Brain, I could tell you that US has the largest prison population among developed countries, most of whom consists of folks locked up for bullshit offences such as smoking weed or "parole violations" (FYI, having a cell phone can constitute one). Or I could tell you that most of the US "disappeared" live in far away countries, Chile, Argentina, Guatemala, Indonesia, Iraq - and they disappeared precisely because they were deemed dangerous to the US imperial project. I could also tell you about people locked in a ghetto by the lack of education and opportunities taken away from them by the "market forces." But I would not be telling you anything you, or for that matter most subscribers to this list, do not already know.
Instead, I suggest you watch a documentary from the liberation of the Nazi concentration camp in Bergen Belsen (PBS shows it from time to time). I direct you attention to the scene when the commander of the British troops that liberated the camp, appalled by what he found on the site, ordered the respectable citizenry of the neighboring town of Bergen Belsen to "tour" the camp and witness what their government was doing in their backyard. The camera was registering that "tour."
What I found most interesting was the absolute shock and horror these respectable burghers displayed seeing the piles of starved corpses. These people were not pretending, they were genuinely horrified. What shocked me, however, was how could those people live their lives without knowing what their government was doing literally in their backyards? Did not they see the barbed wires and prisoners, even if from the distance? Did not they smell the stench of the burned human flesh? Did not they see the smoke from the ovens? What the hell did they think this operation was?
The answer which I found is that every government, especially a fascist one, depends on ***learned ignorance*** -a selective inattention of the general public to certain facts that may shatter their complacency. If the burghers of Bergen Belsen realized that their government was committing genocide in their backyard, they would have to either a) endorse it, and thus take the responsibility for it or b) oppose it, and thus take the risk being labeled subversive. In either case, however, they would have to do something that would challenge, or even shatter, their system of values and lifestyle. They would either have to reject the normative system of the occidental civilization or run a personal risk of being socially ostracized or even punished by their government. However, a selective blindness coming from learned ignorance of inconvenient fact relieved them from that disturbing dilemma. They could go about their everyday business, working, shopping, playing without noticing what their government was doing in their name.
Now fast forward it to 2003 and tell me what it takes for the most citizens of this county to work, play, watch teeve, shop etc, while a fourth of the country population live in abject poverty, while their government is killing people all around the world, and while Americans are among one of the most hated people around the world. My answer is, predictably, learned ignorance that makes the people to believe that they live in, using your phrase "fucking paradise."
Wojtek