So I have Italian friends.

There's two Italian slurs, "dago" and "wop".

But very few Italians know anything about these words beyond that they were historically used as slurs. I still don't know what wop means, but dago is a claim that Italians aren't racially white. Now consider what would happen if an Italian was walking down the street, and some guy muttered "dago". What would the Italian think? He'd think he had encountered someone with mental problems. What he wouldn't do is take it seriously. We can drink dago red without pissing Italians off, but referring to an actual Italian as a dago is similar to referring to him as an asshole. It's offensive for just that reason.

Somehow we have to move the n-word into the d-word category. Blacks using it among themselves is, I suppose progress, but real progress will grant whites the social right to use the word appropriately.

Interesting.

You know (bowing to the sensitivities of the masses for a moment), the n-word is very like the d-word in this respect...it's a claim that Black folks aren't ethnically white.

Difference is, Black folks aren't ethnically white.

White folks still trip me out over the desperate need to say "nigger." Fact is, you've always had the right to use the word appropriately.

White folks still trip me out over the desperate need to say "nigger."

That's a fact.

Some folks (and by that I mean 'some white folks') just can't quite wrap their heads around why the meaning of the word changes depending on who says it.

It's these same folks (and by that I mean 'the same conservative yokels who yell all the time') who holler 'racism' when Howard Dean points out that the only way black people get into a GOP meeting is by being part of the waitstaff.

Like they'd know.

White people know what "nigger" means to them. Why do they so want to call Black people niggers?

Nevermind...

White folks still trip me out over the desperate need to say "nigger."

That's not the intent. The intent is to get along without having fearful words, in either direction.

Sorry. Not possible.

And that's not a race thing. It's a human thing, a word thing.

Some folks (and by that I mean 'some white folks') just can't quite wrap their heads around why the meaning of the word changes depending on who says it.

Well said. An important point missing from most related discussions I have seen.

Oh, they understand the meaning of words is established by context. Everyone does. It's just that no one approves of a context that says "you can't"...especially when the reason harkens back to a situation you'd just rather not think about.

Every time you run into that wall, you think about it.

Oh, they understand the meaning of words is established by context. Everyone does. It's just that no one approves of a context that says "you can't"...

I agree. But they don't think that's the case. And by "they" I mean "some white people," generally those that grew up hearing the n-word or who "have friends that have no problem with it." You are giving some people too much credit for thinking about it. They don't think about the meaning changing with context; instead, they tell me why they are entitled to use the word.

We're not really disagreeing. If they explain why they can use the word it's because they KNOW it's problematic...and with all the racial experience we ALL have, that doesn't require thought.

.especially when the reason harkens back to a situation you'd just rather not think about.

If you really think that most white people have some repressed desire to denigrate black people, that's paranoia.

The current state of affairs is a symptom, not a cause. White people using the n-word surely wouldn't make things any better, and black people suppressing such isn't making things worse. However, relaxed tension would also be a symptom, a positive indicator of positive change. Now if you don't want or expect such change, I suppose it seems entirely different.

If you really think that most white people have some repressed desire to denigrate black people, that's paranoia.

No, I think white people have an open desire to not be blamed for racism. This compels them to want stupid things as proof that racism isn't their fault.

I DO think all those folks who so hate "political correctness" as to actively campaign against it want the freedom to be obnoxiously racist/sexist/homophobic without repercussions, though.

I'll take it a step further P6.

IMOHO - "terra" as Bill O'Lielly is want to pronounce terror(ism)- is an onomatopoetic substitute for "nigga".

Kinda like Splenda is a substitute for shuga.

I'm a careful observer of argot and goetic speech - and I been feeling this one now for a minute or three.

These sorkos are working on multiple fronts to abolish the designation under law of hate crimes, and to control language and its repitition in ways that would have made Edward Bernays green with envy. If given to eclecsia, you'd almost be inclined to think that Luntz, Rove, and the Neocons are sorcerors given the exquisite discipline(s) they apply to control of symbolism and signification.

IMOHO - "terra" as Bill O'Lielly is want to pronounce terror(ism)- is an onomatopoetic substitute for "nigga".

Um...

No.

That would make "terror" a substitute for "niggor."

Organically speaking, you are undoubtedly correct...,

however, if you listen to Rush, O'Lielly, and Savage, as I'm wont to do off and on during the day, you hear a tremendous amount of Luntzian experimentation.

What talking-heads-to-the-faithful are doing is not linguistically organic. Urrday, they're throwing mass quantities up against the wall to see what will stick.

When something gets fed back to them by their callers and e-mailers, and, when it begins to circulate and gain currency among the other talking heads, e.g., "islamo-facism" a Savage coinage, then they know they're onto something and it enters into their argot.

No, I think white people have an open desire to not be blamed for racism. This compels them to want stupid things as proof that racism isn't their fault.

That's not paranoia, but it's off target.

They want racism to be gone, and evidence of such progress.

"No, I think white people have an open desire to not be blamed for racism. This compels them to want stupid things as proof that racism isn't their fault."

Disclosure: white boy talking here.

It's fear and greed. And not necessarily in that order.

Some white folks (and by that, I mean "those who pretend there isn't any racism") don't want to be blamed for it. P6 is correct.

Why not? Because they're afraid they'll have to give up some of their stuff--tax dollars, job advantages, all-white neighborhoods where houses appreciate 8 percent every year. Y'see if we admit that the Voting Rights Act didn't take care of EVERYTHING way back in 1965, then we have to admit that it's not right to keep it all.

Beyond that, it's mighty convenient to have a place to deposit all your fears and failures. Just wad 'em all up, lay 'em on somebody else, and then denigrate the whole package by putting the 'nigger' label on it.

And it's at this point that I realize I'm drifting waaay offa P6's original topic. This is about the discussion among black people about the use of "the N-word." None of what I just wrote has beans to do with that.

I don't think it's off target. At all. I've had far too many conversations with white folks confirm it.

They want racism to be gone, and evidence of such progress.

This is very optimistic of you, but I have to agree with Quaker in a Basement in his comment above.

I don't think it's off target. At all. I've had far too many conversations with white folks confirm it.

I went to most of these links but had to stop reading somewhere after the comment with the "I had a friend who was African" introduction.

Those were just the convenient ones. Over the years I've had some real doozies.

Those were just the convenient ones. Over the years I've had some real doozies.

I don't doubt that for a second, p6.

But do you see any value whatsoever in separating three categories?
1. malice/suppression (as cited by QiB)
2. repressed racism inadvertently expressed
3. bad phrasing which betrays lack of discourse on the topic

All of these result in doozie quotes.

I observe almost none of 1 these days, some amount of 2, and a whole lot of 3. In between 2 and 3 are a lot of people, mostly young, who by default, treat strangers like they're inferior. When they're whites speaking to blacks, they come off as racists, and maybe they are, but it's not a specialization.

I see value in sorting out bad phrasing due to lack of discourse. I see no value in seperating the intentional from the accidental in this case.

I both agree and disagree with dw.

I think there's very little of category 1 and some amount of 2. But I'd put the people I was talking about in category 2. They're the people P6 linked to.

There's not a whole lot of pre-civil rights, neo-confederate, black-people-are-inferior racism, at least not right out in public.

But an awful lot of anti-tax, anti-government, anti-affirmative action, let's-all-live-in-a-colorblind-society brand of conservative politics is driven by racial animosity. Put simply, it runs on a fear that big government will take away what belongs to me and give it to people who don't deserve it.

And guess what color that boogey man is.

But an awful lot of anti-tax, anti-government, anti-affirmative action, let's-all-live-in-a-colorblind-society brand of conservative politics is driven by racial animosity.

Damn near a description of the GOP.

There's NOTHING "inadvertant" about anything they're doing and they're not feeling institutionally repressed - as far as I can see - at this juncture, either.

I see value in sorting out bad phrasing due to lack of discourse. I see no value in seperating the intentional from the accidental in this case.

The reason why there might be value is that such people are usually redeemable.

35 years ago... I had a friend who was an American Indian. He hung out mostly with white kids, and I didn't think of him as much different.

However...one day, in a context I can't recall, I used the phrase "just another bunch of fucking Indians". Now was this repressed racism? You bet. If you'd asked me if I felt racially superior to Indians, I would have said no.

My friend let out a subdued "hey", with a slightly pained expression.

That's the part I recall in intense detail. I had caused him pain. Accidentally. It sunk in what I had done, and why I had done it. Just two people among billions, but that's how things get better.

1. malice/suppression (as cited by QiB)
2. repressed racism inadvertently expressed

One is an outward racist. The other one is hiding it.

Sorry. No difference to me.

Fix it. THEN I'll say there's a difference.

Fix it. THEN I'll say there's a difference.

It gets fixed on a personal level, p6. When people know people, and interact with people, and value people.

We're not discussing people here who are lying when they claim not to feel racially superior, or not to feel some desire to keep black people down. We're discussing people who honestly feel friendly, but withold somewhere in their minds a willingness to be equally human.

They're not the enemy.

We're discussing people who honestly feel friendly, but withold somewhere in their minds a willingness to be equally human.

paradox incarnate..., [honestly feel, but withhold somewhere]

which cortical hemisphere feels friendly and which cortical hemisphere denies the humanity of the dark-skinned other?

was this paradox engendered collectively or individually?

pod people were not the enemy either, they had been collectively parasitized..,

The theme of the cautionary, politicized film was open to varying interpretations, including paranoia toward the spread of a harmful ideology such as socialistic Communism, or the sweeping mass hysteria of McCarthyism in the 1950s and blacklisting of Hollywood, the spread of an unknown malignancy or virulent germ (read fear of annihilation by 'nuclear war'), or the numbing of our individuality and emotional psyches through conformity and group-think. Yet its main theme was the alien (read 'Communist') dehumanization and take-over of an entire community by large seed pods (found in basements, automobile trunks, a greenhouse, and on a pool table) that replicated and replaced human beings. And it told of the heroic struggle of one helpless but determined man of conscience, a small-town doctor (McCarthy), to vainly combat and quell the deadly, indestructible threat.

It gets fixed on a personal level, p6.

Then it's not my issue or concern.

which cortical hemisphere feels friendly and which cortical hemisphere denies the humanity of the dark-skinned other?

It's not denial of humanity, cnulan. It's blocking the experience of equal humanity. Even while feeling proud of being otherwise.

We're all a bit contradictory. Some more than others.

It gets fixed on a personal level, p6.

Then it's not my issue or concern.

I agree it's not your responsibility.

But you're missing some good relationships, some good times.

But you're missing some good relationships, some good times.

I disagree. You're assuming I run my personal life by collective rules of engagement.

blocking the experience...,while feeling proud of being otherwise

strikes me as not only denying, but deceiving, as well.

You may suppose that I'm gaming with you semantically DW. Please be assured, I'm not. I find your unselfconscious expression of the psychological and political conflicts inherent in the Murkan psyche uniquely instructive.

"So, my boy, in view of this the Most High Commission then decided among other things provisionally to implant into the common presences of the three-brained beings there a special organ with a property such that, first, they should perceive reality topsy-turvy and, secondly, that every repeated impression from outside should crystallize in them data which would engender factors for evoking in them sensations of 'pleasure' and 'enjoyment.'

"And then, in fact, with the help of the Chief-Common-Universal-Arch-Chemist-Physicist Angel Looisos, who was also among the members of this Most High Commission, they caused to grow in the three-brained beings there, in a special way, at the base of their spinal column, at the root of their tail—which they also, at that time, still had, and which part of their common presences furthermore still had its normal exterior expressing the, so to say, 'fullness-of-its-inner-significance'—a 'something' which assisted the arising of the said properties in them.

"And this 'something' they then first called the 'organ Kundabuffer.'

the paradox (internal conflict) could easily be ignored if not for its power to perniciously influence real work, on a go-forward basis...,

and THAT is my underlying and abiding concern.

I find your unselfconscious expression of the psychological and political conflicts inherent in the Murkan psyche uniquely instructive.

As do I. I'm developing a sense of what the mainstream needs to feel absolution without actually changing.

In theory, there could be people who fumble the language and fit in the third category cited by dwshelf, above:

"bad phrasing which betrays lack of discourse on the topic"

But how many such innocents are out there? Is it possible in our society to absorb the language of racism without also adopting the thinking on some level? Maybe, but if so, it's rare.

The language of white society has moderated. The public use of racial slurs has abated because white society enforces that change on itself. In other words "nice folks" don't say stuff like that.

But absence of hateful language isn't evidence of an absence of malevolence. People can talk right and still harbor fears, resentments, and animosities that find expression in ways other than the use of a racial epithet.

Bottom line: the difference between intentional racism and inadvertent racism is no difference at all. They cause the same harm.

"Fix it. THEN I'll say there's a difference."

Solutions? P6 has been right about this throughout this thread. There's a large segment of white people in this country who want to believe it's already fixed, not my problem, I'm not to blame, leave me alone and let me keep all my stuff.

It gets fixed only when people make a conscious decision to fix it.

Too much for one individual? I'll go with dwshelf on this: you do what you can do. Start with "Hello" and see what happens.

But how many such innocents are out there?

Very hard to say, but when we know beyond ANY doubt that there are intentional political/cultural manipulators in the tradition of Bernays.., it's hard to extend the benefit of the doubt.

Is it possible in our society to absorb the language of racism without also adopting the thinking on some level?

Of course not.

All of that left hemispheric verbal logic is strictly mechanical and totally subject to adept manipulation.

I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid Aoccdrnig to rscheearch taem at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Such a cdonition is arppoiately cllaed Typoglycemia :)-

Amzanig huh? Yaeh and yuo awlyas thought slpeling was ipmorantt.

So, the brief demonstration above shows the power of the language mechanism the [bot] to impose order, and, its predisposition to extract meaning based on strictly mechanical criteria.

NOW

Extrapolate this to labels and reflect on the profoundly debilitating effect of the label as [bot] to absolutely derail clarity of thought.

Not only is the label anti-intellectual, it is a mechanical shortcut to what should ultimately be a conscious engagement with issues.

It's not "liberal", "conservative", "democrat", or "republican" that every matters. All that matters are underlying issues and YOUR capacity to engage with issues consciously.

Labels are antithetical to conscious engagement. Where there is labelling, there also you will find dangerous and mechanical lack of conscious engagement.

This selfsame language machinic shortcut is also a reflexive buffer to the potential emotional discomfort of novel or unfamiliar social intercourse. It traps and cuts off feelings - which is precisely why the paradox is not only tolerated, it exists in a cognitive lacuna between the separate cognitive domains of *thinking* and *feeling* and is largely invisible to those that it afflicts.

Now, combine the thought sapping mechanism of the verbal *bot* with the emotion buffering verbal reflex which exists to offset moments of social intercourse potentially fraught with emotional discomfort- and voila - we have a self-perpetuating mindtrap of astonishing power and durability.

The language of white society has moderated. The public use of racial slurs has abated because white society enforces that change on itself. In other words "nice folks" don't say stuff like that.

And it bothers the hell out of some folks...note the railing against "political correctness."

Just need to say nigger.

"Just need to say nigger."

Yes. Quite so.

That and closely related, the strained explanation that "they call each other that so it's not racist if I do."

Same, same.

That gave me a laugh P6. It gives me a hilarious mental image of someone just about to bust because he wants to say it so bad.

ou may suppose that I'm gaming with you semantically DW

The audience may need such assurance cnulan, but I know you well enough to know that when you post you're trying to communicate something important.

However, I'm not sure that thinking of people as having 3 brains is consistent with human nature. Consider the more pedestrian alternative. That such inconsistencies are the norm rather than the exception. That ridding one's self of them is a matter of introspection. That some people don't care to introspect, and others aren't very good at it.

However, I'm not sure that thinking of people as having 3 brains is consistent with human nature.

Sure it is. Whether we take a contemporary view and realize our "stuck in the middle" condition, or, we take the older representation which holds three distinct centers of awareness, thinking, feeling, and moving. What is important in either event, (both actually) is to recognize that the two persons you're in the middle of have completely separate and incommensurable languages.

Both are spoken to - all the time. One of these persons, frankly the more important of the two, we've mostly lost the basic cultural competency to listen to or understand, nevertheless, that person is constantly spoken to and programmed - by factors outside our subjective awareness and control.

In the older representation of three *brains*, the key thing understanding was not only that each center has its own language, but that each center operates at its own speed. Remember the last time you felt acutely endangered and time seemed to s.l.o.w w.a.y. d.o.w.n? That was because your thinking center was suspended and awareness moved into the moving center. The moving center is exponentially faster than the thinking center. The emotional center is yet again exponentially faster.

Consider the more pedestrian alternative. That such inconsistencies are the norm rather than the exception. That ridding one's self of them is a matter of introspection. That some people don't care to introspect, and others aren't very good at it.

I agree with you totally, and would add only the following provision. We exist in a culture that suppresses introspection and has systematically extinguished systems of introspective competency. The extent of this suppression is so great, that the language itself has been expunged of introspectively helpful and useful terminology. Now, I know quite a lot about this fact, you are aware of this fact, how much more about this cultural state of affairs do you suppose those whose interests are served by the status quo know about this and its utility in governance?

If you accept the accounting afforded us by P6 concerning the origins and use of racism as a tool of governance in America, I invite you to consider the psychological implications of such a thing once established and broadly propagated over generations. I invite you to consider the manifold ways in which racist content is programmed into [albeit far more subtley than say 50 years ago] the collective and individual American psyche.

Other than individual epiphany, which only happens when awareness operates out of the emotional center, a rare occurrence indeed, do you suppose that collective countermeasures might exist for combatting the pernicious psychological ramifications of racism as a tool of governance? It seems to me that that, in addition to the great good Work of individual interpersonal outreach, collective cultural and psychological insurgency - may in fact be imperative on both sides of the fence. Any policy, legislative, or structural solution approaches failing to take into consideration the psychological ramifications of what has been done in the Murkan (American) system of governance, seem to me to be inherently doomed to failure. I don't share your optimism that the Murkan system of governance is a uniquely self-evolving construct. In fact, I'd argue that it started from a severe deficit position and has over the course of a few centuries and by dent of significant collective sufferings arived at a baseline level of development.

Um...

No.

That would make "terror" a substitute for "niggor."

Realizing and accepting that I'm likely by myself in this proclivity for tracking neocon neologistic improvisation on talk radio, I listened in rapt fascination yesterday as Hush Bimbo, (Rush Limbaugh) spent the better part of an hour attempting to conflate crime in Philadelphia (77 Murders so far this year) with insurgency in Iraq.

This is a fairly constant theme with him, i.e., calling drug-trade related urban violence terrrorism and insurgency, and, suggesting various and sundry approaches to putting this in check. Of course, he never speaks to this from his own core values, i.e., legalize the drugs, which would have greater personal value to him (to his credit, Hush did broach this for a hot minute when his own oxycontin habit and illegal procurement of synth heroin was making headlines and costing him his hearing) but I guess somebody told him to put that pipe down...,

So now he's back to his Luntzian verbal-logic improvisations seeking to move young black male crimeys into the crosshairs of the global war on terra...,

We exist in a culture that suppresses introspection and has systematically extinguished systems of introspective competency. The extent of this suppression is so great, that the language itself has been expunged of introspectively helpful and useful terminology. Now, I know quite a lot about this fact, you are aware of this fact, how much more about this cultural state of affairs do you suppose those whose interests are served by the status quo know about this and its utility in governance?

Why does it take a conspiricy theory when a garden variety explanation will do?

Start with one definition of an intellectual: a person who is compelled to accept theories of why things are the way they are when the new theory survives a battery of tests better than the old theory did. Now what part of the percentage would you say meets that definition? Not too many, right? Supply your own definition, and see if that word "compelled" doesn't appear somewhere in the concept.

In that compelled is a requiremnet for introspection. I'm not only compelled to analyze competitive theories to those I belive, and to accept those which supercede the old one, I'm compelled to accept them in ways which I wasn't thinking of when I first accepted the new theory. I'm not compelled to spend my life or even an hour in the closet worrying about it, but I'm compelled to be on the lookout for beliefs inconsistent with the current reigning set of theories in my life, and to bring them into compliance when I discover them.

The problem is, not too many people feel such a compulsion. Far more common is feeling comfortable with a set of dogma, combined with a set of theories of which the individual is somewhat unsure of. He feels some compulsion to follow the dogma (as in religion), but doesn't feel much compulsion to fall in line with those theories. If you're not compelled to fall in line, you are basically saying you're at ease with internal contradiction.

So how does that apply to repressed racism? The basic point becomes, we have a white person who accepts the theory that all the races are equal, but doesn't feel compelled by that acceptance, in a way which demands that, over time, it trumps all analyses based on an inferior theory from an earlier time. The person is simply not looking for such contradictions, and in this as well as many other cases, is willing to live with major, life long contradictions.

Why does it take a conspiricy theory when a garden variety explanation will do?

The Luntzian propaganda effort is a simple matter of fact.

The little known origin of American racism as a system of governance is also a simple matter of fact.

Please tell me which aspect of either control implementation fails to meet your garden variety standard for conspiracy?

Political plans involving psychological manipulations aside DW, a true conspirare is actually a tad more subtle than either of these political schemes for controlling the hearts and minds of a mass of people. A breathing together con-spirare that is at the root of the word's meaning - actually takes place;

In the conscious area of the brain, two modes of activity are possible:

Not having a constant, real-time realization of their difference is what the few have historically referred to as a state of mental slumber.

we have a white person who accepts the theory that all the races are equal, but doesn't feel compelled by that acceptance, in a way which demands that, over time, it trumps all analyses based on an inferior theory from an earlier time. The person is simply not looking for such contradictions, and in this as well as many other cases, is willing to live with major, life long contradictions.

I called it "dreaming" just to keep it simple and familiar DW. You, I, everyone has had the experience of "dreaming" and consequently realize its power. If I were to talk about it any more specifically than that, i.e., structurally and functionally, then I'd run the Promethean audience-loss risk which your fetching around for garden variety explanations already demonstrates.

The problem is, not too many people feel such a compulsion. Far more common is feeling comfortable with a set of dogma, combined with a set of theories of which the individual is somewhat unsure of.

It's because the common "feeling" or distinct lack thereof is one of neurological confinement to the verbal logic of the left cortical hemisphere. Why would it come as any shock to you that our culture is normalized around this dominant tendency? That in fact, the (breathing together) is a tendency within the culture to push the extreme ends of the neurological or cognitive bell curve out of existence? Pushing the extreme ends of the curve out of existenceis what has already set the Murkan culture in an evolutionary blind alley.

I'm only asking you to adjust your filters and lenses and *see* the ordinary situation in novel terms. If instead of talking about race, what if we were talking about neurotypes? If instead of talking about cultures, we were talking about normal group variences phenotypically expressed as linguistic tendencies and ranges? Would that make you more comfortable?

I'm compelled to be on the lookout for beliefs inconsistent with the current reigning set of theories in my life, and to bring them into compliance when I discover them.

Everyone engaged in these discussions has a splinter in his or her mind..., celebrate your situatedness toward the end of curve. Realize, however, that you lack the knowledge required to extract the splinter and that the culture in which you are embedded cannot provide you with that knowledge either.

Now what part of the percentage would you say meets that definition? Not too many, right? Supply your own definition, and see if that word "compelled" doesn't appear somewhere in the concept.

In that compelled is a requiremnet for introspection. I'm not only compelled to analyze competitive theories to those I belive, and to accept those which supercede the old one, I'm compelled to accept them in ways which I wasn't thinking of when I first accepted the new theory.

The only thing in question is the strength of your compulsion?

Economic theory goes only so far in explaining why people buy, sell, save or trust. Scientists are looking inside the mind for answers.

Why psychology is more fundamental than economics and psychological insurgency is the only means of effecting collective change....,

I include it in this thread because I view racism as a symptom, albeit one of the more acute and pernicious symptoms, of a larger neuropathology posing as culture. The current economic religion and world order is the primary expression of this neuropathology and its devolutionary momentum and path constitutes a very, very grave threat to everything.

We DO have to stop using words our oppressors used to oppress us, understand the roots of this system of oppression, and effect individual and collective changes in the only place and way that we can.

You DO own your own mind, don't you? at least I'm sure you like to think so....,

“Is it possible that words can now support the very structures
they purport to represent?

Might the success of the British parliamentary system be due to the fact that it is conducted in English?”

Ordinary men who underestimate the effect words have on their lives, their consciousness and their conception of reality, are doomed to remain ordinary.

The only thing in question is the strength of your compulsion?

The strength of compulsion to comply with a theory of how life is follows a willingness to really believe the theory. Willingness to believe the theory follows a battery of tests which we all subject new ideas to.

So in one sense, at the core here, is "how to become convinced". A lot of people are scared to become convinced, because they lack confidence in their personal battery of tests for new ideas. They've been burned before, by becoming convinced only to be shown mistaken, and they react with fear.

Political propaganda: when was the last time you saw anyond actually change her political position based on such? Can't think of one? Neither can I.

Origins of American racism: it's nonsense to isolate racism in America from the world view at the time. The world was a racist place, with Europeans asserting military and cultural authority in arrogant ways the world over. What do we imagine was in the mind of Cortes and Pizzaro as they conquered central and S. America? In the minds of the British when they decided to force open the opium trade into China? It was the colonial era. European countries were asserting sovereignty over much of the world, in places where the people were not white. They felt utterly supererior to those subjects. After all, it was easy to see who was winning.

In this world context, we have Europeans arriving in America, and we have slaves arriving in America. The status quo, with no government activism, supports a highly racist view. That Americans started breaking out of that world view, and started moving toward what we have today says something important about America at the time. That we developed an abolishonist movement which eventually gained control was the first time that had ever happened in the world.

The strength of compulsion to comply with a theory of how life is follows a willingness to really believe the theory. Willingness to believe the theory follows a battery of tests which we all subject new ideas to.

sic [is/follows]

Well?

Does it follow?

or

Is it is?

Do you follow words, or are you the words comprising your theory?

How much of your consciousness have you tested?

What are we talking about DW?

Original, enlightening thought does not backfire, roll over or rewrite itself;

it may be forgotten, but it does none of the above.

Thus do true psychological insurgents never apologize, or explain themselves.

Ordinary men believe they will recognize The Truth when they see it;

they are mistaken

– only the exceptional can –

and about it they have nothing to say

(other than perhaps a muttered: “Wow.”)

The relationship of a psychological insurgent’s normally appearing thoughts to the full potential of his consciousness is like that of a reporter who considers the news to be his enemy.

What are we talking about DW?

Political propaganda: when was the last time you saw anyond actually change her political position based on such? Can't think of one? Neither can I.

WMD's

Harboring Terrorists

Overthrowing a Tyrant (who was our good buddy 20 years ago)

Taking the fight to *them*

Spreading democracy

do I need to go any further?

I've been wide awake the whole time. I can think of numerous examples. Where you been all this time?

zzzzzzzzzzzzzz.......,

What are we talking about DW?

keep telling yourself the comforting just-so-stories taken from the scripture of glorious Murkan hagiography...,

zzzzzzzzzzzzzz.......,

These stories may be all that you have...,

nah....,

nobody changed their minds, white folks are just consciously and intentionally evil.

(o: LOL!!!

Does it follow?

Yes it does. I'm going to make up a theory of how life is, so we can see how it goes.

The optimal way of dealing with stoplights, should one wish to remain alive, is to run all yellows and, under one half second, run reds. This is because your risk of dying in a rear end crash is dramatically increased if you try to avoid running yellow lights.

Sounds plausible, eh? Might be true, might not.

So how am I going to act? The question, am I compelled by this theory? That follows how committed I am to the theory. If I really believe the theory, I'm going to be running more yellows than I do today. On the other hand, if I'm simply unable to disprove the theory, I'm not committed to it, and I'm not going to change my driving behavior.

Here's another theory of stoplights:
while one can sometimes time a stoplight to enter the intersection just as the light turns green, this is an extremely dangerous act, because you'll eventually get t-boned by someone running yellows which turn red.

I can recall, as a 16 year old, actually timing a stoplight one time, feeling very clever and legal. Then I encountered the second theory, which I found convincing. I have not timed a stoplight since. Not once. I am compelled by this theory, because I committed to the theory. The compulsion follows the commitment. I am not compelled by the first theory, because it hasn't passed my battery of tests better than the existing theory.

WMD's

Harboring Terrorists

Overthrowing a Tyrant (who was our good buddy 20 years ago)

Taking the fight to *them*

Spreading democracy

There is a distinction between the presumably clever use of words vs invalid factual claims. My original assertion regarded the former, not the latter. If I falsely advise you that your sister is being brutalized by a man, and you spring to action, that's one thing. If I said something like "your sister is encountering pain" to advise you that she was working out in the gym, then I've told the truth but in a propogandistic way.

Secondly, if GW Bush had just said "the time has come to take this guy down", and not said more than that, he would have gotten pretty much the same support he got as it was. In other words, all that stuff didn't really pursuade anyone who held an anti-war position.

There is a distinction between the presumably clever use of words vs invalid factual claims. My original assertion regarded the former, not the latter. If I falsely advise you that your sister is being brutalized by a man, and you spring to action, that's one thing. If I said something like "your sister is encountering pain" to advise you that she was working out in the gym, then I've told the truth but in a propogandistic way.

Secondly, if GW Bush had just said "the time has come to take this guy down", and not said more than that, he would have gotten pretty much the same support he got as it was. In other words, all that stuff didn't really pursuade anyone who held an anti-war position.

Since we're not going to break through verbal logic and imagination today, humor me by speculating what the effect would've been on Murkan political sensibilities if GW Bush had simply told the truth, "Hussein has redenominated his oil in euros and in cahoots with France and Germany has begun instigating other OPEC states to follow suit. Oil importing countries will be compelled to dump their dollar reserves which constitute ~$2 Trillion in low interest loans to the U.S. at this juncture. If we don't unilaterally take him down our grossly overleveraged economy will crater and we'll be phukked. In addition, oil has peaked globally, and China and India are coming online in a big way as oil consumers and growing their force projection capabilities at an alarming clip, if we don't seize strategic control of the 2nd largest proven reserves of cheap oil on the planet, we'll be phukked."

What would've happened then in our evolving, more enlightened, and more civilized culture? Why didn't truth carry the day instead of the propagandistic rhetoric of terrorism and the war on terra?

"In times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act." _George Orwell_

Language is arranged to accommodate consciousness, and Life’s needs are the grammatical structure for all that humans say.

Sentence structure is man’s nervous system taking on form in the apparent out-there; among ordinary people, words are unanalytically taken to be things that somehow exist apart from the men who mouthed them (at least in many significant instances).

In this rhetorical system, consciousness must consider itself a noun (the subject) or man could not perceive a distinction between his mental in-here and the out-there; the Equation (I + Not-I = Everything) would implode and consciousness could no longer function as a practical weapon in the struggle to survive; man would be unable to mentally discern between his self and others in an intangible sense and could thus not properly lay-the-blame where it belongs -- on others.

Subjects exist in language to express something about action – not vice versa as routine consciousness would have it – but if there is no actual subject (which from the psychological insurgent’s view there is not) then there is no one TO blame, for action itself cannot be responsible for its acts; the act of your car hitting mine is not what is at fault, but rather you were the fault – you the driver.

When you are ready to assign blame there are two choices: either them or you, (your consciousness, that is) and it has no nature for selecting itself for the distinction:

Life did not get where it is today (that is: still here) by blaming itself, and any time a man has the twin choices available, he too has no inclination to accept any blame that insists on finding a home.

Jan Cox 9/15/04