``... Our mission, should we choose to accept it is not to simply inform folks that they are wrong, or that they are morally reprehensible, or stupid, those are the easy things. The real challenge resides in finding where and how the majority of americans see radical social change as a desirable and reachable possibility, or getting them to the point where they can see such a thing. mcapri
(Finlayson's text follows) P.S. Lurkers rule.
But Zizek is on to something when he realises that people could find out all the facts if they wanted to and the question is why it makes no difference.... But it doesn't make any difference in the end. The US state doesn't stomp all over the rest of the world satisfying the self-interest of its leading classes DESPITE the citizens of the republic it does it BECAUSE of them, to keep them happy, clappy and sated, to give them what they want... And that is what the wars on latin and south america gave them, the war on terrorism AND the paranoid fantasies about world government that feed the militiamen AND the arguments of Chomsky and the 'anarchist' left. It is all a very satisfying and very American and even (though it may sound odd with reference to Chomsky) Protestant eschatological manichean and individualist fantasy. On this list, the long and unnecessary discussion about whether the US is fascist or not was part of the same thing. (Alan Finlayson?)''
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``..was part of the same thing.'' What same thing? The protestant eschatological and individualist fantasy?
Well, part of the problem is a failure to recognize just how comprehensive the manufacturing of consent is, and how large a role the media play in creating and sustaining the state. In brief those together make the connection between the interests of US capital and empire and the US public intimate. So it is not just a matter of convincing some reluctant mass, but of systematically dis-entangling and articulating their interests from those of the ruling elites.
Chuck Grimes