Not Taking the Bait - Page 2

And I believe that's what progress should be. Someone has to put forward the big idea and right now conservatives are offering up big ideas but in the opposite direction of history. They want us to go back instead of forward.

However, you can't advocate rejecting the basic assumptions of society and still want to use that model as a basis for shifting the cultural paradigm. You can't push the edge of something that isn't there.

Honestly, the overwhelming assumptions you make about people you know based solely on their message board postings make your insults empty and tiresome.

Of course not. But where does it begin and end? Yes, there is an evil military-industrial complex that runs this country but their are lots of evil corporations in the world. Will you abandon every product that comes from a questionable moral background? If you discover that Coca-Cola supposedely crushes unions in their Columbian bottling plant, will you stop drinking all Coke products?

How uncomfortable are you willing to be for what you believe in? If you're willing to put yourself into a black and white world, then honestly, you're just as frightening as those you rail against. Yes, you may be force of good and they the force of evil but you'll both be painted with an extremist brush and then who will take you seriously?

Not that he needs my support, but I'm with Devin on this one. Things are fundamentally broken and need to be fixed. If a different (some would say radical but I prefer innovative) approach isn't used, does anyone honestly think things will get better by themselves?

The hippy, or 60s counterculture generation got co-opted, consumed, whatever, by the mainstream. That's not so bad. What is bad is that they forgot what they fought for in the first place.

Things are slowly changing, but I firmly believe that things will have to get worse before they get better. Its the nature of things. The question remains: How low is the bottom?

Again, you're talking about things you know nothing about in an attempt to paint me as someone I'm not. Yes, I probably spend more than 20 hours a week in front of the TV. I also spend more than 20 hours reading books and I spend 16 hours a week in classes and then I spend more time writing papers, writing articles, and talking with fine gents like yourself.

It's absolutely a very sick society and the problems are very deep. They only get deeper when you advocate vague radicalist ideals instead of trying to come up with solutions to these "very real problems".

Also, what's wrong with addressing the symptoms? I advocate Affirmative Action even though it's a response to the real problem of economic racism in our country. So do I stop supporting AA, join the socialist party, and try to tear down the country so that there will be no more rich people and poor people?

And if this previous paragraph confuses or irritates you, it's only because you speak of "sickness" and "problems" and you just assume everyone should know what you're talking about and if they don't, fuck 'em. How do you plan to educate children when you apparently have no desire to educate the people who are willing to engage you?

Don't take the bait, Goldberg.

Thanks, Morpheus.

So how do we create this new society, this new culture, and get rid of the evil corporations? You're assuming that people want corporations to act morally when in truth, people will settle for the appearance of morality.

So how do we break the cycle? How do you plan on convincing people that World A is better than World B?

Retcon it?

Any recommendations on particular books?

......provocative.....it's amusing that you're calling for a return to the mind-set of the 60's, when the leftist concepts from that decade have largely failed or been rejected en masse.

I have no idea why Goldberg set himself up for that last one.

Devin is King Troll, now? I miss John Shade already.

So is Devin gonna put on the Guy Fawkes mask and get the ball rolling?

Arguably, those things did succeed in the 60s, how else did people get to this state of apathy and allow wars of aggression, erosion of civil liberties and government corruption to recur?

He took the red pill.

So what exactly do you advocate, Devin? I'm being serious. What is the answer? Should we all take to the streets? What I find interesting is that you seem to be advocating some vague notion of power to the people, the majority of which you seem to clearly despise.

Before the feeding frenzy starts, let me say again that I harbor no hate or resentment of Devin, his writing, or his political beliefs.

Yes, I did. The problem is that for the most part I agree with what you're saying, there is a culture war waging in America, what I'm asking is how do we go about winning it? I'm just not convinced that scrapping society as we know it is the answer.

EDIT: What I should say, is how do we go about practically winning it, how do we put the lofty ideas in motion?

Devin, how much do you think complete and enforced Campaign Finance Reform & Restriction would help in renewing a truer and more honest representation of morals and goals of the American citizenry? It occurs to me that the biggest problems in this country stem from what its politicans are willing to do to get elected and re-elected. Either elongating terms and limiting the opportunities for re-election or choking the flow of cash to smear campaigns, I believe both are solutions that scare the rich and powerful.

Devin isn't talking about elections per se, but more of a culture thing that effects everything. But to answer your question, I think public financing of elections is a good place to start.

If only it was as exciting as you make it sound.

VENDETTA had two things about it that allowed it to fly under the Right-wing psycho-blogs' radar.

1. It's sci-fi, which the old folk opiners like O'reilly don't pay attention to. Also, the "facist future" is such an ingrained archetype no one pays attention to it anymore.

2. The country in question isn't America. If this film had had a Bush look-alike spouting all the stuff next to America flags instead of Neo-Naziesque crosses, you can be certain it would have pissed people off.

Sure, there's a lot of overt references to America's current situation, but the Right is anything but subtle. Small touches or ideas not enough - FARENHEIT was anything but subtle in its content and intent, so they couldn't ignore it. It's the nature of group outrage.

The New Deal spawned massive entitlement programs, the worst of which is Social Security. The entitlement era ushered in by the New Deal is a catastrophe of such gigantic proportions it boggles the mind. The concepts of duplicative taxation that took hold during the New Deal also continues to plague us.

WWII and the massive expenditures and jobs created by it were much more significant in ending the Depression than the New Deal.

I don't know, the Viet Cong's war of aggression was pretty darned successful. Probably because they fought to win.

The "big government" 60's mentality has failed because it is based on invalid and fantasy based, rather than empirically based, beliefs about the nature of how society and individuals organize themselves; by their very nature, the type of programs leftists favor can NEVER have enough funding, because the behavior and attitudes these programs foster among the recipients of the largess (which includes government workers) actually worsen rather than improve the underlying problem. Government bureaucracies are inefficient, unmanagabeable nightmares that themselves turn into entitlement programs because it is nearly impossible to eliminate large departments.

Given your extraordinary close-mindedness, radical positions, and constant name-calling you've basically doomed yourself to howl into the Internet void.

Does a civil war count as a war of aggression? Either way, it's much easier to win support for a fight for independence than for a hunt for the Communist boogeyman.

Rightist revisionism is so fucked up. FDR is a bad guy, and Joe McCarthy is underrated/overhated.

But they unequivocably love the part where FDR inadvertantly spawns the military-industrial complex.

I loved Joe McCarthy in Mannequin. He is underrated. And Dreamy.

Jesus wept.

Remember whn Bob Roberts used to be a mockumentary?!?!

I think the Right has not taken the "bait" because the Left has failed time and again to present a consistent idea of how things should be. This has been the strength of the American Right and weakness of the American Left for decade. Republicans can enjoy "V" just as well as Democrats because the films portrays a tolitarian regime, examples of which exist on both the Left and Right side of the political spectrum. What's Orwell's "1984" if not modern-day North Korea? When it comes to problems, we always go with the guy who says he has an idea how to fix them versus the one who just complains and has no solutions. The Democrats won't win the next election because they have some much hate and vitriol (deserved and undeserved) invested Bush that they'll probably be mystified as how to campaign when he's gone. He's their Straw Man, their Iblis and without him they're in dissarray.

I asked for YOUR recommendations, idiot.

And this is why you're full of shit. Someone tries to actually engage you, learn from you, and you tell them to piss off. Honestly, how hard would it have been to just say "check out these couple of titles". I'm sure there are tons of books out there on 60s counterculture so I'm asking for a RECOMMENDATION. But no, you obviously prefer to be snide which defeats your entire argument. You want people to change and yet you're either too lazy or too much of a prick to recommend a couple books that would help your argument.

I think it's pretty clear that as far as politics and social reform are concerned, you're worthless.

I made the mistake that Devin actually believed in what he was saying.

I just miss the "Can't Pray the Gay Away" user text.

How was American Dreamz?

To be fair, he just wanted a few title names, not a Cliffs Notes on something.

I asked for the titles of books. I didn't ask what they were about, for an indepth review, or for anything other than recommendations for particular books.

And apparently, this qualifies as "legwork"? Are you serious?

They may back up your point as you read them, but someone else may read the text and come away with another conclusion. They may feel that the author didn't make a convincing argument or that more questions need to be asked. Maybe these books will lead to new texts.

All Google does is give results and all those results are equal because I don't know which books are worth a read and which are a waste of time. It's unbelievable that you would be such a prick about someone valuing your opinion enough to ask for book recommendations that would help people better engage your ideas.

Based solely on this thread, I find it hard to believe that Devin thinks you value his opinion and were asking for sources in earnest.

*edited to add that I only have 99 posts, so what do I know?