Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

[flintlock]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

I agree with some of what Joe says in his piece, but while we all talk about how dumb people are today,( me included), the dumb masses have always been like this. If we could go back and ask a 19th century working class Londoner what he thought about politics we'd get much of the same. Same with a farmer in the rural south in the 1920s. Some over-simplistic answer would be their response. People today are actually better educated for the most part, but they just choose not to think. At least people used to have the excuse of no available education. They had to learn common sense as there was no nanny state to rescue them from their own mistakes like we have today. I guess you could say that it's much EASIER to be dumb today. Fewer consequences.

[llanlad2]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

I agree with some of what Joe says in his piece, but while we all talk about how dumb people are today,( me included), the dumb masses have always been like this. If we could go back and ask a 19th century working class Londoner what he thought about politics we'd get much of the same. Same with a farmer in the rural south in the 1920s. Some over-simplistic answer would be their response. People today are actually better educated for the most part, but they just choose not to think. At least people used to have the excuse of no available education. They had to learn common sense as there was no nanny state to rescue them from their own mistakes like we have today. I guess you could say that it's much EASIER to be dumb today. Fewer consequences.

I agree with what you say about the dumb masses and it being easier to be dumb nowadays.
But on the flip side what I would also argue is that it's a lot harder in this corporate-media world for the "middle classes" to not be ignorant of the real world. When I chatted to people about what has gone on in the last ten years I mostly get accused of being "cynical". This is not surprising as the media is full of red herrings as to why the West is in the state it's in now.(eg big govt , terrorists, global warming, immigrants, Julian Assange, Gays, Religious Fundamentalists, Secularism, drugs, bad parenting, lazy poor people, socialism, capitalism, high corporate taxes, DEFLATION!!!). Some of these arguments are perennial (immigrants, immorality, lazy poor people). Some may have played a role to be sure. But ultimately they all serve the same purpose which is to distract people from the main problem of corporate monopolies and oligarchy.


Ultimately it's the middle classes that drive political change not "the masses".In the 19th century it was this class of new business owners, entrepreneurs that campaigned to take power away from the monopolistic land owners. The enemy was clear for all to see. Mobilising the "dumb masses" in their favour was much easier. Pamphleteering, new newspapers, campaigning etc helped build a ground swell that led to massive change in Europe (not always for the better admittedly).

At the moment the corporate media is winning the propaganda battle. It is not until all the "entitlements" have been cut, and rising inflation can't be hidden and the to be ex-middle classes have become impoverished, small businesses continue failing en masse and the country is still in the shit will this group start to demand change in my opinion. We can only keep our fingers crossed that they will be able to see through the smoke and mirrors and obtain the right sort of change in a peaceful manner. Only a handful of countries managed this in the 19th century.

[don]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

This is a central tenet of Zbigniew Brzezinski global analysis.

[Ghent12]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

Even the threat of toasting planetary life is not enough to shake Americans loose from this disconnect. As Professor Emeritus of Natural Resources and Ecology & Evolutionary Biology Guy R. McPherson points out, "79.6% of respondents to a Scientific American poll are unwilling to forgo even a single penny to forestall the risk of catastrophic climate change. Scientific American readers undoubtedly are better informed than the general populace. And yet they won't pay a thing to avoid extinction of our species. Kinda makes you warm and fuzzy all over, doesn't it?"

Why pay another cent when the billions that have gone into research have only brought us our very own Lysenkoism and/or Church of Climate Science?

Maybe Joe should lay it out for us dumb Americans by answering some basic questions: If I pay some amount [X] of dollars, then "catastrophic climate change" will be delayed by how many [Y] years?

[llanlad2]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

This is a central tenet of Zbigniew Brzezinski global analysis.

What is?

[mliu_01]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

Bullshit. The most dangerous kind of bullshit. The kind that make a lot of sense yet burried deep in it is a lie.

are unwilling to forgo even a single penny to forestall the risk of catastrophic climate change.??

Who the heck he think he can fool with all that global warming bullcrap.

[don]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

What is?

Global consciousness is seen by Brzezinski as a fundamental threat to be addressed. Would the American middle class awaken with the ending of its steady stream of consumer good transfusions? It's an interesting nuanced view of global communication, sans a flood of cheap consumer goods, that presents a "problem" of too much democracy. A good fit with Bageant.

Brzezinski has written extensively on the issue of the ‘Global Political Awakening,’ and has been giving speeches at various elite think tanks around the world, ‘informing’ the elites of this changing global dynamic. Brzezinski is one of the principle representatives of the global elite and one of the most influential elite intellectuals in the world. His analysis of the `global politicl awakening`is useful because of his repesentation of it as the primary global threat to elite interests everywhere. Thus, people should view the concept of the `global political awakening`as the greatest potential hope for humanity and that it should be advanced and aided, as opposed to Brzezinski`s perspective that it should be controlled and suppressed. However, it would be best for Brzezinski to explain the concept in his own words to allow people to understand how it constitutes a `threat`to elite interests :

For the first time in human history almost all of humanity is politically activated, politically conscious and politically interactive. There are only a few pockets of humanity left in the remotest corners of the world that are not politically alert and engaged with the political turmoil and stirrings that are so widespread today around the world. The resulting global political activism is generating a surge in the quest for personal dignity, cultural respect and economic opportunity in a world painfully scarred by memories of centuries-long alien colonial or imperial domination... The worldwide yearning for human dignity is the central challenge inherent in the phenomenon of global political awakening.

...America needs to face squarely a centrally important new global reality: that the world's population is experiencing a political awakening unprecedented in scope and intensity, with the result that the politics of populism are transforming the politics of power. The need to respond to that massive phenomenon poses to the uniquely sovereign America an historic dilemma: What should be the central definition of America's global role? ... The central challenge of our time is posed not by global terrorism, but rather by the intensifying turbulence caused by the phenomenon of global political awakening. That awakening is socially massive and politically radicalizing.

... It is no overstatement to assert that now in the 21st century the population of much of the developing world is politically stirring and in many places seething with unrest. It is a population acutely conscious of social injustice to an unprecedented degree, and often resentful of its perceived lack of political dignity. The nearly universal access to radio, television and increasingly the Internet is creating a community of shared perceptions and envy that can be galvanized and channeled by demagogic political or religious passions. These energies transcend sovereign borders and pose a challenge both to existing states as well as to the existing global hierarchy, on top of which America still perches.

... The youth of the Third World are particularly restless and resentful. The demographic revolution they embody is thus a political time-bomb, as well. With the exception of Europe, Japan and America, the rapidly expanding demographic bulge in the 25-year-old-and-under age bracket is creating a huge mass of impatient young people. Their minds have been stirred by sounds and images that emanate from afar and which intensify their disaffection with what is at hand. Their potential revolutionary spearhead is likely to emerge from among the scores of millions of students concentrated in the often intellectually dubious "tertiary level" educational institutions of developing countries. Depending on the definition of the tertiary educational level, there are currently worldwide between 80 and 130 million "college" students. Typically originating from the socially insecure lower middle class and inflamed by a sense of social outrage, these millions of students are revolutionaries-in-waiting, already semi-mobilized in large congregations, connected by the Internet and pre-positioned for a replay on a larger scale of what transpired years earlier in Mexico City or in Tiananmen Square. Their physical energy and emotional frustration is just waiting to be triggered by a cause, or a faith, or a hatred.

Brzezinski thus posits that to address this new global “challenge” to entrenched powers, particularly nation-states that cannot sufficiently address the increasingly non-pliant populations and populist demands, what is required, is “increasingly supranational cooperation, actively promoted by the United States.” In other words, Brzezinski favours an increased and expanded ‘internationalization’, not surprising considering he laid the intellectual foundations of the Trilateral Commission. He explains that “Democracy per se is not an enduring solution,” as it could be overtaken by “radically resentful populism.” This is truly a new global reality:

Politically awakened mankind craves political dignity, which democracy can enhance, but political dignity also encompasses ethnic or national self-determination, religious self-definition, and human and social rights, all in a world now acutely aware of economic, racial and ethnic inequities. The quest for political dignity, especially through national self-determination and social transformation, is part of the pulse of self-assertion by the world's underprivileged.

Thus, writes Brzezinski, “an effective response can only come from a self-confident America genuinely committed to a new vision of global solidarity.” The idea is that to address the grievances caused by globalization and global power structures, the world and America must expand and institutionalize the process of globalization, not simply in the economic sphere, but in the social and political as well. It is a flawed logic, to say the least, that the answer to these systemic problems is to enhance and strengthen the systemic flaws that created them. One cannot put out a fire by adding fuel.

Brzezinski even wrote that, “let it be said right away that supranationality should not be confused with world government. Even if it were desirable, mankind is not remotely ready for world government, and the American people certainly do not want it.” Instead, Brzezinski argues, America must be central in constructing a system of global governance, “in shaping a world that is defined less by the fiction of state sovereignty and more by the reality of expanding and politically regulated interdependence.” In other words, not ‘global government’ but ‘global governance’, which is simply a rhetorical ploy, as ‘global governance’ – no matter how overlapping, sporadic and desultory it presents itself – is in fact a key step and necessary transition in the moves toward an actual global government structure.

[See: Andrew Gavin Marshall, The Global Political Awakening and the New World Order, Global Research, 24 June 2010]

[mliu_01]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

Maybe he will change his mind and ask people to pay X dollars to warm the earth up since we have record cold in europe right now.

Global warming is causing Global cooling big time. Pay them to stop it.

[jpatter666]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

Maybe he will change his mind and ask people to pay X dollars to warm the earth up since we have record cold in europe right now.

Global warming is causing Global cooling big time. Pay them to stop it.

It's bitter cold in DC as well -- unusual for this time of year. Makes me wonder about the whole global warming thing, but apparently a side effect is supposed to be more extremes in heat *and* cold. Certainly been getting that the past few years. Also massive rainstorms.

[Raz]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

So, he wants to tear it all down and replace it with... what? A religion-less, socialist paradise? Oh ... wait a minute, that's been tried before and hasn't worked out all that well.

I'm tired of people ranting that it all sucks, especially people that have left the USA. Come on, Joe - show some balls yourself, come back here and do something more than whine about how nasty those "creationists" are and how they're ruining the country. Never mind that those golden ages of the USA over which you so proudly pine were filled with leaders for whom the worship of God was a driving passion in their lives, whose revolutionary thinking was that it was God who endowed us with rights, not kings, not the state, not the oligarchs. Oh - and they were avowed capitalists, so that's not the issue, either.

We're in deep poop, and it has nothing to do with Bristol Palin, but with a country, with a world even, that's been bought and paid for by very powerful people. Dividing the non-elites by railing about side issues does nothing to contribute to that struggle.

Sheesh.

- Pete

Thank you, Pete, for posting this response.

I can now get back to work without spending the time to refute this useless bilge.

[DSpencer]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

1) The Internet isn't liberating people through education - it is dumbing them down by allowing them to selectively choose what information they partake of

I don't agree. I think that the internet is having a positive effect on educating people. I certainly feel that I've personally become much better informed as a result of the internet.

I think it just seems that it's dumbing people down because:
1. Many people are dumb and I believe there's a bias towards thinking "this must be the dumbest population in the history of the world".
2. People in the US and similar are very comfortable and aren't very motivated to self educate. Therefore they often remain willfully ignorant, not because of the internet, but in spite of it.

It's bitter cold in DC as well -- unusual for this time of year. Makes me wonder about the whole global warming thing, but apparently a side effect is supposed to be more extremes in heat *and* cold.

Excuse my cynicism if I find it just a little too convenient that global warming is now responsible for warming and cooling. If I recall correctly, there was some concern decades ago about global cooling. Then it was warming. Now recently, they're trying to play it safe by just calling it "climate change" so that any variation is proof.

[Raz]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

This piece is actually very typical of the failure of liberal values. No matter how bad things get, or how the nihilism of liberalism is present in all their victims who engage in the pointless activities he describes, it is because there isn't enough liberation! Enough MORAL liberation!

Follow us and we will free you to enjoy all the various accouterments of liberal civilization as described on the SWPL website!

Liberalism, being a radical religion completely inconsistent with human nature, is doomed for failure. It provides no true ethos, no meaning for death, it only allows the intelligent to heap scorn upon lower castes that just can't be as smart as they are.

Fortunately, said masses love bloodsport, and will enjoy making the lives of pansies like this cat living hell when the time is right.

It's also what your brain looks like from listening to too much Keith Olbermann.

[DSpencer]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

2) The Peter Principle vs. random promotion: http://www.inc.com/news/articles/200...romotions.html

Thanks for posting the article. When you read it, it's easy to realize that this "study" is complete nonsense. This is a simulation, not reality. It is simplified to the point of being useless. They set the parameters to create the result that they wanted in order to make the study interesting.

If this is the study that Joe refers to when he says

At least one study demonstrated that random selection for corporate promotions offsets the effect significantly, research again confirming what is common knowledge around every workplace water cooler in the country.

...then I find that very misleading and irresponsible. That's like playing a game of Monopoly and calling it research in the real estate and housing industry.

[c1ue]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

I don't agree. I think that the internet is having a positive effect on educating people. I certainly feel that I've personally become much better informed as a result of the internet.

I think it just seems that it's dumbing people down because:
1. Many people are dumb and I believe there's a bias towards thinking "this must be the dumbest population in the history of the world".
2. People in the US and similar are very comfortable and aren't very motivated to self educate. Therefore they often remain willfully ignorant, not because of the internet, but in spite of it.

I don't disagree that you can become more educated from using the Internet.

I just don't agree that most people do.

Most of the readers on iTulip are those specifically seeking the truth - we have all sorts here who battle out their respective views to provide an intellectual level playing ground for ideas to emerge from adversity.

But much as Fox News -> "Conservatives" and PBS/NPR -> "Liberals" pander to specific world views and tailor said news/views to that demographic, the internet provides and even greater capability.

The AGW-CO2-Catastrophe/Global Warming/Climate Change/Global Climate Disruption is an excellent example: there are literally dozens of sites on both sides which pander to specific viewpoints.

And these don't require multinationals like CNN or the New York Times, they are staffed by and content provided for free by individuals.

So you have the 9/11 truthers with their various sites; the NWO world order paranoics with their own sites; the gold manipulation cabalists with their own sites and so on and so forth.

Not to say any of the above aren't true - but who can tell? It all subsumes to a low level noise after a while as only the most outrageous claims arise from the muck.

Kind of like a personal National Enquirer for every person on the Internet.

[Ghent12]

Re: Joe Bageant: Ignorance and courage in the age of Lady Gaga

I don't disagree that you can become more educated from using the Internet.

I just don't agree that most people do.

Most of the readers on iTulip are those specifically seeking the truth - we have all sorts here who battle out their respective views to provide an intellectual level playing ground for ideas to emerge from adversity.

But much as Fox News -> "Conservatives" and PBS/NPR -> "Liberals" pander to specific world views and tailor said news/views to that demographic, the internet provides and even greater capability.

The AGW-CO2-Catastrophe/Global Warming/Climate Change/Global Climate Disruption is an excellent example: there are literally dozens of sites on both sides which pander to specific viewpoints.

And these don't require multinationals like CNN or the New York Times, they are staffed by and content provided for free by individuals.

So you have the 9/11 truthers with their various sites; the NWO world order paranoics with their own sites; the gold manipulation cabalists with their own sites and so on and so forth.

Not to say any of the above aren't true - but who can tell? It all subsumes to a low level noise after a while as only the most outrageous claims arise from the muck.

Kind of like a personal National Enquirer for every person on the Internet.

I disagree that the freedom to own websites and say anything on the Internet is in any way bad. In fact, I think it is good for the paranoid, delusional types to have their own way of expressing their insanity--I think it's good that people have the choice to consume whatever information they want. I believe that humans are generally intelligent and generally interested in what's good for themselves, so I am perfectly fine with giving people choices.

Is not the Internet the very embodiment of nearly free choice, free commerce, and freedom of expression? It is certainly freer than any physical system in the world that I know of. People can volunteer themselves into all kinds of pitfalls on the Internet if they want, but that is their choice. It doesn't bother me too much that people believe in X, Y, or Z conspiracy theory or magical thinking and have the choice to be hermits living in echo chambers with their idiotic ideas--it's their choice and they have chosen stupidity over enlightenment. As a believer in things such as the theory of natural selection, I have to believe that such people and ideas will eventually die off just like magical ways of thinking of old have.

In any case, the alternative to freedom of choice is always inevitably worse. The Internet is only a medium of exchange of information and commerce, and so it is only as dangerous as information and commerce can be--no need to regulate here, please look elsewhere nanny-state supporters.