils: what the hell is your point anyway? If some white kid in an economically prosperous family and a good school district doesn't take advantage of the education and opportunities available to him, then fuck him.

Amen to Rev Slappy's comments above. Sports are WAY too over valued in the schools. My local district spent millions putting artificial surfaces on the sports fields of the high schools (all in last 2 or 3 years), yet they are cutting teachers, bitching about lack of funding for the classroom, etc.

comment #29

JohnnyM says ...

@Perils: "it might be decent of us to care about and try to alleviate the plight of another group of human beings"

It is very decent and even noble to care about the plight of our fellow man. I encourage all men to help whenever and however they can from their own resources and means. The problem is when you get government involved, because that means using the force of government to take from one man to give to another. The funny thing about those who prefer this approach is that they are rarely the ones being given to or the ones being taken from, so they have no skin in the game.

It would be great if the world was fair, but it is not, and the problem of trying to make it fair is quite simple: who determines what is fair.

comment #30

DuluozGray says ...

George Prager - thanks for reading, I appreciate the hate.

Perils - I love Utopians, if you somehow don't believe in Utopia, you're a nihilist who believes in nothing. It's not possible for you to be someone who thinks things can be improved bit by bit, but "fairness" will never be achieved no matter what, cause we are human beings, and human beings are not created equal.

Perils, you think man and society can be perfectible, you're just scared to admit it in an open forum, cause you know how ridiculous it sounds, deep down inside. You also think the best way for man to improve himself is by governmental means. Man doesn't know what's best for himself, gov't does. Just admit it.

comment #31

Fruta Planta Diet Pills says ...

I'm a wholesome diet regime fan, I am positive the ZiXiuTang Slimming is the best, I prefer it really significantly. If you'd like to turn into more slender fine? So hurriedly action! The Fruta Planta Diet Pills retailer possess a lot of healthful diet program products for you to pick. Such as Letpin Slim Coffe

comment #32

aryan1911 says ...

Hey you have a very nice blog
Download gta iv

comment #33

Scarlett05 says ...

Thanks for your sharing,here are something interesting.hermes bags
hermes handbags
hermes shop
hermes outlet
hermes sale
hermes birkin
birkin bag
hermes birkin bag
birkin hermes
hermes birkin price

comment #34

Scarlett05 says ...

Thanks for your sharing,here are something interesting.cheap jerseys
packers jerseys
buffalo bills jerseys
49ers jerseys
steelers jerseys
saints jerseys
jimmy graham jersey
lsu 7 jersey

comment #35

Scarlett05 says ...

Thanks for your sharing,here are something interesting.beats headphones sale
monster headphones
dr.dre headphones
monster beats headphones
beats by dr dre
monster lady gaga

comment #36

Scarlett05 says ...

Thanks for your sharing,here are something interesting.mulberry bags
mulberry outlet
mulberry handbags
mulberry alexa
mulberry sale
mulberry uk

comment #37

azaazafighting says ...

Thank you for sharing this, we have something interesting mulberry bags
mulberry outlet
mulberry handbags
mulberry alexa
mulberry sale
mulberry uk

comment #38

azaazafighting says ...

Thank you! There are something interesting
nfl jerseys
lsu 7 jersey
packers jerseys
49ers jerseys
steelers jerseys
saints jerseys
buffalo bills jerseys
jimmy graham jersey

comment #39

azaazafighting says ...

Thanks for sharing this,and there also something interested beats by dr dre monster headphones beats headphones dr dre headphones monster beats by dr. dre monster beats by dre monster beats studio beats by dre studio

comment #40

azaazafighting says ...

Thanks for your news.Wonderful
hermes bags
hermes handbags
hermes shop
hermes outlet
hermes sale
hermes birkin
birkin bag
hermes birkin bag
birkin hermes
hermes birkin price

comment #41

marcialala says ...

It is so interesting. There are something interesting for u .
nfl jerseys
lsu 7 jersey
packers jerseys
49ers jerseys
saints jerseys

comment #42

marcialala says ...

It's so luck to enjoy this article ,so nice.Thanks for sharing. There are something interesting for u .
mulberry bags
mulberry handbags
mulberry bags sale
mulberry bags uk
mulberry bags outlet
designer bags
mulberry alexa
mulberry alexa bag

comment #43

marcialala says ...

Excellent dude. I enjoyed the article a lot while reading.Thanks for sharing.
beats by dr dre
monster headphones
beats headphones
dr dre headphones
monster beats by dr. dre
monster beats by dre
monster beats studio
beats by dre studio