>Justin Schwartz:
>> ... The Islamists insist, however, that you actually believe. ....
>
>I have read in more than one place that Islamic
>fundamentalists -- maybe Muslims in general -- do not
>care what you think but what you do, the peformances
>required being specified by their interpretation of the
>scriptures. It may be that totalitarianism in the
>sense of thought control is a specialty of the West.
>If so, one might see this as a consequence of idealism.
' ... (in the SU) propaganda is very easily identifiable. Everybody knows what it is ... but basically it's not trying to control your thought very much; it's giving you the party line. It's saying "Here's the official doctrine; as long as you don't disobey you won't get in trouble. What you think is not of great importance to anyone. If you get out of line we'll do something to you because we have force." Democratic societies can't really work like that, because the state can't control behavious by force ... Therefore it has to control what you think.
Chomsky in Chronicles of Dissent 24/10/86 http://www.zmag.org/chomsky/
Cheers, Rob.