Why are US progressives so anti-socialism?

[LeninistKing]

This is just an observation, why are progressives in America so centrists and so anti-Marx. Why do the people of progressive websites like alternet.org, Commondreams.org, and other progressive sites reject a workers-control system of production in America, and i am member of some progressive alternative websites and many of their commentors even have suggested to drop the word "socialism". They also include Mao in the list of dictators.

Any comments on why US grass roots movements and progressives so centrists and so anti-socialism

.

[cb9's_unity]

Every democrats nightmare is to be heavily associated with radical socialism. The conservatives best weapon may have been using guilt by association to condemn progressives that may have a few socialist friends.

As a result liberals have always had to focus just as much on socialism and communism as they have conservatism. Historically the democrats have actually had to be tougher on 'communist' country's than the republicans have, however the democrats always retained the 'soft on communism' criticism.

[Kwisatz Haderach]

It is largely because of a lack of faith in their own strength to change society. They believe that the only way to make a difference is through the Democratic Party. And the Democratic Party is a capitalist party that receives vast amounts of money from business interests, so it is very hostile to socialism.

Since the Democratic Party is anti-socialist, progressives who want to support the Democratic Party must also make themselves anti-socialist.

[Invincible Summer]

It's not just in the US. A lot of "progressives" in Canada here are the same way. Heck, a lot of my sociology profs (who are usually characterized as Marxist or radical in some way) will spout all sorts of pro-labour, pseudo-Marxist rhetoric/analysis, then when someone comes along and actually mentions socialist/communist movements then they're all namby-pamby about them and basically end up supporting social democracy

[StalinFanboy]

Because Progressives are capitalists. They just want a nicer capitalism.

[RadioRaheem84]

This is just an observation, why are progressives in America so centrists and so anti-Marx. Why do the people of progressive websites like alternet.org, Commondreams.org, and other progressive sites reject a workers-control system of production in America, and i am member of some progressive alternative websites and many of their commentors even have suggested to drop the word "socialism". They also include Mao in the list of dictators.

Any comments on why US grass roots movements and progressives so centrists and so anti-socialism

.

Believe me, you don't want anything to do with them anyways. They're the biggest chumps of all because they look utterly toolish and foolish in front of both Marxists and Libertarians (even conservatives) for not having a real grounded position on anything. For basically not having a set of foundations at all. Instead the look ridiculously stupid to both Right Libertarians and Marxists as we both rip apart their attempts to promote friendly capitalism. They end up just looking like silly trendy wonks that believe they can change the system through the system.

Oh but they love to associate themselves with everything our comrades of the past have done in the 20th century to promote social justice. But then when the next speculative bubble grows before it bursts they love to rally on about the ingenuity of the market.

I can't write anymore about them they just really tick me off. I had to deal with these people every day at a really trendy liberal wonkish college. They're just another pro-establishment group that love to appear radical.

[heiss93]

I think that the USA is somewhat unique in that most other nations the centre-left party usually is some sort of social democratic labor party, with some roots in socialism, that usually hides capitalist politics behind socialist phrases. In the US even social democrats use capitalist phraseology. The US Democratic party has never "sold out" in that sense, they remain true to their Andrew Jackson origins.

[Vendetta]

They also include Mao in the list of dictators.

Something wrong with that?

[LeninistKing]

I gave up on Democrat and progressive people in USA, i had a bunch of friends who are progressive liberals and progressive-democrats and i had to quit hanging around with them because they are very confusing, they do hate capitalism and at the same time they hate hate socialism and violence.

According to most progressive-liberals we should only follow Dr. Martin Luther King, and Ghandi. They say that because Dr. Martin Luther King and Ghandi advocated a pacifist, diplomatic revolution, that it is an evil crime for leftists to advocate violent-revolutions like guerrilla armed rebellions or a socialist revolutionary coup de etat.

They do hate capitalism and imperialism, but they also reject the revolutionary-left. But i told them that according to Karl Marx who was an Albert Einstein and Isaac Newton of politics there can be no real change without blood, assasinations and violence.

So what side are progressive-liberals on, they hate capitalism and they hate revolutionary-socialism. so what the hell do they want? a perfect world?

.


It is largely because of a lack of faith in their own strength to change society. They believe that the only way to make a difference is through the Democratic Party. And the Democratic Party is a capitalist party that receives vast amounts of money from business interests, so it is very hostile to socialism.

Since the Democratic Party is anti-socialist, progressives who want to support the Democratic Party must also make themselves anti-socialist.

[Raúl Duke]

So what side are progressive-liberals on, they hate capitalism and they hate revolutionary-socialism. so what the hell do they want? a perfect world?

Perhaps they're useful idiots (especially when they complain about democrats and than do an about-face and vote democrats in anyway), perhaps they would prefer social democracy or greens, or maybe they're just confused/have no ground to stand on.

[LeninistKing]

Thanks a lot for your comments, and indeed, you are right, the progressive bourgeoise liberal people in America are very confused and are so centrists like Obama. I think a philosopher Nietzsche said that it is a mistake to be neutral in this world, either you are with God or with The Devil, and most progressive bourgeoise liberals in America are so neutral, so centrists.

.




Believe me, you don't want anything to do with them anyways. They're the biggest chumps of all because they look utterly toolish and foolish in front of both Marxists and Libertarians (even conservatives) for not having a real grounded position on anything. For basically not having a set of foundations at all. Instead the look ridiculously stupid to both Right Libertarians and Marxists as we both rip apart their attempts to promote friendly capitalism. They end up just looking like silly trendy wonks that believe they can change the system through the system.

Oh but they love to associate themselves with everything our comrades of the past have done in the 20th century to promote social justice. But then when the next speculative bubble grows before it bursts they love to rally on about the ingenuity of the market.

I can't write anymore about them they just really tick me off. I had to deal with these people every day at a really trendy liberal wonkish college. They're just another pro-establishment group that love to appear radical.

[ckaihatsu]

This thread has a complement in this other thread that deals more with the *economic* side of things:

The fall of the United States

http://www.revleft.com/vb/fall-united-states-t128066/index.html





the progressive bourgeoise liberal people in America are very confused and are so centrists like Obama.




They're the biggest chumps of all




we [...] rip apart their attempts to promote friendly capitalism. They end up just looking like silly trendy wonks that believe they can change the system through the system.




They're just another pro-establishment group that love to appear radical.




It is largely because of a lack of faith in their own strength to change society. They believe that the only way to make a difference is through the Democratic Party. And the Democratic Party is a capitalist party that receives vast amounts of money from business interests, so it is very hostile to socialism.

Since the Democratic Party is anti-socialist, progressives who want to support the Democratic Party must also make themselves anti-socialist.


If the Kennedy Administration defined the death of liberalism, then the Obama Administration defines the death of populism.

The revolutionary left has never had better ammunition than where things stand *right now*. None of the facts are controversial at all, anywhere on the political spectrum -- all we have to do is note that the U.S. population repudiated Bush's politics from a disgust with the War on Iraq quagmire, and that Obama beat Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary because he was the anti-war candidate while she wasn't.

Now, not even two years later, Obama has blended into the nationalist establishment perfectly, shunning the popular mandate from the electorate and fulfilling the Marxist prediction of being "Bush's third term".

*Any* former Obama supporter is guaranteed *not* to be one *now*. By staying within the constraints of the two-party system *all* Obama backers now look like Flat Earthers as our real-world perspective reveals his politics to be just as bankrupt as Cheney's or McCain's ever were.

In the economic realm the past ten years has been the U.S.' "Lost Decade", an economy addicted to Keynesian steroids -- for the military, for non-productive sectors, and now for banking -- with endless billions of public funds lined up to mete out a 1,000,000+ deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan and so that the paragons of U.S. capitalism can continue to be propped up and showcased.




The latest financial bubbles, in virtual real estate (dotcom), wars of aggression in the Middle East, telecom, energy, housing, food, and carbon credits, are all nonproductive sectors -- it's basically the capitalists' floating craps game looking for a venue to play in.


Chris




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[AmericanRed]

Most "ordinary" U.S. left-liberals/progressives simply know nothing about socialism one way or another, or associate it with inefficient bureaucratic state planning. They're not rejecting socialism per se; they just haven't been introduced to socialist thought yet.

[RadioRaheem84]

Most "ordinary" U.S. left-liberals/progressives simply know nothing about socialism one way or another, or associate it with inefficient bureaucratic state planning. They're not rejecting socialism per se; they just haven't been introduced to socialist thought yet.

This is true. But if they were the "independent free thinking" people they claim to be then they would see what we mean by Socialism. The thing is that they like the establishment as a position to effect change, they just don't like the people who head the establishment (or didn't until Obama took over). They aren't any less pro-establishment than the conservatives. They just want to be in power to make the system friendlier.

But they're smart enough to know. They just don't want to know. I find it ridiculous that they can be so idealistically blind that they cannot understand the reality of the situation. It's no wonder that when an idealistic liberal finally gets into office he ends up looking no different than the conservative predecessor.

[ckaihatsu]

But they're smart enough to know. They just don't want to know.


Exactly. Turns out they're as reality-challenged as the Republicans, but just in a different way.





I find it ridiculous that they can be so idealistically blind that they cannot understand the reality of the situation. It's no wonder that when an idealistic liberal finally gets into office he ends up looking no different than the conservative predecessor.


It *is* ridiculous, and we *always* have to be wary in dealing with or working with these types because their relationship to politics is very much like a fan's relationship to a celebrity. In both cases there's a certain amount of fantasy and wish-fulfillment at work, meaning a *personalization* of politics, which is no good for politics itself, or for the population's best interests.

And, once in a position of power -- like Obama -- their Employee-of-the-Month attitude just leads them right into being the shiniest cog in the machine. Any chance for critical reflection, much less pro-worker policies, flies right out the window.

[The Red Next Door]

it comes from years of being taught that communism equal murder and oppression, that people like Stalin and Pol Pot was actually communists.

[Os Cangaceiros]

Most progressives view themselves as pragmatists. While they may be sympathetic to calls for worker's control/liberation, they do not view that as a realistic solution to capitalism and therefore do not endorse it.

It's kind of silly to wonder why U.S. progressives don't support radical socialist policies. As someone said previously, their primary goal is to sculpt a kindler, gentler capitalism: smoothing out crisis tendencies with the state and trying to deal with wealth/class inequality as best they can whilst leaving the primary economic relations in place.

[Liberateeducate]

mccarthyism really did a number on america

[Nosotros]

This is just an observation, why are progressives in America so centrists and so anti-Marx. Why do the people of progressive websites like alternet.org, Commondreams.org, and other progressive sites reject a workers-control system of production in America, and i am member of some progressive alternative websites and many of their commentors even have suggested to drop the word "socialism". They also include Mao in the list of dictators.

Any comments on why US grass roots movements and progressives so centrists and so anti-socialism

.Because they are two faced liberal bastards, although I would agree with them that Mao was a dictator.

[RED DAVE]

So what side are progressive-liberals on, they hate capitalism and they hate revolutionary-socialism. so what the hell do they want? a perfect world?In the end, liberals hate and fear, fear more than hate, socialism more than they hate capitalism. The key political issue with liberals is, always, support for the Democratic Party. No matter what the Democrats do, and we have seen them sell out on every reactionary issue possible, including since the election of Obama., liberals will find some excuse for supporting them.

RED DAVE

[khad]

This is just an observation, why are progressives in America so centrists and so anti-Marx. Why do the people of progressive websites like alternet.org, Commondreams.org, and other progressive sites reject a workers-control system of production in America, and i am member of some progressive alternative websites and many of their commentors even have suggested to drop the word "socialism". They also include Mao in the list of dictators.

Any comments on why US grass roots movements and progressives so centrists and so anti-socialism.
The question you should be asking is why progressives shouldn't be centrist and anti-Marx. The entire "progressive" tradition of activism and protest in the United States has been, as one historian characterizes, a middle class "search for order."

Progressivism arose at the end of the nineteenth century as a consequence of the monopoly capitalism of the Gilded Age. Although there was an ideological spread among Progressives from race warriors like Theodore Roosevelt to quasi-socialists like Jane Addams, Progressives as a rule were not committed to revolutionary change. Instead, the ostensible goal of the movement was to "harmonize" the antagonistically opposed class interests in capitalist society through reform legislation. Typical hallmarks of Progressivist rhetoric are appeals to efficiency and pragmatism, and a deemphasis of partisan politics (you can see what so-called Obama "progressives" do with their appeals to bipartisan wankery). In previous generations progressives could count nativist eugenicists like Margaret Sanger in their ranks.

Anyone who calls him or herself a progressive has been playing at this century-old game of liberal capitalism.

[ckaihatsu]

they are two faced liberal bastards





The key political issue with liberals is, always, support for the Democratic Party.


I view the ideologies on the political spectrum relativistically -- while those to our immediate right are buffers (to some degree) against what's even further-right, they also happen to be the *closest* representation to us of what's to our right.


Ideologies & Operations -- Fundamentals

http://i48.tinypic.com/1zxm51g.jpg


A good example might be the ecological / global warming / climate change stuff -- sure we're all pro-left on this, relative to the natural resource stripping that corporations do for their own profits, but "internally", on the left, the progressives look almost fascistic they way they concentrate on this issue to the exclusion of explicitly class-based politics.

[LeninistKing]

You are 100% correct !! I really don't know what do the leaders of the US-socialist-revolutionary parties are wating for? Now is a good time for most USA small socialist parties to get together, to think about a plan, and to propose a United Front with an alternative to the 2 corporate traditional political parties for the 2012 elections. But without a will power, with plain theorizing and plain words the US-revolutionary left will get no where.

.



This thread has a complement in this other thread that deals more with the *economic* side of things:

The fall of the United States

http://www.revleft.com/vb/fall-united-states-t128066/index.html













If the Kennedy Administration defined the death of liberalism, then the Obama Administration defines the death of populism.

The revolutionary left has never had better ammunition than where things stand *right now*. None of the facts are controversial at all, anywhere on the political spectrum -- all we have to do is note that the U.S. population repudiated Bush's politics from a disgust with the War on Iraq quagmire, and that Obama beat Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary because he was the anti-war candidate while she wasn't.

Now, not even two years later, Obama has blended into the nationalist establishment perfectly, shunning the popular mandate from the electorate and fulfilling the Marxist prediction of being "Bush's third term".

*Any* former Obama supporter is guaranteed *not* to be one *now*. By staying within the constraints of the two-party system *all* Obama backers now look like Flat Earthers as our real-world perspective reveals his politics to be just as bankrupt as Cheney's or McCain's ever were.

In the economic realm the past ten years has been the U.S.' "Lost Decade", an economy addicted to Keynesian steroids -- for the military, for non-productive sectors, and now for banking -- with endless billions of public funds lined up to mete out a 1,000,000+ deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan and so that the paragons of U.S. capitalism can continue to be propped up and showcased.




Chris




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-- Taking jadedness far beyond the gemstone industry --

[LeninistKing]

The USA left needs to get off its butts, to quit theorizing, to quit blogging, and think about an electoral-plan right now

we won't blog ourselves out of this quagmire of endless wars, staged-terror, low-wages, poverty, 800 military bases, fascism and zionism

JEFFERSON !! imitate Lenin, Karl Marx, Trotsky, Che Guevara, Evo Morales, Jefferson, Zapata, Simon Bolivar, Hugo Chavez, Jose Marti, Zamora, Rafael Correa, Daniel Ortega, Sub-Comandante Marcos, Dr. Martin Luther King, Thomas Jefferson. Those people didn't just have knowledge but will-power. they had will

all we need is will, the will that Shopenhauer and Nietzsche wrote about

.







This thread has a complement in this other thread that deals more with the *economic* side of things:

The fall of the United States

http://www.revleft.com/vb/fall-united-states-t128066/index.html













If the Kennedy Administration defined the death of liberalism, then the Obama Administration defines the death of populism.

The revolutionary left has never had better ammunition than where things stand *right now*. None of the facts are controversial at all, anywhere on the political spectrum -- all we have to do is note that the U.S. population repudiated Bush's politics from a disgust with the War on Iraq quagmire, and that Obama beat Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary because he was the anti-war candidate while she wasn't.

Now, not even two years later, Obama has blended into the nationalist establishment perfectly, shunning the popular mandate from the electorate and fulfilling the Marxist prediction of being "Bush's third term".

*Any* former Obama supporter is guaranteed *not* to be one *now*. By staying within the constraints of the two-party system *all* Obama backers now look like Flat Earthers as our real-world perspective reveals his politics to be just as bankrupt as Cheney's or McCain's ever were.

In the economic realm the past ten years has been the U.S.' "Lost Decade", an economy addicted to Keynesian steroids -- for the military, for non-productive sectors, and now for banking -- with endless billions of public funds lined up to mete out a 1,000,000+ deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan and so that the paragons of U.S. capitalism can continue to be propped up and showcased.




Chris




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-- Taking jadedness far beyond the gemstone industry --

[ckaihatsu]

Now is a good time for most USA small socialist parties to get together, to think about a plan, and to propose a United Front with an alternative to the 2 corporate traditional political parties for the 2012 elections.


This is one regular *strategy* for political visibility and gauging an estimate of popular support, but we certainly have no interest, either objectively or strategically, to actually *participate* in the bourgeois system -- the *point* is to *overthrow* it based on class solidarity and rank-and-file activity.




I'm thinking of mass rank-and-file labor protests, citywide general strikes, the workers' seizing of their workplaces, interconnections made among worker-controlled workplaces for the continuation of production under workers' direction from their own workplaces, the takeover of major mass media channels, barricades in the streets, vehicular traffic permitted by workers' committees (for essential humane services only), and so on....





Those people didn't just have knowledge but will-power. they had will

all we need is will, the will that Shopenhauer and Nietzsche wrote about


The thing in common about the people you named is that they are all anti-colonial figures. *Those* struggles, in outlying areas of oppressed populations, *required* some rudimentary (if you will) political leadership for where they were / are.

But we need to be clear that populism -- even a kind of *revolutionary* populism with a charismatic leader -- is *not enough* to create a worldwide *proletarian* movement that's anti-imperialist and anti-capitalist. Only a rank-and-file, industrial-based worker solidarity at the workplace, all over the world, would be sufficient to bring international capitalist management to its knees.

[LeninistKing]

Thanks my friend !! you have a great education !! I also love you quote about anarchism. I mean i love anarchism (communism), i wish that people would be a lot more open minded and would be ready for a fast transition from corporate-capitalist imperialism to anarcho-communism really fast. But you know that's not the way most people are, people and societies react slow, and changes are real slow in this world.

.



Most progressives view themselves as pragmatists. While they may be sympathetic to calls for worker's control/liberation, they do not view that as a realistic solution to capitalism and therefore do not endorse it.

It's kind of silly to wonder why U.S. progressives don't support radical socialist policies. As someone said previously, their primary goal is to sculpt a kindler, gentler capitalism: smoothing out crisis tendencies with the state and trying to deal with wealth/class inequality as best they can whilst leaving the primary economic relations in place.

[LeninistKing]

Hello, you are very right !! indeed !! political changes is not a walk in the park, it is not a piece of cake. Politics, the world out there is complex, and socialism won't come by decree or by elections like you said. It requires a massive participation of workers. Workers is the heart of socialism and even though i support Rafael Correa, Evo Morales, Lula DaSilva, Fernando Lugo, Cristina Kirshner, Hugo Chavez, Tavare Vasquez, Daniel Ortega, Funes and Zelaya I understand that most of those left-leaning governments are great and a lot better than neoliberal-governments, however even though they are trying their best, if the workers themselves don't overthrow the bourgeoise apparatus of their state, don't expropiate the means of productions, and dont demand their leaders a more radical shifting toward the left, a neoliberal political party might bring those countries back to full oligarchic free markets.

.



This is one regular *strategy* for political visibility and gauging an estimate of popular support, but we certainly have no interest, either objectively or strategically, to actually *participate* in the bourgeois system -- the *point* is to *overthrow* it based on class solidarity and rank-and-file activity.







The thing in common about the people you named is that they are all anti-colonial figures. *Those* struggles, in outlying areas of oppressed populations, *required* some rudimentary (if you will) political leadership for where they were / are.

But we need to be clear that populism -- even a kind of *revolutionary* populism with a charismatic leader -- is *not enough* to create a worldwide *proletarian* movement that's anti-imperialist and anti-capitalist. Only a rank-and-file, industrial-based worker solidarity at the workplace, all over the world, would be sufficient to bring international capitalist management to its knees.

[ckaihatsu]

I thought sociology was supposed to be about critical thinking. They can think critically about identity politics and reformist issues, but nope, communism is a given. It's just "bad."

Sorry for ranting. I had to get this off of my chest. I can tell I have some anti-worker tones in it, but I'm really fed up with people who are supposed to be
"progressive," yet can't think outside of capitalism because they're too scared. "Oh no! I can't support socialism/communism! Revolution is violent! Violence is bad! Lenin/Mao/Stalin are evil!"

http://www.revleft.com/vb/blog.php?b=773


Maybe just note that class struggle, too, is a given. (There are tens of thousands of spontaneous worker uprisings in China every year.)

Also maybe dare them to put their money where their mouth is -- why is capitalism having to turn to handouts from the government in order to keep their financial institutions afloat? And since capitalism is undergoing *yet another* massive crisis right now why should we continue to put our confidence in an economic system for the world that requires handouts from public funds?

[We could just as well argue that the same wealth value -- all from past labor performed, of course -- could be *better administrated* by the workers themselves than by the current system of financiers and "free markets". It would be like relocating the overhead "in-house" instead of paying a hefty fee to "outsource" it to "professionals".]

[GPDP]

You know what I love more than being called an unrealistic utopian? Being called a pessimist and a cynic. Liberals are very prone to do this when you criticize the system and/or their darling figureheads like the Dalai Obama (to use Paul Street's phrase) from a left-wing POV. "Oh, you're just pessimistic that Obama can't change things! Why are you so cynical?" Has anyone else here experienced that?

Of course, what I like to do is turn it around on them, and say that if anything, I'm the optimist and they are the pessimists, because unlike them, I think we can do better than liberal democracy. I believe socialism can work, and they don't. Who's the cynic now, then?

[LeninistKing]

Hello, I was banned yesterday from the progressive-liberal news website http://www.commondreams.org for posting Marxist and socialist articles in the comments section. And I thought that Commondreams.org was a revolutionary pro-socialism website. But i've noticed how centrists, most progressive leaders of America are. Maybe they are scared of FBI, CIA or something.

Maybe it is fear that makes them anti-marx

.



You know what I love more than being called an unrealistic utopian? Being called a pessimist and a cynic. Liberals are very prone to do this when you criticize the system and/or their darling figureheads like the Dalai Obama (to use Paul Street's phrase) from a left-wing POV. "Oh, you're just pessimistic that Obama can't change things! Why are you so cynical?" Has anyone else here experienced that?

Of course, what I like to do is turn it around on them, and say that if anything, I'm the optimist and they are the pessimists, because unlike them, I think we can do better than liberal democracy. I believe socialism can work, and they don't. Who's the cynic now, then?

[RadioRaheem84]

You were banned from CommonDreams because of your socialist leanings? Then what is it that the represent? You see this is why I dislike liberal/progressives and why I think they're not serious about social change.

[comradshaw]

This is just an observation, why are progressives in America so centrists and so anti-Marx. Why do the people of progressive websites like alternet.org, Commondreams.org, and other progressive sites reject a workers-control system of production in America, and i am member of some progressive alternative websites and many of their commentors even have suggested to drop the word "socialism". They also include Mao in the list of dictators.

Any comments on why US grass roots movements and progressives so centrists and so anti-socialism

.

Simple answer: liberals have not yet jettisoned their capitalist-worshiping ways. Since many of them (speaking as an American here) haven't the slightest class consciousness, they loathe the idea of a self-managed economy. They also buy the notion that all the degenerate state-capitalist regimes we've seen in the past represent "socialism." Maybe they fear that after the workers have taken over the factories and shops, they won't be able to get their lattes the way they want them;).

The elephant in the room with liberals is of course the fact that many of them, if pressed, will not admit that capitalism, per se, is the problem. Plain and simple. It's a shame because many of them are well-meaning and get it right on a number of issues, but on economics, they at best are Keynesian. Call that what you want, but it ain't radical.

[ckaihatsu]

[T]hey fear that after the workers have taken over the factories and shops, they won't be able to get their lattes the way they want them.


A fate worse than death, you say...? Hmmmmmm...!


x D

[Stranger Than Paradise]

America's political climate is extremely nationalist and cold war propaganda has helped a great deal.

[LeninistKing]

http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/film/undergrads/outlines/fi312/neo_the_matrix.jpg


I think that USA is like the movie The Matrix. Most people in America escape reality every afternoon either thru TV, internet or music. if all americans at the same time quit their TVs radios and computers for a week, americans would land real hard on real-reality and there would be a revolution in this country. So the excess of entertainments and hobbies in the americans lifestyle is what disconnects them from this ugly reality of the capitalist system we all live in

.





America's political climate is extremely nationalist and cold war propaganda has helped a great deal.

[ckaihatsu]

You're back to blaming the victims again -- before, as compulsive decadent consumers and now as escapist media junkies.

You're forgetting that people *still* have to *go* to work to *make* the money so that they can have some periods of relaxation and leisure when they're *not* working.

You're *also* forgetting that, even with the corporate monopoly on the mass media, some critical stories become the prevailing politics, if only for a week or so, like about the billions for AIG executive bonuses.

If you continue to point your finger at regular people then you'll be firmly in the "progressive" / Green camp yourself.

[RadioRaheem84]

You're back to blaming the victims again -- before, as compulsive decadent consumers and now as escapist media junkies.

You're forgetting that people *still* have to *go* to work to *make* the money so that they can have some periods of relaxation and leisure when they're *not* working.

You're *also* forgetting that, even with the corporate monopoly on the mass media, some critical stories become the prevailing politics, if only for a week or so, like about the billions for AIG executive bonuses.

If you continue to point your finger at regular people then you'll be firmly in the "progressive" / Green camp yourself.


I suggest you read Noam Chomsky and Edward Herman's Propaganda model in their book Manufacturing Consent. Critical stories, while noteworthy, never reflect a true critique of the entire system. The rule of thumb is, "thus far but no further". Criticizing CEO bonuses is one thing but what about criticizing the system that got us here in the first place. Instead of doing so its blamed on "toxic assets" and frustration over executive bonuses is only due to their negligence or "greed" when in fact they were only acting as rational players in a system totally built on self interest. Their schemes were legal, so what's the fuss? Under this system they are due what they put in and they bet with a lot of money; our money. The politicians let them borrow a trillion dollars with zero interest. They tripled their money, paid back the loan and lavished themselves with bonuses. This system is legal, so the backlash is hypocritical and there to tame the public's nerves (making them think that someone's noticed).

[LeninistKing]

You are right in that people need rest and pleasures. We are not machines. So i guess you are right, in that i am being too perfectionistic about people. Like you said people work and after 8 hours of work, plust domestic-chores, like cooking, cleaning and laundry, they would feel even more exhausted and mentally-stressed so watching TV, or any hobby is a need for most workers.

So like you said, we should attack the head of the snake of the capitalist-system (The monopoly-capitalist ruling class) and not the middle and lower classes.

.



You're back to blaming the victims again -- before, as compulsive decadent consumers and now as escapist media junkies.

You're forgetting that people *still* have to *go* to work to *make* the money so that they can have some periods of relaxation and leisure when they're *not* working.

You're *also* forgetting that, even with the corporate monopoly on the mass media, some critical stories become the prevailing politics, if only for a week or so, like about the billions for AIG executive bonuses.

If you continue to point your finger at regular people then you'll be firmly in the "progressive" / Green camp yourself.