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See extracts from Chomsky's: MEDIA CONTROL for how we are so easily manipulated...

plus Pilger's impressive Invisible Government video + text

(see also, on Stuart Christie: Who's An Anarchist Then?)

CHOMSKY ON ANARCHY

(+ TRICKS ) & below 'The Great Fraud'

"I was attracted to anarchism as a young teenager, as soon as I began to think about the world beyond a pretty narrow range, and haven't seen much reason to revise those early attitudes since. I think it only makes sense to seek out and identify structures of authority, hierarchy, and domination in every aspect of life, and to challenge them; unless a justification for them can be given, they are illegitimate, and should be dismantled, to increase the scope of human freedom.

"That includes political power, ownership and management, relations among men and women, parents and children, our control over the fate of future generations (the basic moral imperative behind the environmental movement, in my view), and much else.

"Naturally, this means a challenge to the huge institutions of coercion and control: the state, the unaccountable private tyrannies that control most of the domestic and international economy, and so on. But not only these.

"That is what I have always understood to be the essence of anarchism: the conviction that the burden of proof has to be placed on authority, and that it should be dismantled if that burden cannot be met.

"Sometimes the burden can be met. If I'm taking a walk with my grandchildren and they dart out into a busy street, I will use not only authority but also physical coercion to stop them. The act should be challenged, but I think it can readily meet the challenge.

"And there are other cases; life is a complex affair, we understand very little about humans and society, and grand pronouncements are generally more a source of harm than of benefit. But the perspective is a valid one, I think, and can lead us quite a long way.

"The general intellectual culture, as you know, associates 'anarchism' with chaos, violence, bombs, disruption, and so on. So people are often surprised when I speak positively of anarchism and identify myself with leading traditions within it. All misrepresentation is a nuisance. Much of it can be traced back to structures of power that have an interest in preventing understanding, for pretty obvious reasons. But my impression is that among the general public, the basic ideas seem reasonable when the clouds are cleared away. Of course, when we turn to specific matters -- say, the nature of families, or how an economy would work in a society that is more free and just -- questions and controversy arise. But that is as it should be… "


From a newspaper article by Anthony Hubbard:

A business corporation, says philosopher Noam Chomsky, is a tyranny. "That's always been well understood," he says in his matter-of-fact way, as though he were stating the obvious. Among human institutions, he continues, it's hard to find one whose internal structure is more tyrannical. "Orders come from the top down. At the bottom you can sort of rent yourself out to it if you're lucky. At middle level you take orders from above and hand them on down below. You know what to call that in the political domain?" What Chomsky calls it is fascism.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

 

The Great Fraud

A RESPONSE TO MY ATTACK ON BUSINESS (see also from Wallace Shawn)

"Looking at the profit situation, some people WOULD charge even their mothers to make profit! But they probably won't, due to their emotional connection with that person. Same if a shopkeeper built up a relationship with a customer. The shopkeeper would then give favours and discounts, possibly freebies. What this boils down to is that humans look after people in their immediate circle, or people that directly affect their life and happiness. It's a base survival instinct that is as raw as the drive for sex. When people say they care for 'mankind' I take it with a massive pinch of salt, as the survival programme has not got that routine built into it. You superficially care for mankind but not really. Profit is fine when made from people you don't know as they have done you no favours or directly influenced your happiness. To change that is to change what it is to be human and to robotize people into a terrible autonomous state."

 

MY REPLY

How you say many people behave towards one another is certainly true. It is also true - even for me - that if I thought I could get away with nicking £1m from a bank, or from a wealthy individual for that matter, then I would. But should I be allowed to do that? Because THAT is the BIG question????

In fact to suggest that I should be allowed to get away with THAT, is far, far less than to suggest that certain individuals and their families should be allowed to get away with living permanently in opulence and ease on the work of many, many other individuals and their families who, even though they slave incessantly, never receive or benefit from more than a fraction of the wealth they create... who live in abject poverty, die relatively young - and are rarely happy. Because THAT is how things now stand. Compared with the scale of this colossal universal legalised THEFT, a bank robbery resembles a mere church raffle. (See: Cendrars's quote in CND Conference)

At some future time - assuming humankind survives the current wanton environmental destruction - people will glance back at this state of affairs with horror and amazement, as we look back at the Negro slave trade and kids going up chimneys.

What is essential is LEGISLATION as effective and stringent as it is in making it illegal for me to steal from a bank. This cannot happen while the slave-drivers are the legislators, as now. Enforceable legislation and technology are the key features that separate our society from the stone age.

Where human nature deviates from what in the broadest terms is desirable in society, that deviant quality has to be directed or curtailed, or handled in such a way as it doesn't present a menace to others. Otherwise anything near civilisation can hardly exist. Early attempt at this, I suppose, were various religous common-sense platitudes such as the Ten Commandments. Nowadays we have laws and the means to enforce them. But how can they address the REAL problems when they are made by the rich for the rich?

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Recently on the news I heard that the UK government had hatched a scheme where mothers would be encouraged to take their preschool children to a 'start' centre. These were being set-up all across the country, and would allow the mother to go to work - doubtless for some industry or business.

The scheme is to be operated and funded by local councils (already financially overstretched, and funded unfairly - basically, charging poor and rich the same).

Just pause and think for a moment what this means. Little kids, at precisely the age when they should most definitely be with their mothers, are being shuttled off to government 'battery-farms' till old enough for the formal propaganda assembly-line (operated by unwitting individuals called 'teachers'). The trend is ominous. The whole sordid mechanism to release more workers for business - at the expense of ordinary people (why should we subsidise wealthy business like this?) - and at the same time creating yet another generation of underclass, dunderhead slaves… business fodder that will lack both the initiative and drive to assess and react to their adverse conditions.

And isn't this the same for graduates being charged tuition fees? Who is going to employ them with all these skills they've coughed-up for and are going to spend years repaying? I'll tell you who: Business… that's who. You could be forgiven for expecting Business and Industry to pay for their slaves' education - but the fact is they pay for NOTHING; they say:

"Lump our costs onto the public, the government, the naïve idiots we control and exploit so easily; if we can get away with it, if our pals who represent us in government can wrangle it, then yippee - so we and our shareholders can effortlessly become ever richer and ever more powerful."

 

SEE ALSO>>