----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, April 19, 2013 7:41 AM
Subject: Re: Let's Hope the Boston Marathon Bomber Is a White American
All:
As I dash off a quick thought or two, jump in the shower and head off for Ellensburg to our daughter and son-in-laws, and enjoy a long weekend with our four year old Great Grandson. Rylan is perhaps the brightest four year old I know. He thinks outside of all boxes because he does not know yet that boxes exist.
But time and the Great American Empire's Mass Media and Propaganda Blitz will soon take care of that.
Soon, far too soon, Rylan will be tangled in the same webs that threaten to strangle independent thought processes out of all of us. Our schools will squash him into non-thinking boxes, our media will shape him into a consumer box, our Empire will force him into believing that America is the most democratic, free nation ever, our churches will force him to ponder the existence of a Just but Loving God who Just Loves violence, and his peers will shame him if he dares to express an independent thought.
But as I say, Rylan is very bright. Grandpa is already sending him little notes, questions about everyday stuff that Grandpa took for granted when I was young. Over the years I have noticed that when I speak with school children, if I ask lots of questions, they begin to explore ideas and grasp the points I'm trying to make much faster than if I simply ram it into their heads.
Roger is right. We are all caught up in boxes. The thing is that some of us realize this fact and we do work and think outside of them, in spite of ourselves.
We just don't all do it the way Roger does it. Probably I am as Radical a person as one can be and still walk about as a free man. But my approach to the world is much different than Roger's. The world needs both of us. And our future is dependent on all of us who do think outside the boxes, even if we are not as far out of them as some wish.
My dad was a Marxist. I learned so much from him, once I'd wandered down some dead ends and wrong way roads. I had to learn much of Life's lessons the hard way. In part it was because of the constant pressures brought to bear by the emerging Empire, and in part because I just had to learn by hands on experience.
Thanks to the folks on this list, my brain gets prodded daily. My goal is to never stand still, mentally. I change my thinking, adding new wrinkles and discarding old concepts as regularly as I change my shorts...which is daily.
And most of all, I really enjoy seeing how other folks minds work. As much alike as we are, we are so very different under our fuzzy scalps.
And now, off to the shower and away to Ellensburg.
Carl Jarvis
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, April 18, 2013 7:17 PM
Subject: Re: Let's Hope the Boston Marathon Bomber Is a White American
Well, I said once before that I think you have been trapped in that
liberal box so long that not only do you fail to think outside the box,
but you fail to realize that there is even an outside to the box at all.
As for myself, I have been trapped in the box of bourgeois ideology my
entire life too. I say bourgeois ideology rather than specifically
liberal ideology because I have been surrounded by the ruling ideas of
the ruling class all of my life. I know all their arguments and all of
their distortions, whether it is liberal or rightest. (I refuse to call
them conservative because that is an insult to conservative thought.(
I, however, have managed to make myself think outside of that box. I
remember once that there was a comrade who was uninterested in my
favorite kind of fiction literature, science fiction, and he questioned
that I should be interested in it myself. Putting aside the fact that he
did not really understand what it was that he did not like, I told him
that science fiction had, in my opinion, made me a better socialist. He
did not understand that, so I explained that science fiction was a
constant reminder that the way things are is not the way things have to
be. If this conversation had been going on at the time I think I might
have framed it as science fiction has helped me to think outside the
box. I really do think it has, but you do not have to be a science
fiction fan to be a socialist. I think it has helped me to open my mind,
though, and see that the ways of thinking that I have been taught are
not the only ways to think. In your case, you may not be a science
fiction fan and I would not recommend that you become one for this
specific purpose. It is a long term thing and you must really like that
kind of entertainment rather than to be just reading it to open your
mind in some way that you do not understand and in which way it cannot
be predicted. However, I have noted the kinds of books you do read as
you have mentioned them here and I have noticed what kinds of articles
you read too. It is solidly liberal. You do not give yourself a chance
to see things from other perspectives. Remember, there is a whole left
out there that is not the left of the bourgeoisie. There is a
proletarian left. There is an anarchist left. To put it simply, there is
a radical left out there and it is not just a matter of degree from
liberalism. I remember that back when you first alerted me to the
existence of this list you also mentioned something about regularly
reading the Nation from BARD. I said that I occasionally do too, but
that a magazine that promotes liberalism is not the highest priority for
me and that I was considerably left of that. You said that you didn't
think I was further left, but that it was just a different left. You
were right about that. I still say that I am further left than the
Nation, but it is still not just a matter of being further along on some
kind of spectrum. It really is different. All the assumptions and
precepts of liberalism are in opposition to my kind of politics. I
certainly read enough of liberal material to constantly see that they do
not have a clue about a whole lot of things that explain social and
economic dynamics. They just cannot conceive of not defending the
bourgeois state. I would suggest, though that you try reading left
political perspectives other than liberal perspectives on a regular
basis and try to put yourself in the place of those who are writing. You
will be surprised at what a whole world of ideas are out there that you
have never even thought of. By the way, try some science fiction too. It
might open your mind in other ways. That one Stephen King time travel
novel is a start, but it is only a start.
On 4/18/2013 9:49 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
> Roger,
>
> I am not ignoring what you've said and I do appreciate your explanation:
>
> "the ultimate goal as being the maximization of humanity's power over nature
> and the minimization of humanity's power over humanity and it is an open
> ended goal and that a perfect state cannot ever be achieved and human
> society is subject to the same character as the rest of the universe, that
> is dialectical, so that social contradiction will never end and that there
> will always be room for and the necessity of struggle
>
> I am paying attention, but I'm just not getting into the same box that
> you're in, which means that even though you are explaining what you believe
> to be an uncontrovertible scientific truth, I am unable to see the world in
> the same way as you do. It isn't a question of just logic. It has to do with
> the fact that we have different personalities, life experiences, emotional
> predispositions. It has to do with the way my brain works.
>
> Miriam
> -----Original Message-----
> From: blind-democracy-bounces@octothorp.org
> [mailto:blind-democracy-bounces@octothorp.org] On Behalf Of Roger Loran
> Bailey
> Sent: Thursday, April 18, 2013 9:07 PM
> To: Blind Democracy Discussion List
> Subject: Re: Let's Hope the Boston Marathon Bomber Is a White American
>
> But you don't even have to read every single Marxist writing that has ever
> been written. You don't even have to read any of them.
> All you have to do is acknowledge what I have said. When I describe the
> ultimate goal as being the maximization of humanity's power over nature and
> the minimization of humanity's power over humanity and carefully explain
> that it is an open ended goal and that a perfect state cannot ever be
> achieved and when I say that human society is subject to the same character
> as the rest of the universe, that is dialectical, so that social
> contradiction will never end and that there will always be room for and the
> necessity of struggle and then you say that you see no evidence of society
> evolving into a classless society, not even to mention that it has been
> clearly pointed out to you that the vast majority of humanity's existence
> has been spent in classless society, then it is really hard for me to see
> that you are paying the slightest bit of attention. Instead, I get back this
> standard liberal misrepresentation of Marxism that has very little to do
> with Marxism at all. Now, I can point to innumerable cases in which
> officials of the Catholic church have proclaimed the existence of angels,
> but can you point to even one case in which a Marxist has called a bourgeois
> coup an insurrection? Let's face it, a few people can get together and plot
> a coup. A few people can get together and make all kinds of plots and
> conspiracies, but an uprising or an insurrection means that millions are
> mobilized. Now, just how do you think that you can get millions of people to
> do their insurrection on schedule? Honestly, to claim that a small coterie
> of bourgeois coup plotters somehow invalidates Marxism is like saying that
> all the laws of physics are invalidated because of that example I used of
> the guy who pumps water uphill. As a matter of fact, creationists are
> notorious for doing the same thing. They claim that the theory of biological
> evolution violates the laws of thermodynamics, specifically the one about
> entropy. To make claims like that is either a deliberate attempt to mislead
> or it shows a complete lack of understanding of the laws of thermodynamics.
> In the case of the creationists who make a career of writing those tracts
> and supposedly refuting evolution I think it is pretty clear that they are
> deliberately trying to mislead. That is, they are creationist liars. The
> ignorant masses who swallow what they are told by these charlatans are just
> that, ignorant. The bourgeois writers and professional promoters of
> liberalism are similar to the creationist liars. They do not want you to
> understand what Marxism really is and they are liars. Liberal masses like
> you who just swallow what they say I will charitably consider to be dupes.
> The trouble is that you have right here a person who forthrightly proclaims
> himself to be a Marxist and he goes ahead and tells you what Marxism is.
> Then the next time you have something to say about it you make no reference
> at all to those explanations. Instead, you go right ahead and repeat the
> distortions of Marxism that you have heard from this liberal gang of
> disinformation purveyors. At least acknowledge what I have said.
> If you disagree with it then at least disagree with me and not with the
> false caricature of Marxism that you have been taught rather than with me.
> What is the point of my explaining anything if it is not even referred to
> when someone is trying to say that I am wrong?Carl recently was referring to
> what he called my methodical way of thinking and asked me to never leave
> this list. I thought about giving him a reply to that, but I let it go. I
> have left this list before because of heavy list traffic and have come back.
> I am constantly coming close to doing so again for the same reason. However,
> there is another thing that tends to push me in that direction. That is the
> exasperation I feel over the rampant liberalism on this list. I keep hanging
> around, though, when I think of the pointlessness of preaching to the choir
> and how one must be patient with people who have been indoctrinated into
> ruling class ideology during an ebb in the class struggle. What is even more
> exasperating, though, is my repeated attempts to explain certain concepts
> and for all the good it does I may as well be spouting liberalism myself. It
> makes me want to tear my hair out in exasperation.
> On 4/18/2013 8:10 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
>> Religious educated believing Roman Catholics would say that if only
>> you really paid attention to all of the theological writing and didn't
>> describe religious precepts from an atheist's framework, you would not
>> be writing an atheist's caricature of it. If only you would read all
>> of the religious and philosophical writings about the subject, really
>> study it, then you wouldn't be misunderstanding what is actually the
> truth.
>> So, here we are, each one of us stuck in our own belief systems and
>> every one of us is absolutely positive that our particular belief
>> system isn't a belief system at all, but is the truth. You are
>> describing what you consider to be a scientific explanation of human
>> behavior which is a very logical, closed system. It is mechanistic. It
>> leaves no room for individual choice, nor for emotional truths. To me,
>> some of what it says seems accurate. But even if you call me names,
>> even if I fit into those dreaded categories of liberal, bourgeois, or
>> whatever negative labels you are assigning to me, like the implied
>> stupid and stubborn ones, even though you have explained as well as
>> you can, the logic of your point of view, I guess I am intransigent or
>> just a free spirit. I have never been able to fit myself into a box,
>> not a religious one or an ethnic one or a national one or a political
>> one or an intellectual one. I have been able to borrow a lot of
>> helpful and lovely and sometimes, wonderful things from a lot of those
> boxes, even though I couldn't fit into them.
>> Miriam
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: blind-democracy-bounces@octothorp.org
>> [mailto:blind-democracy-bounces@octothorp.org] On Behalf Of Roger
>> Loran Bailey
>> Sent: Thursday, April 18, 2013 7:25 PM
>> To: Blind Democracy Discussion List
>> Subject: Re: Let's Hope the Boston Marathon Bomber Is a White American
>>
>> Of course such a coup is backed by the wealthy and the U.S., but
>> that was not what we were talking about. What does that have to do
>> with uprisings or insurrections? You may as well say that water does
>> not flow downhill because you personally know someone who has a pump that
> made it flow uphill.
>> No, that is not quite the right analogy. That actually has something
>> to do with the flow of water. I suppose it is more like saying that
>> water does not flow downhill because you recently saw someone with a
>> red ribbon in their hat. As for Marxism talking about an evolution to
>> classless society, has all my explanation of that really been for
>> nothing? Did you really pay no attention to anything I have said
>> about that? Are you so determined to hang onto that bourgeois liberal
>> straw man caricature of Marxism that you completely ignore what
>> Marxists actually have to say? Don't you remember anything about open
>> ended goals and the character of the universe that maintains perpetual
>> contradiction? Honestly, Miriam, it would help your credibility a lot
>> if you would address what Marxists actually have to say rather than a
> liberal caricature of it.
>> On 4/18/2013 4:07 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
>>> But I'm not convinced that it's scientific. It does seem more like a
>>> religion to me than hard science. The coup will work in Venezuela
>>> because it's backed by the wealthy and by the U.S. and it has nothing
>>> to do with class theory. The masses there have, and want socialism,
>>> as flawed as the Venezuelan systsem may be. And I'm not sure that
>>> reality has supported Marxist theory because the theory talks about
>>> an evolution to a classless society and although we've seen Communist
>>> revolutions, they never evolved the way the theory said they were
>>> supposed
>> to.
>>> Miriam
>>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: blind-democracy-bounces@octothorp.org
>>> [mailto:blind-democracy-bounces@octothorp.org] On Behalf Of Roger
>>> Loran Bailey
>>> Sent: Thursday, April 18, 2013 3:53 PM
>>> To: Blind Democracy Discussion List
>>> Subject: Re: Let's Hope the Boston Marathon Bomber Is a White
>>> American
>>>
>>> You can dismiss what I am saying as a theoretical Marxist
>>> explanation if you want to, but if you join a peaceful sit in and the
>>> tanks start firing at you because of it and you remain peaceful you
>>> just end up dead and you will have accomplished nothing. You can
>>> dismiss it as theoretical Marxist explanation if you want to, but
>>> just go out and start your uprising and see how far you get. You can
>>> dismiss it as a theoretical Marxist explanation if you want to, but
>>> when those individuals in the Venezuelan ruling class conspire to
>>> have a coup against other factions of that ruling class without the
>>> backing of the masses then the ruling class is still in power.
>>> Miriam, you are forgetting something. Marxism is scientific. Science
>>> is the study of reality. It is not a religious doctrine that will
>>> just continue to make the same pronouncements no matter how wrong
>>> reality shows those pronouncements to be. If it does not match
>>> reality then it has to be abandoned. That is, reality itself will dismiss
> it as not valid.
>>> Marxist theory has to meet the test of reality or it is worthless.
>>> This persistence in not understanding that and in not understanding
>>> reality itself just keeps on bringing back these assumptions that we
>>> can
>> have a revolution any time that we want or that maybe we should avoid
>> a revolution because it just might be too bloody.
>>> If we can avoid reality that easy then we may as well just go ahead
>>> and start having world communism right now. After all, it would be a
>>> lot easier to just go ahead and have world communism rather than have
>>> to fight for it, wouldn't it?
>>> On 4/18/2013 3:35 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
>>>> Roger,
>>>>
>>>> You are talking about a theoretical, Marxist explanation of how and
>>>> when revolution occurs. But there are individuals who make choices
>>>> about whether or not to join groups whose purpose it is to disrupt
>>>> the current system either peacefully or violently. There are people,
>>>> as for example, in Venezuela, who plan coups. Social movements
>>>> happen because of individual choices made by real people.
>>>>
>>>> Miriam
>>>>
>>>> ________________________________
>>>>
>>>> From: blind-democracy-bounces@octothorp.org
>>>> [mailto:blind-democracy-bounces@octothorp.org] On Behalf Of Roger
>>>> Loran Bailey
>>>> Sent: Thursday, April 18, 2013 3:19 PM
>>>> To: Blind Democracy Discussion List
>>>> Subject: Re: Let's Hope the Boston Marathon Bomber Is a White
>>>> American
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> I don't understand why you guys persist in thinking that we or any
>>>> group can just decide to have an uprising and then have it, even
>>>> down to when and where to have it. If that was possible there are a
>>>> good many groups of people who would be engineering what would
>>>> amount to a daily uprising. The simple fact is that class
>>>> contradictions build up, kind of like in a pressure cooker, and then
>>>> their is a social explosion. If anyone is trying to say that such an
>>>> explosion is good then
>>> I will contradict the claim.
>>>> There are all kinds of things wrong with it and, yes, the explosions
>>>> at the Boston Marathon are only very small examples of what it will
>>>> be like. Do not advocate violence. If you do then you are shooting
>>>> yourself in the foot. Do not carry out violence prematurely because
>>>> if you do then you are shooting yourself in the other foot. When the
>>>> violence does break out, though, and when it does break out in a
>>>> widespread fashion that would indicate that a revolution is going on
>>>> then the thing to do is to take control and to steer the social
>>>> explosion toward the best outcome possible. Even then the outcome
>>>> will not be perfect. The violence alone keeps it from being perfect.
>>>> It means that a lot of resources that might have been used to gain
>>>> an even better outcome are destroyed. But this idea that we need a
>>>> revolution so let's go ahead and have one does not work at all. And
>>>> we do not need anyone to tell us that we had better avoid it because
>>>> of what the Boston bombing shows us is likely to be even more
> widespread.
>>>> There is no avoiding it. Stop thinking teleological! You may as well
>>>> tell an asteroid to not hit the Earth because it will be even more
>>>> harmful to the asteroid than it will be to the earth. If asteroids
>>>> had will and could control that will then that might make sense, but
>>>> since
>>> they do not then telling asteroids any such thing just shows
>>> teleological thinking.
>>>> On 4/18/2013 12:26 PM, Carl Jarvis wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Bob, Dick and all Lovers of Peace and Tranquility,
>>>>
>>>> Some of us have talked in the past regarding the need for an
>>>> uprising, a revolution. Perhaps we might stop and consider just
>>>> what that would look like. Take the two bombs that exploded at the
>>>> Boston Marathon and multiply them a few thousand times over, and
>>>> plant them in public buildings, under bridges, in schools, in
>>>> churches and Synagogs and other places of worship.
>>>> Next, take every group that disagrees with the government and whip
>>>> them up to a fairtheewell, put weapons in their hands and send them
>>>> into the fracas. When all the dust has settled, and all the smoke
>>>> has cleared away, who will have won?
>>>> The answer is, No One! No winners. And why? Because no one has a
>>>> better plan for people to live in harmony and cooperation. Not with
>>>> each other, and not with our planet.
>>>> There is no Master Plan that would change the world and make it a
>>>> better life for all Life on Earth.
>>>> The overwhelming proof is that we don't get it. We don't
>>>> understand that we can't just continue uprising, throwing off one
>>>> corrupt government only to replace it with another.
>>>> But if we don't come to our senses soon, it will not matter. We
>>>> now have the ability to wipe ourselves and all Life from the face of
>>>> the Universe.
>>>>
>>>> Carl Jarvis
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>>> From: Bob Hachey <mailto:bhachey@verizon.net>
>>>> To: Blind Democracy Discussion List
>>>> <mailto:blind-democracy@octothorp.org>
>>>> Sent: Thursday, April 18, 2013 6:22 AM
>>>> Subject: Re: Let's Hope the Boston Marathon Bomber Is a
>>> White
>>>> American
>>>>
>>>> Hi Dick,
>>>> In a perfect world, I'd love to say that Sirota has no
>>> business
>>>> hoping that the marathon bomber(s) belong to any ethnic or racial
>>>> group.
>>>> But Sirota makes a point that is painful to admit for this
>>> white
>>>> male an one from which we dare not hide. WE hide from his
>>>> perspective at our peril because he is right on point when it comes
>>>> to the stark differences in American reaction to terrorist attacks
>>>> depending upon the race and ethnicity of the attacker. IN my book,
>>>> this stark difference is a stain upon the American government and
>>>> upon the American conscience. This stark difference also flies in
>>>> the face of the declaration of Independence and the bill of Rights.
>>>> IT is truly sad that we are seemingly unable to live up to
>>> the lofty
>>>> principles expressed therein.
>>>> And, you know what? I'm guilty too. that's right. I'm guilty
>>> of the
>>>> same kind of hate that has sparked our bad reactions to nonwhite
>>>> terrorist attacks.
>>>> The difference is that I hate the Rush Limbaughs, Sean
>>> Hanity's and
>>>> Laura Ingrams of this world who use the conservative media megaphone
>>>> to foment fear and hate of all things that are different from the
>>>> white Christian evangelical perspective. I recognize that hate as a
>>>> weakness and know that I'm worse off for that hate and that to the
>>>> extent that we all can reduce such hate, we will all be better off.
>>>> Bob Hachey
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> ________________________________
>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
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