theory: America has been trolled

[ninakat]

[JackRiddler]

.

I see that my question of whether the loving, understanding approach is really more effective than mockery has inspired some fixation here. I was looking to provoke. Also, to recall that the right wing has had enormous success with the latter, and not the former. My "zombie" comment was on a different matter, but as to whether it's right to hold this against folk... that wasn't my question. I said it wouldn't be right to hold it against people, but that it may be more effective; or at any rate, the jury is still out. That is, given that most of the struggle is about youth over time. Mockery of given ideas as unacceptably stupid wouldn't be a conversion device for those already burdened with these ideas, but a way of influencing how youth think of these ideas. (A way that has been used very effectively over the decades, as in the successful corporate advertising/psyops from the 1970s to 1990s to "rebrand" the 1960s youth and feminist movements as old, boring, elitist, anti-hedonist, not fun, strident, intolerant, unscientific, etc. etc.)

Of course, as I said: I have devil in me, and like to play its advocate.

Right on crikkett

Jack wrote...

We're all zombies from different combinations of stress overload, trauma, or long-ago training.

Given that conditioning effects are so pervasive, it doesn’t seem quite right to hold this against folk to the point of using mockery and derision as tools of influence.


A split model for reality naturally embraces coercion. We should not be surprised that we all become trolls as our very success (and self-image) is measured by how well we influence our surroundings to conform to our individual and often petty beliefs and pretences.

[Nordic]

Well the mockery thing only works when you have the mainstream corporate media on your side. As the right-wing has had since oh, about 1980 or thereabouts, with more and more influence every year.

The smart set only has a few comedians on their side. Nothing else whatsoever.

[Weather Balloons]

Quoted from eyeno's post, I'm still not sure how to make a quote that shows who said the quote.

The author wanted an end to corporate money and lobbying, an end to "corporate personhood," and called for a new constitutional convention to rewrite the constitution.

Seems like a good excuse to crackdown on OWS this spring. Or they could always just blame Iran..

[Luther Blissett]

Yes, but remember 1992, when Buchanan got a pretty good head of steam, and everybody seemed to kind of freak out about it, and it seemed that the Repubs really didn't want someone that extreme to be their Official Candidate? It was embarrassing?

Well, things sure have changed. Santorum makes Buchanan look like Abraham Lincoln, an intellectual heavyweight and a moderate, sober and mature statesman.

So weird.

Somewhere, someone in that .00016 % of the ruling class is saying "maybe we pushed things a little too far?" I mean, the "base" of the Repub Party actually does support this freakazoid nutjob. He actually represents their views!

I don't think he represents their views necessarily. They don't really need him for that purpose; he's doing a job and that's it. Their mission will carry on behind the scene of Santorum's social extremism and Obama's war crimes.

[crikkett]

.
Mockery of given ideas as unacceptably stupid wouldn't be a conversion device for those already burdened with these ideas, but a way of influencing how youth think of these ideas.

I'll see your sweeping generalization and raise with my own:
The concept of ridiculing ideas is from before the time when the jester was the only person who could bring down the king -- the king obviously being burdened by his ideas. Like King Lear. It's not just liberals and young people who are watching Colbert, Stewart, and Maddow. Each person is championing their own social cause (or two) through humor and ridicule (however mild). I find it refreshing.

(A way that has been used very effectively over the decades, as in the successful corporate advertising/psyops from the 1970s to 1990s to "rebrand" the 1960s youth and feminist movements as old, boring, elitist, anti-hedonist, not fun, strident, intolerant, unscientific, etc. etc.)

Ha, I'm surrounded by people from 60s social movements and it's sometimes a challenge for them not to live up to the hype.

[justdrew]

Cultural historian: ‘Politics is a movie’ and that’s a problem
By Muriel Kane | Friday, February 24, 2012 21:13 EST
Cultural historian Neal Gabler believes that Hollywood movies have shaped our perceptions of political campaigns for the worse.

“Life itself has become an entertainment medium,” Gabler told Bill Moyers during a PBS interview on Friday. “We are all actors in and audience for an ongoing show. We are so steeped in the theatrical arts … that we have turned our own lives, and life outside of us, into a movie.”

“Politics is a movie,” he continued, “and now we’re in a campaign season where what we’re really watching is not so much political debate … as we are watching a movie in which candidates are pretending to be our protagonists-in-chief. … They want to be the hero of the movie because they understand that’s what the American people really are looking for.”

When Moyers objected that heroes like George Washington have been elected president in the past, Gabler replied that those were real heroes but what we are seeing now is “celebrities,” who are poorly fitted for the non-heroic business of governing.

This video is from Moyers & Company, February 24, 2012.

[Nordic]

Neal Gabler is now a "cultural historian?". WTF? And why would Moyers give that little shit a second of face time?

[eyeno]

“We are all actors in and audience for an ongoing show. We are so steeped in the theatrical arts … that we have turned our own lives, and life outside of us, into a movie.”

In a nutshell that is exactly my point with my comments in the Israel lobby thread. I have said this before, and I have been saying it for years. I'll say it again...

"enough is enough, sometimes enough is enough"

Our culture has 'acted' for so long that it has totally lost its identity. Our actors no longer have an identity or a purpose. The original intent was to survive off the backs of the animals and live a life of leisure. We had a mathematical process for that and a way of life. It worked well too. So damn well its amazing.

Well...ladies and gentlemen, its all fucked up now. None of our blood lines will likely survive it. The actors have lost the script. We now have so much radiation on the planet that no blood lines will hardly survive it. All the water is so damn toxic that mammals will have a hard time living in the next few thousand years. Oh yes I know, supposedly they have all that figured out.

Bullshit. Nobody, and I mean no blood lines will survive this without drastic measures for survival in the next few hundred years. What a bunch of dumb fucks. Talk about "boy in a bubble". Remember the movie?

There was a time, several thousands of years ago, when it almost made sense. Not now. Not anymore. Our ruling actors lost their self in the drama. The "act" is not the function. Function was thrown out and replaced by a slowly eroded game of bullshit melodrama.

Now, every blood line shall pay and none shall escape. I"m pissed about it. But nothing I can do. The keepers of the gold fucked it up for EVERY MAMMAL.

[justdrew]

Neal Gabler is now a "cultural historian?". WTF? And why would Moyers give that little shit a second of face time?

well, he seems ok http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neal_Gabler

I'm not that familiar with him, though I recognize the name I don't remember why.

---

I hear ya eyeno, it may be so. I'm sticking with uncertainty for the time being, I think it's just barely possible things may not be AS BAD as we tend to think, only time will tell.



beyond that, please take care of yourself and try to just relax a bit, I think you might be a little over stressed at the moment (not trying to be condescending, just concerned).

[Wombaticus Rex]

Gabler left Fox News to work PBS. Also wrote a fawning Disney biopic. He strikes me as a harmless little poodle, unless he corners you at a dinner party or wine tasting in which case you'd have to resort to violence.

[eyeno]

justdrew wrote:
beyond that, please take care of yourself and try to just relax a bit, I think you might be a little over stressed at the moment (not trying to be condescending, just concerned).

Thanx bud. Same to you.

Fukushima put me a little off center for a while. I steadied and then due to recent epiphanies, of a broader nature, I feel the Andromeda strain at times. Remember that movie? Considering that we experience time as the passage of events, time is speeding up. I wish it would slow down but it won't. It will continue to slowly speed up. It will be an interesting ride to say the least. All the pieces are in place. Nothing left now but the show.

[justdrew]

justdrew wrote:
beyond that, please take care of yourself and try to just relax a bit, I think you might be a little over stressed at the moment (not trying to be condescending, just concerned).

Thanx bud. Same to you.

Fukushima put me a little off center for a while. I steadied and then due to recent epiphanies, of a broader nature, I feel the Andromeda strain at times. Remember that movie? Considering that we experience time as the passage of events, time is speeding up. I wish it would slow down but it won't. It will continue to slowly speed up. It will be an interesting ride to say the least. All the pieces are in place. Nothing left now but the show.

well, as epiphanies go, don't neglect the one that reminds, "whatever happens, you're going to be ok (in the big picture/long run)" or put in a more tradition form: "forms rise and fall. nothing real is ever lost."

[Simulist]

That's one of the wisest thing I've ever read.

[justdrew]

That's one of the wisest thing I've ever read.

oh it's not me, not sure who said it first. Maybe Buddha, I don't know

some stuff on/from swedenborg here. but I doubt that's the source